Ecclesiates part1

If your looking for an upbeat, feel good message do not continue on...

The trip home feels much more long and arduous than the trip to Brisbane. Everything is tiring and joy though present is often fleeting. Maybe its just winter getting me down. I thank the Lord for all the joy is from him, all goodness and mercy from God alone. I often think about but never really consider actually doing it, taking the easy way home, whether by car, plane or train but the Lord has work for me. Sometimes I wonder why he uses my hands, my mouth and my feet when in the depths of my mind lies the filth of mankind, perhaps not seen from the outside but weighing me down inside. It is not the fact I sin but that I choose sin over him time and time again. I would wish for God to strike either my evil inner man or even me as a whole dead, then my torment would end. Surely it is easier for a man to give in to his sinful nature, of course ignoring future consequences.

I seek the Lord out, but where is he to be found? In the bland and dry prayer and reading of the word? I think not. But how do you transform something the has become religion back into the relationship it was always intended to be? How do we truely approach the throne of grace with confidence? Stuff religion in whatever form it might take, church attendance every Sunday, being 'saved' more times than you have digits, speaking in tongues to prove your baptism in the Holy Spirit, being a public philanthropist but a private scrooge, publically acting righteous but privately hiding your sin or engaging in the politics of the church. What would the Lord rather? For you to truly seek him out or to attend a church service? Religion is safe, secure and is how you can control God, put him in his box, a relationship with him is unstable, ever fluxing, dangerous yet alive. I want to feel God not feel church, to know him, not know about him.

I have seen the Lord do marvellous things in the last 2 months. One of the many things occured as I was leaving Brisbane. I became very ill in a matter of hours with nausea and vomitting, splitting headache, general severe muscle aches and a fever. Some people from a church took me to the doctor and gave me a place to crash where I got progressively worse throughout the day. It came to a point where all I could do was go to sleep. I managed to send a text message to 8 WA people asking them to pray for me and 2 hour later I woke up with all gone except a mild headache. Praise the Lord oh my soul! I evermore realise the reality of having conversations with God, sometimes with him entrusting you with even realities of that which you could not possibly know in the natural. Every Christian has the potential to converse with God through the in-dwelling of the Holy Spirit. Why neglect this gift from God? God's proveidence has increased 100 fold as I have now stepped out in faith to rely on him for all my needs. Our God is truely an awesome God...understatement of all time.

Please keep me in prayer,I feel the prayer waning as I have been gone longer. The greatest support you can give me is your prayer, and that I truly need. May God's plan come to pass, may he be with us all.
Nathan

Literature of a kind

Sin
My heart is heavy as with weight of stone
My mind knows he's here I feel so alone
This all because the weight of sin
Discard the weight and let him in
Yet why do I return to wrong
When pleasure it lacks and it grieves the one
O Lord strike dead all evil in me
And let me rest safely on your knee

Nathan

Deuteronomy 4:29
But if from there you seek the LORD your God, you will find him if you look for him with all your heart and with all your soul.