10-11-10
“My son, if you receive my words, and treasure my commands within you, so that you incline your ear to wisdom, and apply your heart to understanding; Yes, if you cry out for discernment, and lift up your voice for understanding, and if you seek her as silver, and search for her as for hidden treasures; then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God” (Prov. 2:1-5)
“If you receive my words…” That’s a spirit of obedience. In other words, it’s the opposite of rejecting His words. You don’t receive His words because you believe them; you receive His words because you commit to agree with then in your lifestyle. If His finger is on you in an area, and if you don’t respond, you are not receiving His words for you, you are resisting it. And, prayer is no substitute for obedience, meaning you can’t live in deliberate disobedience and add more prayer time and throw in a fasting day and hope it all sorts itself out. No, you need to accept His words and then live a life obedient to them.
“Treasure His words,” means to meditate on them. We treasure the words and make them dear to us by turning the Word of God into a dialogue with God. We agree with His word, we ask for more insight and we commit to respond and ask for help.
Incline your ear to wisdom, apply your heart to understanding is to have a teachable spirit and open heart. When we are reading the Word, we cannot approach it with a bias as to its meaning. We have to apply our heart to what we read and come under the discipline of the Word, and not resist its meaning to justify what we want it to mean. I lay down my bias and what I want it to mean and accept what it does mean. I cry out for understanding and ask the Lord to give me more insight and revelation.
“Search for it as hidden treasure.” Search for it; pursue it diligently. It is not enough to “kind of” get the information. We have to search for it as hidden treasure which will take some rigorous effort to attain. It is within reach, but it is not easy to get, because the Lord only wants to give deeper things of His heart to the people who cannot live without them. He gives salvation for free, but He gives the deep things of His heart to the people who hunger and search for them.
Proverbs 25:2 says, “The glory of God is to conceal” – or hide- “a matter; the glory of a king is to search it out.” God says, “It is my glory to hide the deep things. It is a kingly spirit to come after Me. When I hide Myself, love comes to the surface and the seeker who comes after Me can’t take no for an answer.” So if you have said, “Lord, you are hiding yourself”, the Lord might say, “It is my glory to do this but it is your glory to search it out because here I am.”
If you do this you will discover the knowledge of God. Let’s not give up. Let’s not draw back based on how we feel or how well we are doing. Let’s stay committed to diligently seek after the hidden treasure of the knowledge of God.
Blessings,
Gary