" One thing I have desired of the Lord, That will I seek: That I may dwell in the house of the Lord All the days of my life, To behold the beauty of the Lord, And to inquire in His temple… When You said: Seek My face, My heart said to You: Your face, Lord, I will seek " (Psalms 27 : 4 – 8).
Only one thing.. David asked the Lord he desired it, that he dwells in the house of the Lord all the days of his life, to see the Lord face to face, to behold His beauty.. seeking His face only..
So did Asaph who said: " Whom have I in heaven but You? And there is none upon earth that I desire besides You " (Psalms 73 : 25).
They both new the meaning of God’s presence in their lives, they knew the meaning of seeking God’s face.
All agrees that the church around the world is facing an aggressive war, and will face more aggressive ones, and the Lord had already told us about this. The people of God around the world, has taken big missions, to take the people out of the land of slavery and darkness, transferring them from the authority of darkness to the kingdom of light.. and this mission will surely face the most violent aggressive war and resistance from the enemy and his kingdom..
When God appointed Moses to take out the people from Egypt, the land of slavery, to the Promised Land, Moses said to Him: " See, You say to me: Bring up this people. But You have not let me know whom You will send with me. Yet You have said: I know you by name, and you have also found grace in My sight. Now therefore, I pray, if I have found grace in Your sight, show me now Your way, that I may know You and that I may find grace in Your sight. And consider that this nation is Your people. And He said: My Presence (Face) will go with you, and I will give you rest. Then he said to Him: If Your Presence (Face) does not go with us, do not bring us up from here. For how then will it be known that Your people and I have found grace in Your sight, except You go with us? So we shall be separate, Your people and I, from all the people who are upon the face of the earth. So the Lord said to Moses: I will also do this thing that you have spoken; for you have found grace in My sight, and I know you by name. And he said: Please, show me Your glory… But He said: You cannot see My face; for no man shall see Me, and live " (Exodus 33 : 12 – 20).
Moses insisted.. that if God’s face will not go with him and the people, he will not move.. He knew the meaning of having God’s face, presence and glory with the people, by this everyone will know that they found grace in God’s sight.. a people chosen by God from all other people.
The goal of this letter today is to seek God’s face once again, but.. in a way we never did before, for many reasons and we will mention the most important ones:
First reason: to behold His beauty, to enjoy an intimate fellowship with Him, and to make the Lord number one in our life, even before the spiritual ministry, before winning the lost, before doing the tasks the Lord asks us to do, even if we are going to do all these things God is willing.
many times the ministry pulls us away from God – not to mention other things – so we sink in it and we loose our first love and our intimate fellowship with the Lord, and this hurts His loving heart, and makes us loose His presence in our lives and the sweetness of the fellowship with Him, and after a while we discover that the Lord’s presence in our life has gone, it disappeared, the ministry has become an idol in our life, it took the first place instead of the Lord.. let us read this passage for more understanding:
" Now it happened as they went that He entered a certain village; and a certain woman named Martha welcomed Him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who also sat at Jesus’ feet and heard His word. But Martha was distracted with much serving, and she approached Him and said: Lord, do You not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Therefore tell her to help me. And Jesus answered and said to her: Martha, Martha, you are worried and troubled about many things. But one thing is needed, and Mary has chosen that good part, which will not be taken away from her " (Luke 10 : 38 – 42).
She was serving the Lord and taking care of Him as He entered her house, and this is very important, but she got furious when she saw her sister not helping her in the service, and her anger made her say to the Lord:
do You not care that my sister has left me to serve alone?
But the Lord’s answer was: Martha, Martha, you are worried and troubled about many things. But one thing is needed, and Mary has chosen that good part, which will not be taken away from her.
The ministry can hide many things under it that don’t have a 100% clean purpose
If Martha was serving the Lord out of pure love to His person, I don’t think she would have said these words.
How hard it is to serve the Lord and do all what we are doing just out of love for Him.. that’s why we see most of us wanting to serve Him as we want to not as the Lord wants us to, that’s why we see our ministry turning into an idol in our life, and the Lord’s presence and seeking His face and the desire of David to dwell in the Lord’s house all the days of his life, and the desire of Asaph not to have anything else but God, will disappear from our life, or at least they became secondary !!!
A very thin line stands between serving the Lord and seeking His face for who he is only, and between serving Him for many other reasons, and you can’t discern this line without the Holy Spirit, without meeting God face to face, and that’s what I am calling you to do today.
Second reason: to die !!!
God said to Moses: you can’t see my face , because no man see Me and live.
Say to the Lord: I want to see You face to face to die..
When we look in God’s eyes, all that which is carnal in us will die.. all unclean doubtful purposes in us will die..
When Isaiah the prophet saw the Lord he said:
" Woe is me, for I am undone! Because I am a man of unclean lips… For my eyes have seen the King, The Lord of hosts " (Isaiah 6 : 5).
No matter how faithful you are to the Lord, no matter how meticulous you are in your behavior, you will not reveal your buried sins and problems and motives, until you see God’s face as you should, only then the unclean motives in you will die, and with it everything that is carnal..
There is more, when you see God’s face you will change to become the person God wants you to be and that’s what happened with Jacob:
When Jacob fled from Esau his brother, and went to Haran, he stayed at “Bethel” which means the house of God, and there he saw a dream: the heaven is open, and a ladder that reaches to heaven, and the angels of God going up and down on it, but when he woke up he went in his way and his name remained Jacob which means the one who follows, who counts on his feet and wicked plans to get the blessing.
