The LORD hasn’t lost his powerful strength; he can still hear and answer prayers. Your sins are the roadblock between you and your God. That’s why he doesn’t answer your prayers or let you see his face.    Isaiah 59:1-2 (CEV)
In this section of the book of Isaiah I am taught some good lessons about how I can live a ‘God life’. In Chapter 58 God teaches me about repentance and His ideas about ‘true fasting’ that manifests itself in my compassion and love for others and not just spiritual exercises. I could be led to do these ‘exercises’ in order that God would hear my prayers – more clearly. In Chapter 59 God says that it is not ‘fasting’ that will bring my prayers to Him like a hearing aid. It is the revelation of and repentance for my sins!
Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Could oppression, or anguish, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? Even as it is written, “For your sake we are killed all day long. We were accounted as sheep for the slaughter.†– No, in all these things, we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 8:35-39 (WEB)
Who can separate me from the love of Jesus? Only one person – me. Not satan or any of his little demons can keep me from an intimate relationship with God unless I give them permission. God is really trying to get me to see how my own flesh pulls me off the very path that I desire to be on. I am the child of The King. He created all things. The Creator has the ultimate power over all that He has created! But He gave me choice. He gave me the choice of obedience. He gave me the choice of His way or my way. He loves me so much that He desires that I make the decision of Him over all else – because I love Him. Paul says that not the death of sin or the world’s temptations or any ‘power’ can keep me from the ‘peace that passes understanding’ (Philippians 4:7) if I choose God first.
So – it is a good thing for me to come before the Lord every day and lay the day before Him and say, “Father, please forgive my sins because of Jesus’ perfect sacrifice.†Listing the sins as the Holy Spirit brings them to my mind helps me to acknowledge them, ask for forgiveness, learn from it, and move on – clean and forgiven! I remember that Paul said in Romans 8:28 that God works all things for good. The blockage that my sin creates is easily obliterated with Jesus’ blood and I am put on the potter’s wheel to be molded once again into the tool that God can use.
I had a rough day yesterday. But it was a great day in my relationship with God. He loved me enough to discipline me and break sin in my life. At the end of the day, I was exhausted but felt so loved and lighter in my spirit. My spirit was jumping up and down for joy even if my body was done!
Yahweh, your God, is in the midst of you, a mighty one who will save. He will rejoice over you with joy. He will calm you in his love. He will rejoice over you with singing.      Zephaniah 3:17 (WEB)
