Wednesday April 11, 2011

It’s an interesting concept that hits me this morning. More of a question I guess. Is it possible to seek the Lord as I jloged about yesterday and at the same time be involved in wicked things. I think about the process of growing in my Christian life and seeing positive and negative things happen almost simultaneous. God speaks to this issue in II Chronicles 7:14 and says, “If my people, who are will called by my name . . . will seek my face AND turn from their wicked ways. . .”. He seems to be saying that it is impossible to be seeking (truly, diligently, all in seeking) the face of God and being actively involved in wickedness and not turning away from it.

It’s interesting to note that the prerequisite for the healing process we so desperately want is not having a life that is free from wickedness. If that were the case, count me out (and might I add you). No, it says that we need to make a conscious choice to turn away from wickedness. How do we turn away from wickedness?

I believe the first step is to recognize what that wickedness is. There are some things that God clearly spells out for us that are wicked and wrong. This is the easy ones. The more difficult ones are those that are not spelled out in the bible, but definitely holds us back from seeking the Lord. How do we find those?

I believe that asking God to convict us of those things will start the cleansing/healing process. I had a cowboy friend who was a tobacco chewer accept Christ in Colorado when I was working on the college campus. He came in one day and wasn’t chewing. When asked why, he said that he didn’t think that Christians should be doing that. I said that until the Lord convicted him about it, he should continue to chew at which time he expressed his delight. A couple of months later, we met and he wasn’t chewing. When asked why, he said that the Lord had convicted him about his chewing and decided to stop.

God wants to speak to us in personal ways and will tell us what He wants us to change. We need to come with an open and willing heart and mind to listen to Him and allow Him to convict us of areas of wickedness that He wants us to turn from.

Once He brings conviction, it is our responsibility if we truly want His healing process to turn from those things that we have been convicted of. This journey sometimes means admitting that we have gone down a dead-end road and need to turn back.