A Personal Love Experience

"O God, thou art my God; early will I seek thee: my soul thirsteth for thee, my flesh longeth for thee in a dry and thirsty land , where no water is" (Psalm 63:1)

They can change the expressions in the hymnals, but whenever men and women are lost in worship they will cry out, "O God, thou art my God; early will I seek thee" (Psalm 63:1). Worship becomes a completely personal love experience between God and the worshiper. It was like that with David, with Isaiah, with Paul. It is like that with all whose desire has been to possess God. [Amen]

This is the glad truth: God is my God.

Brother or sister, until you can say God and I, you cannot say "us" with any meaning. Until you have been able to meet God in loneliness of soul, just you and God - as if there were no one else in the world - you will never know what it is to love the other persons in the world.

In Canada, those who have written of the saintly Holy Anne said, "She talks to God as if there were nobody else but God and He had no other children but her." That was not a selfish quality. She had found the value and delight of pouring her personal devotion and adoration at God's feet.

May I know today that personal love experience with You, my God. I will seek You early, for You are my God. Amen

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To Perfectly Love and Worthily Praise

"O God, my heart is fixed; I will sing and give praise, even with my glory" (Psalm 108:1)

I will refer to one of God's great souls of the past and his book, "The Cloud of Unknowing." We do not know the name of the devoted saint who more than 600 years ago wrote in his pre-Elizabethan English for the purpose, as he declares it, "that God's children might on on to be "oned" with God."

At the beginning of his book, he breathed a brief prayer of longing and devotion, and I come back to it often for the good of my own spirit.

He said, "Oh God, under whom all hearts be open, and unto whom all will speaketh, and unto whom no privy thing is hid, I beseech Thee, so for to cleanse the intent of my heart with the unspeakable gift of Thy grace, that I may perfectly love Thee and worthily praise Thee!"

I can discern no trace of theological fault or error in this prayer of devotion and desire breathed long ago by this saint of God.

"Oh God, fix my heart so that I may perfectly love Thee and worthily praise Thee!" Nothing extreme and fanatical there. The true child of God will say "Amen" to this desire within the being to perfectly love God and worthily praise Him.

Father, may I love You and praise You with the same devotion; may I be one with You. Amen

~A. W. Tozer~