♬ “O Lord, Thou art my God; I will exalt Thee,
I will praise Thy Name; for Thou hast done wonderful things;
Thy counsels of old are faithfulness and truth” ♬ (Isaiah 25:1 KJV).
Some years ago in a prayer meeting, someone started singing the fast-tempo chorus taken from the verse cited above. Heaven fell down! We sang that same chorus for over an hour! It was like I could see the Father’s smile beaming down and could hear Him saying with delight, “Say it one more time! I love to hear you say that I am your God!”
Ever since that prayer meeting, this song penned by the hand of Isaiah has been a special song for my prayer-closet times (which is oftentimes out in the forest). “O Lord, You are my God.”
“O God, thou art my God; early will I seek thee: my soul thirsteth for thee, my flesh longeth for thee in a dry and thirsty land, where no water is.”
Psalm 63:1
Jacob had some real “hang-ups” in his life. His father was Isaac who saw God’s provision on an altar at the expense of first seeing his father’s hand with a knife! Jacob was also the grandson of Abraham, the Father of Faith. Talk about family peer pressure! Yet Jacob was not willing to say the God of Abraham and Isaac was “his God.” Listen to how he spoke to God:
Then Jacob made a vow, saying, “If God will be with me, and keep me in this way that I am going, and give me bread to eat and clothing to put on, so that I come back to my father’s house in peace, then the Lord shall be my God.”
Genesis 28:20-21 NKJV
Sometimes, like Jacob, we may be somewhat hesitant to declare that God is “my God” simply because we are unfamiliar with who He really is! But this indeed presents a problem because the only way we can ever “know” God is if we first surrender and enter into a covenant relationship with Him.
This dilemma seems unsolvable, right? But wait, in many ways isn’t this also true of marriage? No matter how long a couple has “known” each other before marriage, it is not until after they exchange vows and enter into the God-ordained marriage covenant that they truly get to “know” each other enough to declare: “I am my beloved’s and he is mine.”
Even after we have surrendering ourselves in abandonment to love the Lord, very often our spiritual life gets dumped into routine ruts and can quickly dry up. At other times that precious personal relationship with God gets sacrificed for the “corporate good” of God’s people. Of course, it is a noble thing to love and live for God’s people. But, at times, our prayers can be more “we’s, us’s, and our’s” rather than “I’s, me’s, and mine’s”. How necessary it is to have little “marriage vow renewal” ceremonies with the Lord, and to say “I do” to Him all afresh – and to do that frequently and spontaneously.
This morning the whole thought of the preciousness of personal ownership in our relationship with Christ was kindled anew while I read this passage:
“Unto thee, O my strength, will I sing: for God is my defense, and the God of my mercy” (Psalms 59:17 KJV, cf. 59:10).
Not only did David use the expression, “my God,” but he also took personal ownership of the mercy (read “covenant-love”) which God had shown him – “the God of my mercy.”
This same intimate relationship is seen when the phrase “my salvation” is used throughout the Bible. Now David makes a very important observation that “salvation belongeth unto the Lord” (Psalm 3:8 KJV), yet he reveals his intimate personal experience of God’s salvation by calling it “my salvation” and he does so many times throughout the Psalms (see Psalm 18:2, 46; 25:5; 27:1, 9; 38:22; 51:14; 62:1,2,6,7; 88:1; 89:26; 91:16; 118:14,21; 140:7). Moses, Isaiah, Micah, and Habakkuk also declared their personal integration with God’s salvation (see Exo 15:2; Isaiah 12:2; 46:13; 49:6; 51:5, 6; Micah 7:7; Hab 3:18).
In the New Testament, Paul is not a single step behind in the personal ownership of his relationship with Jesus Christ. As Paul teaches and preaches the doctrinal intricacies and the wonderful beauties of the Gospel, he refers to it as “my Gospel”:
“This will take place on the day when God judges people’s secrets through Jesus Christ, as my Gospel declares” (Rom 2:16 NIV).
“Now to him who is able to establish you in accordance with my Gospel, the message I proclaim about Jesus Christ, in keeping with the revelation of the mystery hidden for long ages past” (Romans 16:25 NIV).
“Remember Jesus Christ, raised from the dead, descended from David. This is my Gospel” (2 Timothy 2:8 NIV).
Paul shouldered a huge responsibility of ministry – an apostleship and a stewardship was entrusted to him. He was busy with souls. He was entrusted with the writing of many books in the New Testament. Nevertheless, he recognized the extreme importance of personal devotion. The underlying passion and pursuit that guided Paul’s life was “that I may win Christ and be found in Him…that I may know Him…that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus…I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus” (Phil 3:8-14 KJV). He sternly exhorted the Corinthians about the serious peril of allowing stuff (and even religion) to complicate our lives which causes us to be “led astray from the “simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ” (2 Cor 11:2-3 NASB).
“This is my Gospel!” “This is my salvation!” “This is my mercy!” “O Lord, you are my God!” I believe in the eyes of God, there is a preciousness in the personal ownership of our relationship with Him and all He has and wants for us. “I am my beloved’s and my Beloved is mine” (S.O.S. 6:3).
Why not take a few spontaneous moments today? Whether it be out in the forest, by the lake, in rush-hour traffic, or in the business of your job… Just close your eyes. Lift your hands. Whisper into His heart: “O God, You are my God!” Amen.
I found this verse on 2016-07-02:
“Then shall the earth yield her increase; and God, EVEN OUR OWN GOD, shall bless us” (Psalms 67:6).