But while coming back from Haran, the situation was different in “Peniel” which means “ God’s face”.
Jacob met with God face to face, he struggled with Him till dawn, and he refused to let Him go until He blesses Him, so the Lord hit him at his side and broke it, and with it every dependence on his own power games and tricks was also broken, everything that is fleshly in him melted away, only then he stood up and walked in a new way, for God said to him: you shall not be called Jacob anymore.. but Israel.. and here we don’t mean the nation of Israel.. but the word means: “the one who struggled with God and won – or a prince with God”.
( Genesis 32: 24 – 30)
Beloveds: we might come a lot to God’s house and see visions and miracles, and have many gifts, but our life might remain the same, like with Jacob in God’s house, we need to see God face to face, only then we will change..
Let’s say to God: we don’t want to be ordinary Christians who just come to Your house, and experience supernatural things but remains the same, we want to meet with You face to face to be changed by your glory, we don’t want to have the knowledge and understanding of the angels, we want You to take us to a very deep places, where You change our names like You did with Jacob.
We don’t want You to send angels with us in our journey, ministry and confrontation with the devil, we seek your face, and if your face will not be with us we promise you we won’t move, because your word says:
" Lord, by Your favor You have made my mountain stand strong; You hid Your face, and I was troubled " (Psalms 30 : 7).
And we know that we won’t change if we don’t see you face to face:
" But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord " (2 Corinthians 3 : 18).
Beloveds: the Old Testament people didn’t have the privilege of seeing God face to face, that’s why the Lord Jesus said:
" But blessed are your eyes for they see, and your ears for they hear; for assuredly, I say to you that many prophets and righteous men desired to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it " (Matthew 13 : 16 – 17).
They had a big desire to see God face to face.. but they didn’t..
And today the opposite is happening with us, because of the blood of Jesus the veil was cut in two and the smallest one in the kingdom of heaven have access to enter and see God face to face.. but we don’t have their big desire.. Are we going to stay like this?
Philip knew what was the meaning of seeing God face to face in the Old Testament, that’s why he said to the Lord: show us the Father.. and the Lord answered him saying:
" Have I been with you so long, and yet you have not known Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; so how can you say: Show us the Father ". (John 14 : 9).
Jesus is with us all our life through the Holy Spirit, and when we see Him we see the Father face to face.. He even promised us more:
" If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our home with him " (John 14 : 23).
If we desired His presence, and His face, and the sitting at His feet like Mary did, He will come with the Father and make their home with us.. How great are these words beloveds.. the home of the Father and the Son are with us all the time !!!
Third reason: God’s presence and glory terrify the enemies and make them flee from us.
" I will send My terror before you, I will cause confusion among all the people to whom you come, and will make all your enemies turn their backs to you ". (Exodus 23 : 27).
Like we said before, we are facing cruel wars and we will face more others with the enemy, we need God’s presence, we need to seek His face to walk with us, we need Him to send His terror and confuse all those we oppose and make them flee, so we can possess the new lands, we bound the enemy and enter his house and deliver the captives and steal the wealth..
Let us seek God’s face like Bartimaeus the blind:
" And when he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to cry out and say: Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me! Then many warned him to be quiet; but he cried out all the more: Son of David, have mercy on me! So Jesus stood still and commanded him to be called… " (Mark 10 : 47 – 49).
And the Lord opened his eyes..
The great privilege Bartimaeus had is:
The first thing he saw was the Lord’s face.
One man of God says, he was surprised with Bartimaeus’ way of insistence and cry to get a miracle from the Lord, and he asked himself why this insistence as if it was his last chance? For as long as the Lord exists it was possible for him to see Him another day, but when he read the word he understood and he found out that this was the last miracle the Lord made !!!
Why this speech?
When it is your last chance to get a solution to a dangerous hard problem you have, then you will ask for it like Bartimaeus did.. so I encourage you today, to seek God’s face and presence in your life, as if it was your last chance, so your request would be real, serious and impressive.
Let’s pray together:
Lord we’ve lost our first love, we’ve let many things and many ministries take us from your person, we worry about many things while one thing is needed: to see your face, to delight in your beauty, to know that you created us for a fellowship with you, we’ve lost our intimacy with you.. so draw us after you anew so we run. Lord we are walking on a hard way, and we don’t know what is waiting for us from cruel encounters in the coming days, except what all your men around the world are feeling, and that is that we will face cruel wars, that’s why we are standing before you here today, saying to you: we will not step one step until we are sure of your radiant presence and great glory in our life, and that your face is walking with us, and your terror is with us, to terrify our enemies and make them flee from us. If we find favor in your eyes, let your face and glory walk before us, we want to see your face, you spoke with Moses face to face like a man speaks to his friend, you didn’t talk to him with mysteries, but from a friend to another, face to face, that’s what we want today. We want to seek your face like Bartimaeus did, we want to see your glory to die on every unclean motive, and to make everything fleshly in us die, we want you and the Father to come and make your home with us.. without your face and presence we will remain the same, we will not change no matter how many miracles and gifts or others we’ve seen..
And at the end we say with David and Asaph:
“One thing we desire and we seek, that we may dwell in your house all the days of our lives, to behold your beauty.. and there is nothing upon earth that we desire besides you”.
