Day 14: Steadfastness

A continual attending to the presence of God

Jesus is our exemplar of godliness. Hebrews 1.3 speaks of Jesus as “the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of His nature…” Godliness then, as Jesus showed us, is the reflection of the nature and glory of God in our lives. How did Jesus reflect the nature and glory of God? He did so through a continual attendance to the presence and will of the Father. We are called to do the same, to live in a perpetual response to an omnipresent Father. As daunting a task as this may seem, we must be reminded that Jesus manifested godliness as a man empowered by the Holy Spirit (Isaiah 42.1-7, Acts 2.22-23). Even better, Jesus promised us the ability to do as He did, even more, through the power of the Holy Spirit and His divine agency at the right hand of the Father (John 14.11-21).

• Read 2 Peter 1.5-8
• In what areas of your life is God inviting you into a deeper awareness of His presence?

God truly has become more present to me in my life these past few days. It has become clear to me, though, that God is not as present as He should be in my marriage. Danny and I have always been good friends and parents but there are times when we fill like little more than roommates. It seems like the spiritual connection that seemed to bring us together has disappeared over the years with the added responsibilities of adulthood. We are rarely “godly” with one another. Even if we’re not arguing or stressing about our commitments, we are just passing each other during the day without real connection. When we were dating, we actual sat down each evening and did devotions together. We both promised that we would continue that and that when we had children, we would do family devotions too. This hasn’t happened consistently and truthfully we don’t even have the energy to initiate it. I think the reason might be because we have not been attending to the presence of God.

• How is God inviting you to practice a deeper attendance to His presence within your community?

We truly need to make an effort to attend to the Holy Spirit in our marriage. It seems like we are so busy waiting on the Holy Spirit to fill and guide us that we forget to make time to entertain that Spirit. In our lives, our day to day schedule is about to change dramatically because the kids are heading back to playschool, where I’ll be working two days a week and I will have a class at seminary that meets weekly. Sammi will continue her dance class and we will all continue to be active in our church. As this schedule changes, I hope to be able to look at the calendar schedule time with my husband for attending to the presence of God as often as possible.