The Sunday Mail
Kelvin Mutize
We have been taught how to worship and we have been taught how to praise regardless of how and when; and so we worship because we love to.
However at times, very few people are aware of the presence of God.
Pastor Bonnie Deuschle calls it the Great Connection.
In church we know how to get into the presence of God but as soon as we enter into his goodness, we do not really know what to do after that.
The following scriptures captured my attention.
“Keep thy foot when thou goest to the house of God, and be more ready to hear, than to give the sacrifice of fools: for they consider not that they do evil. Be not rash with thy mouth, and let not thine heart be hasty to utter anything before God: for God is in heaven, and thou upon earth: therefore let thy words be few. For a dream cometh through the multitude of business; and a fool’s voice is known by multitude of words”, Ecclesiastes 5:1-3
Yes, we do know how to enter into His presence; but then what do we do once we are in the presence of the Lord, what do you do? What do you say? Where do you start from?
Ecclesiastes shows us that the Presence of the Lord is about:
◆ Keeping Thy Foot:
Guard your steps as you go in, consider your ways, look at your heart, think carefully as you go into His presence. If the presence of God really hits your life, you see your life like Isaiah did. And he gasped, “Woe I’m a man of unclean lips.” Consider your ways as you get into His presence, Jesus said if you are about to offer a sacrifice and things aren’t well with your brother, leave your sacrifice and deal with your life first.
◆ Hearing:
“. . . be more ready to hear . . . ”, “. . . therefore let thy words be few . . . ”.
In his place it is all about Him showing and telling us, the presence is what we came to see and touch, and we should stick to that. Some people are not good at hearing because they talk too much and if we are going to see and hear from the Lord, we should be ready to hear. We need to learn the attitude, make it a culture and endeavour to be better listeners. That way we will be able to listen and hear from the Lord.
◆ Speaking Less:
“Don’t be hasty”, “let thy words be few”. The Lord here is showing us that in His presence it is key to know which words to say. Moses said, “I stutter” and Isaiah said, “Here I am, send me.” Samuel said “Here I am Lord.” What will you say and what have you said in his presence before? In God’s presence we have to know the words we speak. We have to learn to withhold words and be careful with words.
◆ Words of the Heart
The heart speaks, the heart has words and even though our minds speak before our hearts relate, God is teaching us to learn a lifestyle where our hearts and minds speak the same language and we mean what we say. Jesus said they honour me with their lips but their hearts are far from me, God wants our hearts and minds to be in sync.
The presence of God is more than just an idea, it’s a reality and it’s a lifestyle that we have to cultivate in our own space before we endeavour to step into His presence. May we learn to hear, may we consider our ways, may we speak less and know the God we serve above all. Worship Him in the beauty of His Holiness.
◆ Kelvin Mutize is a speaker and musician whose heart is for building and equipping worshippers to create a lifestyle of worship based on the word of God.
