Search me O God, and know my heart; test me and know my thoughts. Point out anything in me that offends you, and lead me along the path of everlasting life +Psalm 139:24-24

These verses challenge me. Basically, David is asking the Lord to bring a holy microscope to his heart. This Christian life can hurt at times. We take our heart out and set it on a platter to say, ?Here Lord, do whatever you want with this.? But HOLD UP A SECOND. Isn?t it so easy to keep our eyes on our sacrifice? The focus shifts from God to us, as if we are losing so very much. We start to feel sorry for ourselves because we have to give so much to God. After all, we?re trying to give Him our time, our finances, and our very life. I am so selfish before the Lord with so much of who I am. I?ll say, ?Lord, you can have all of me.? But, then I doubt that He can use me. I doubt that He can speak through me. Almost insisting that I am unusable. Instantly, my prayer changes from ?Lord use me? to ?Lord I?m obviously a lost cause so please use someone else.? Sure, I don?t say it in that way. But, have you reached that point of despair before? Does your walk with God seem one sided? You lift up prayers, you read scriptures here and there that encourage you, but the intimacy isn?t there. I encourage you to take a chance and turn the tables a little. take a second from this little devo and think of what you?ve lost in serving the Lord. What are these great treasures you had before you knew Christ? I can?t think of anything that I?ve given up to Christ that I would ask Him to return. Have we given up anything worth living for? NO! so who is the real giver in the relationship with God? ??And in human form, He (Jesus) obediently humbled himself even further by dying a criminal's death on a cross.? [Philippians 2:8] we don?t serve a King who inhabits a far off world, or lives to torment every man alive. A friend of mine told me that Christianity is the only religion which claims to have a God who took the form of His people and actually went down to their level to save humanity from their wortlessness. God almighty left Heaven to come here. Yes, he came to this world that we feel so weighed down by. He took every ounce of sin and filth upon Himself at one time and did it for every one of us. (Hebrews 7:27) so, we?ve heard this. We know what Christ did. But, will we draw the line between simply knowing what Christ has done and actually living in the light of who He is? How will this mindset change our relationships? What about the way we think? Ultimately, will it change the way we approach God?s throne? This omnipotent God doesn?t need you at all. He could function forever without your existence. But, He chose to make you, and furthermore, He chose to die so that you can be madly in love with Him. A. W. Tozer said this; ?God formed us for His pleasure, and so formed us, that we as well as He, can, in divine communion, enjoy the sweet and mysterious mingling of kindred personalities. He meant us to see Him and live with Him and draw our life from His smile.? Do you crave His smile? Take the first step and serving Him and put yourself in His hands. You can?t ever spend all the time in the Word that you need to. You won?t ever say everything right or display the perfect Christian life. what need do we have for the Lord if we can simply take what He?s taught us and live without ever seeking His face? These amazing dreams we have for the Lord start with coming to Him as the child that we are. He simply wants us to pray the prayer that David screamed within His heart ?search me O God??

Check out these lyrics from Kevin Max's Stereotype Be:

What is, what is this
This mess of my existence
All these politics of life and death and relevance
It's my existence

   Sometimes we can feel so messed up, we wonder why we're even here. KMax put it into words pretty well. I get upset a lot about how we as humans tend to view things as "politics" instead of the joy of life. Ever feel like people say you have to be this way or think this way? As a younger teen I attended a church that sometimes made me feel that way. You have to dress a certain way, you have to say the right words to the right people, that sort of thing. That really gets depressing after a while. It's like you can't be who you are, like you have to be someone else. Now ask yourself, "Does anyone really want to come to a church that acts that way?" Do you? Probably not. If that's how you worship, that's cool I guess, but for the most part, people want to come to church to worship with fellow Christians, not speculate on the latest error in a certain Christan fad. I was challenged greatly by a message I heard from a pastor in Ohio. He said that too many of us as Christians are "watchers" and not "worshippers". What does that mean? Well, it seems that a lot of us tend to watch others and make some kind of judgement on whether or not another person is really worshipping, or just putting on a show. Ya know what? That's none of your business. The whole time we are watching people, we miss the worship! Now who's in worse shape, the people that you don't know if they are really worshipping the "right" way, or the person that misses experiencing the worship? Being my own worst critic, and probably everyone else's, I tend to think critcally of others sometimes. That message the pastor shared hit me in the heart. No wonder nobody wants to go to church! All we do is sit there and judge them. And you know what? If you're reading this and think that you don't judge people, maybe you should take another look inside yourself. Why are we so reluctant to admit our own faults? Why is it always someone else's fault? Because we are prideful and don't let God take over EVERY part of our being. No wonder we feel so messed up sometimes. How about letting God take control and woship God the way HE wants us to, instead of trying to go by some textbook rule that doesn't exist? So how bout it? Wanna be a watcher or a worshipper?