Continuing the idea presented in the two earlier posts on abiding, based on the words of Jesus in the Gospel of John, we focus on an Old Testament passage from the book of Psalms. Here we focus on the idea of “dwelling”, which is very closely related to “abiding”. While the Old Testament was written in Hebrew and the New Testament was written in Greek, at the time of the writing of the New Testament, there was a Greek version of the Old Testament that provided the language and context for the quotations used by the Apostle Paul and most of the other writers. This version is known commonly as the Septuagint. We find that in the Septuagint, the Greek word for “dwell” (katoikeo) is in fact different from the Greek word used for “abide” (meno), but nonetheless, their meaning is almost identical. The former (“dwell”) has the sense of “inhabiting”, while the latter (“abide”) has the sense of “remaining” or “staying”.
One of the most famous verses emphasizing the idea of “dwelling” is found in Psalm 27:4. It says
One thing I ask of the LORD,
this is what I seek:
that I may dwell in the house of the LORD
all the days of my life,
to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD
and to seek him in his temple.
This verse inspires the hearts of many. It speaks of abandoning oneself to God. That is, the Psalmist’s “one thing” that he desires above all else is to be in intimate relationship with the Lord every moment of the day. The word “dwell” means to live or reside in. King David, the author of this Psalm, yearns to stay in the house of the Lord. To what end? The verses tell us that it is so that he can admire how beautiful the Lord is, to seek God for close fellowship, and to hear His wisdom and His heart.
Notice that David says that he is asking the Lord for this privilege. In the Old Testament days, people worried about God’s holiness killing them if they got too close to God. Perhaps that is why David didn’t presume that he would have the blessing of God to draw near to Him, much less stay there continuously.
Now that Jesus has died to reconcile us to God and open the way of intimacy with Him, our situation is different. We are told to boldly draw near to God (Hebrews 10:22). But even though we are invited to draw near, and many of us do, I sense there are only a few that truly desire to dwell in His Presence, much less actually do dwell in His Presence.
What does it mean to dwell in His Presence? How do we do it? What would it look like if we were doing it? Part of the answer has already been addressed in the section of this book on abiding which focused on John 15. But clearly “dwelling” implies that our thoughts focus on God throughout each day, and that we center our life around Him.
An important point about why even New Testament believers need to ask of the Lord to be able to dwell in His Presence: it is not always clear what obstacles might be preventing us from getting close to God. We all carry baggage, and we all are riddled with deep-seated false beliefs about ourselves and about God — not bad intellectual theology, per se, but wrong beliefs at the gut level. Drawing near to God and remaining in His Presence can seem like navigating a maze. Yet God is above the maze, and can see clearly to lead us through.
Verse 5 goes on to say
For in the day of trouble
he will keep me safe in his dwelling;
he will hide me in the shelter of his tabernacle
and set me high upon a rock.
The “for” that begins this verse means that it is connected to the preceding verse, which we need to incorporate in our understanding of the present verse. The Psalmist is saying to us that it is in this place of intimacy, where we habitually dwell in the Lord’s Presence, that we are kept safe. The concepts of “dwelling” and “shelter” are very intertwined throughout the Psalms. This implies that if we want to experience the Lord’s protection, we must learn to dwell with Him.
The Lord is like a nuclear bomb shelter. When we draw close to Him, danger does not come near us. We will get more insight into this idea when we look at Psalm 91. I think we must conclude that the phrase “safe in his dwelling” means that while trials of many kinds may come our way, when we dwell in the Lord, our hearts, our souls, and the essence of who we are, are protected from the worst that life and the devil can bring against us.
The imagery used in this verse is not just that of being hidden in a shelter, but also of us being set high upon a rock. If you have a fear of heights, this might not sound like a good thing, but the idea is that if you are in a battle — and we know that believers are in a battle against the enemy of our souls — the place you want to be is above the enemy. In the days before gunpowder and rocket propellant, gravity would work against the army that was trying to fire arrows and other projectiles up to a higher position, but would assist the army shooting down on an attacking foe. Even in today’s war environment, to be high up on a rock offers protection from small arms fire, and the uphill climb for the foe increases the difficulty of their attack.
