The Importance of Drawing Near - December 17
First15 Devotional
First15
4.9 • 2.3K Ratings
🗓️ 17 December 2018
⏱️ 9 minutes
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Summary
The Christmas season is a powerful and unique time of year to remember that Jesus came to make a way for us to be near God. In his life, death, and resurrection, Jesus built a bridge between us and God allowing us to have continual, unhindered communion with our Creator. But God can’t force us into nearness with him. Even as believers filled with the Holy Spirit, we can choose to live as if God is still far off. So this Christmas season, may we choose to open our hearts to the living God that we might experience fullness of joy in his loving presence.
Our Scripture for today comes from James 4:8, and today's worship is Draw Near by Bethel Music featuring Jeremy Riddle.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The Christmas season is a powerful and unique time of year to remember that Jesus came to make a way for us to be near God. In his life, death, and resurrection, Jesus |
| 0:16.3 | built a bridge between us and God, allowing us to have continual, unhindered |
| 0:21.4 | communion with our Creator. But God can't force us into nearness with Him. |
| 0:27.0 | Even as believers filled with the Holy Spirit, we can choose to live as if God is still far off. |
| 0:34.0 | So this Christmas season, may we choose to open our hearts to the living God |
| 0:39.0 | that we might experience fullness of joy in his loving presence. |
| 0:43.0 | Welcome to the First of Teen Podcast. Our verse of today comes from James 4, verse |
| 0:55.0 | 8. Scripture says, |
| 1:02.0 | draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. |
| 1:05.0 | James 4A contains a powerful promise of God, drawn near to God and he will draw near to you. For a while I thought |
| 1:18.1 | this verse seems backwards. Doesn't God do the drawing? Isn't God the one who constantly pursues us? |
| 1:26.0 | But after diving deeper into the meaning of James 48, |
| 1:31.0 | I discovered an important truth that's foundational to living in communion with God. |
| 1:37.4 | The door of God's heart is always open to us. His love is always for us. His presence is always available. The |
| 1:49.7 | father turned away from Jesus as our sins rested squarely on his shoulders, |
| 1:55.0 | ensuring he would never have to turn away from us. |
| 2:01.0 | To draw near to God is to simply open our hearts to what was always available. |
| 2:08.0 | It's not that God ever withholds his presence from us, |
| 2:12.0 | it's that he never forces us to abide in him. |
| 2:17.0 | If we want to go our own way, he willingly and patiently waits for us. |
| 2:26.7 | In the moment that we turn our hearts back to him, he is there to fill us with a revelation of his loving nearness and unwavering devotion. In his book, The Pursuit of God, A.W. Tozer describes two |
| 2:38.1 | veils. The first veil was the veil between the Holy of Holies and the world that was torn at the death of Jesus, |
... |
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