Love God, love people, and be willing to let God show up.

Psalm 31 (the message)
23 Love God, all you saints;
God takes care of all who stay close to him,
But he pays back in full
those arrogant enough to go it alone.

24 Be brave. Be strong. Don't give up.
Expect God to get here soon.

Churches today skirt the fact that God is a righteously vengeful God. It isn't politically correct to tell people that if you do not serve God, ultimately it will come back around to bite you. So pastors will preach the fact that God will take care of his saints, but will brush by the fact that it says, the saints who are close to him, and skip the fact that it says he pays back in full those who are arrogant enough to leave God alone.

The questions that present themselves in this single verse is, are you loving God and staying close to him? and, In your willing ignorance are you being being arrogant, and self-centric in your worship/life-style/person?

It isn't an easy question to ask yourself, because you've gotta dig deep. You've got to get some of that dirty laundry out before God. You've got to be honest with yourself on how much you really go to church, serve people and live your life selfishly. You may say you're doing it for God but how often do you do it just because it makes you feel better about yourself, or you're worried about what other people think.

God is righteous, all-knowing, all-powerful. Perfect. He alone has the right to speak the truth, condemn us to hell, love unconditionally, forget and forgive, punish, and call each and every one of us arrogant fools.

Whom are you seeking?

The next question. While you are seeking, do you expect God to show up?

Or because you can't see, touch, taste, feel, smell God, do you only partially think he might find the time to show up if his schedule is not to busy.

I think so many times we place our mortal concepts of time and place upon God, and say since he is not here physically, I do not expect him to be present in my every day life. God is at church and I leave him there, God only helps those who help themselves (how often do you hear that one), God only comes in times of trouble (and here you can ask, why the pain, suffering and death). People think you cannot expect anything of God because he is so distant.

This is not the case, we're the ones distancing ourselves from God. Once again this is because of our own foolish arrogance.

If you would just take a second to sit down, shut up and expect God to show up, expect Him to do something, expect the creator of the universe to be there when we call (and even when we don't). Something might actually happen.

Put some practical shoes on and start walking your faith, you might be surprised what happens when you're willing to let your arrogance go. Decide you don't know anything about everything.

Love God, love people, and be willing to let God show up.