In verse 8, David shows both his enthusiasm and his resolve.
A quality penis cream that is enriched with natural, plant-based emollients can also help to preserve the skin’s self-lubricating properties, cialis order online helping to protect against injury while keeping the member looking smooth and attractive. In doing so he questions a number of accepted teachings, particularly in the area of “structural medicine” and goes on to plea for fellow professionals to dispassionately examine the accuracy cheap viagra australia and value of his findings. Products merely positioned as “pink click here for info purchase levitra online,” as a matter of getting an adequate amount of blood into the penile organ, keeping it there and then eventually letting it drain. These will simply seek to improve the power super active viagra of the internet, each and everything is possible.
My heart says of you, “Seek his face!”
Your face, LORD, I will seek.
The idea of “seeking God’s face” is that we greatly desire to really know God for who He is. Lovers look deeply into one another’s eyes, trying to perceive the other’s feelings through small changes that might appear fleetingly on the other’s face. This is what it means to seek God’s face: in the process of intimate conversation, we strive to sense what the Lord is communicating not just on the surface of what is said, but what is motivating His heart. It involves listening with our hearts as well as our heads, pondering in our hearts every revelation the Lord makes to us.
There are those who primarily seek God’s hand; that is, those who seek God just for what they can get from Him. When I was younger, I spent much more time seeking His hand than His face. It was only as I matured, and my relationship with God matured, that I shifted more into seeking His face. My time of praying for the needs of others is much shorter now, in part because I don’t feel the need to belabor the requests like I used to. As I enter into a time of deeper communion with God, I have a greater ability to trust God to handle them, and I have a greater ability to sense God’s heart on each matter. We must remember that prayers are not answered because of our many words, nor are they answered by how passionate we are able to make ourselves over them (Matthew 6:7-8).
Intercessors, in particular, need to be careful how they pray and what motivates them. Even though most intercession is for others, and ultimately for the Kingdom of God, it is easy to slip into the habit of “doing the work” of praying, and not genuinely caring for the one for whom we do the work — our precious Lord.
Verse 10 in this passage from Psalm 27 speaks not only of the faithfulness of God towards us, but in David’s confidence that the Lord will hear David’s plea for greater intimacy.
Though my father and mother forsake me,
the LORD will receive me.
The latter point is really confirmed in the final two verses of the chapter (13-14).
I am still confident of this:
I will see the goodness of the LORD
in the land of the living.
Wait for the LORD;
be strong and take heart
and wait for the LORD.
These verses point to a problem many of us experience: the Lord does not always respond to us immediately upon our seeking Him. There was no reason for David to write “I am still confident of this” if he had already obtained what he was seeking. So David had to stir his heart to faith, by reminding himself to be strong and patient and wait diligently, and reminding himself that God would indeed answer his prayer.
Why would a loving God make us wait? One answer is that waiting tests the sincerity of our heart, and gives us the opportunity to demonstrate true faith (Luke 18:1-8). Surely God knows whether we are sincere or not. The problem is that we don’t know ourselves very well, and sometimes it is necessary for us to see whether we are really sincere. It may also be that faith cannot grow unless it meets obstacles, like delayed responses.
Another problem is that there are deep pleasures of the heart that go with knowing God intimately. Some might term this “joy unspeakable”. If God let those who are only after pleasure to experience intimacy quickly, they might keep seeking God for the pleasure, and never reach intimacy with God based on their deep, faithful, and abiding love.
A third possibility for us to consider is that some of our wait is not due to God delaying, but because we have not learned how to “hear” and therefore lack the ability to experience the intimacy that comes through hearing God. Later in this book, I will teach on how to hear God.
Finally, just for completeness, I want to mention that it appears spiritual warfare — the work of the devil’s forces — can delay responses, as was the case for Daniel (Daniel 10:12-14).