Better is One Day?!

Gary and I are reading through Psalms together...well, not together, just simutaneously for our daily readings...it helps with accountability and to be able to talk about it together. Anyway, so today is Psalm 84. Just read verses 1 & 2:

"How LOVELY is your dwelling place, O LORD of hosts!

My soul LONGS, yes FAINTS

for the courts of the LORD;

my HEART and my FLESH SING FOR JOY

to the living God."

Most of us have sung these words to the Passion song, Better is One Day. I remember how much this Psalm, and consequently, the song (since it is almost word for word), meant to me at the time it came out. God used it to burn that truth on my heart. Talk about conviction. I was single at the time and used to think about- better is one day in your courts than a thousand husbands. Yeah, that was my idol at the time. I wanted a man. Well, not just any man, a Godly, loving, worth it man. And continually God was reminding me that He is better. That is He worth more.

And today, I have that man. I have a wonderful, Godly husband. And today I can still read these words and sing that song with the same conviction, putting the most valuable thing to me on this earth on the altar. But this morning, in this season, the words of the first two verses are what stings, what we've been wrestling with, what we've been questioning in the "church" these days. 

Who can say these words and really MEAN IT?!  I mean, really. I'm all about being truthful. Brutally honest. God is truth. I want God. Thus, I have to be real. And real is this- on most days, at most times, I CANNOT say in complete, full, naked truth that my soul LONGS and FAINTS for the presence of God, that my HEART and my FLESH sing for joy to Him. Most days, I'm longing for a beer, and fainting for lack of sleep. Most days my heart and my flesh want to put someone in their place. Reality check. I need Jesus! Yes, I'm saved. I "have" Jesus. I am regenerate. I have tasted and seen, experienced His goodness, and cannot go back. The blinders have been taken off, by the grace of God, I can see. And like it says in Colossians 2- as I have  received, I must walk. TODAY, as I "do life", I still cling to the grace of God to change my heart and keep me from just being a "do gooder" and religious phony. I hate those. Don't you? I can't stand people who use God and religion as a crutch. You know what I mean. They don't really want God, they want everything else He gives. Unfortunately, many times, that means I'm not liking myself. 

So, today, pray with me that God would continue to pour out His grace and make us so in love with HIM. That His value would be so treasured in our hearts, that even if for just a moment today, we would long, faint for Him. That'd we'd so desire Him, we'd be overwhelmed with joy and just have to sing in spontaneous praise, regardless of the sound.  :)  I so want to do this life for His glory, but not with some religious, stuffy purposefulness. Yes, there's times that we have to be disciplined- which that too is a grace of God. Tools of grace. I'm not going to stop having my daily readings just cause I don't "feel" like it. But He is God. He deserves SO much more than just our religious duty. He is so WORTH our affections. Join me in asking Him to help us see Him as He is so that we'll really, really, genuinely LOVE HIM- with heart, soul, mind, and strength. The all encompassing. Funny, how we can't even obey the "greatest commandment" without Him. He's so about His glory. And that just proves how worth it He is. What an amazing God!