Godly Violation-Part 3

³ You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways.

As creatures of habit, we do not always think about being followed by strangers or anyone else for that matter. For instance, I hate having to stop at a bunch of stop signs in order to move on to my destination. From my house to the main street or highway, I will turn the wrong direction or take a few streets up to avoid any extra stop signs. I developed this while working as a Volunteer First Responder in my town so to save time. I learned which streets had the most stop signs and which ones had the least just for that reason. I may not be volunteering for now, but I still resist those extra stop signs. If the local town Marshall wanted to learn my ways (and most likely he already has if I know him), it would not take long for him to learn. Fortunately, I don't give the police reason to learn them.
Knowing this, I have to pay attention to my habits and which ones needs to be rid of and which ones need to be improved or practiced more often. Paying attention to my own bad habits is not especially a strong suit with me, so in order to make this a strong suit, I have to evaluate them. It will suck big time, but it must happen if I want good habits in place of bad. All change must start with the Lord and where He takes me.

Lord God, Heavenly Father,
You created me with every good that is in You, but I allowed bad habits to come into this life You gave me. I commit myself to allow You to lead me in the changes and habits to be practiced according to Your purpose. Thank You for alluding me to writing for You are using it to lead me, convict me, and guide me into Your character for me. I do not want to turn back, in Jesus' name and for His sake, Amen.

Godly Violation-Part 2

² You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar.

Have you ever felt like someone was watching you? Kind of gives you a weird feeling all over. You have seen those shows and movies where there is someone watching every move a person makes. This is unlike the "Big Brother" thing where the government or your boss watches to make sure you are not doing anything wrong, but someone watching you for their own pleasure or their own protection. Privacy in today's world is becoming a thing of the past to the point no one will be trusted even when you prove yourself trustworthy. It sucks.
Now think about God who is omnipresent. HE SEES ALL! He takes one more step in this ability: HE KNOWS OUR THOUGHTS! There is nothing we can hide from God He cannot see or know. Scary, huh!
Now for the sake of argument, let's say there is no God. Then we have to agree there is always someone watching us. Fair statement? What do they see in our actions everyday? This is how they judge who we are. Do we really think in the course of our doing wrong no one is watching? What did I say about "Big Brother" and the boss? We may get away with it for a period of time, but eventually, we get caught. But imagine if they could perceive our thoughts. Real Scary!
Now let's turn this the right way for those who believe in an omni- present God. What better person to see and know us this intimately? If we love Him because He first loved us, most of all, He created us; how much more should we love Him enough to depend on Him all we can muster that is good within us?

Lord God Creator,
You do know my every move and my every thought and I cannot thank you enough for loving me anyway. You are the only good in me through Your Holy Spirit who lives in me. I am His temple, yet I am not worthy to contain Him in this my evil heart. However, if He did not live there, how wicked would I be. I don't even want to go there! I shudder at the thought! Thank you for the creative good given me that I may use it to Your glory and pleasure, but most of all, discipline my every move and my every thought knowing You are watching. I want my attitude turned in gratitude, in Jesus' name, Amen.

Godly Violation

¹ O LORD, you have searched me and you know me.

I cannot imagine how a person feels after been searched either of their property or their person. What a violation of one's own self-esteem! Yet there will be times when the discomfort becomes a reality within all our lives.
Consider who we allow to see our very best and the worse of ourselves. The spouse or significant other, our children, our best friend, co-workers; far worse and when we are not looking, all those people we encounter outside our four walls. Our actions inside and outside our homes tells people allot about what we do not want to bring out. Admittedly, we try very hard to hide those shameful things, but unfortunately, these things reveal themselves when we are not conscious of our actions.
Let's take this further: If you are a believer in God for who He really is, Creator of our very selves, imagine what He sees and knows way before we act, especially those actions we try to hide. Then consider this! He still loves us! He sent His blameless, sinless, most powerful child, Jesus Christ to die on the cross for those very shameful actions. That makes me feel better, but it sure hate knowing I am still capable of a sin-choice which my Creator already knows about and sees.

Oh Lord, my Creator,
I can self search and take the Lord's Supper in remembrance of You all I want to, but in the everyday life, I run in and out of my days not always thinking about what I am looking like to Your presence. At least I know that when you search me, You are searching the deepest parts of me and that I can take comfort that You know me so well, none of what You find surprises You. As You deal with the very heart of me and my iniquities, make me hurt when I am about to make sin-choices so I may make that choice not to sin. Use this tactic for even those subconscious, embedded things I do not want to reveal, but reveal themselves in me. I want to be more like Your Son, Jesus. Looks like I will be hurting everyday! In Jesus' name, Amen.