God is Callling

In Genesis 35, we see that Jacob with all his household returns to Bethel, the place where the Lord appeared to him. Before they start moving though, he does some "spiritual housecleaning" ordering his people to leave any idols before they proceed with their journey.

The beautiful thing about having a relationship with the Lord is that we have a God who is willing and able to forgive us of our faults, we just need to humble ourselves, admit our mistakes, and ask for forgiveness, and we just need to do some spiritual housecleaning. And as soon as we repent with our sins, the Lord channels His blessings through our lives, some of which as we can see with Jacob's life in today's scripture reading:

1. RENEWAL - God appeared a second time to Jacob, and told him that from now on his name will become Israel. Note that his old name Jacob, sounds like the Hebrew word for deceiver. The Lord changes his name to Israel which meant "God fights" or God will fight for Him.

2. GLORY, HONOR, AND POWER - In verse 11, the Lord says to Jacob, "You will become a great nation, even many nations. Kings will be among your descendants." The Lord promises that He will bring greatness to his nation and that his descendants will be in the seats of glory, honor, and power.

3. PROVISION AND ABUNDANCE - In verse 12, the Lord promises that He will give Jacob the land that He gave his descendants.

If we repent of our sins, if we do some spiritual housecleaning, the Lord is more than willing and able to channel all these very same things in our lives.

I do not intend to lead people though into thinking that the only reason why they should repent of their sins is for the Lord to give them renewal, glory, honor, and power, and provision and abundance. Let us remember that we have a God who is perfect and who deserves perfection, and that is the very reason why we come clean when we sin and repent, that He may cleanse us from our sins.

One thing that strikes me the most though is maybe there is some area in your life that you're struggling with...there is a certain feeling of guilt on your part and you just feel bothered and uncomfortable, maybe because of a broken relationship or something that you have done. It could probably be that you dream of being in a place of prestige, or in a position of power someday, and you seem so far from that dream and it seems impossible to get there. Or simply, there are necessities in your life that you just can't find a way to make ends meet. Maybe these things haven't flown into our lives yet because we still haven't done some spiritual housecleaning and haven't repented for our sins.

Let us examine our lives and look at the areas where we need to be humble and repent on. It is not that the Lord intentionally wants to punish us and give us hardships, but sometimes, in our own stubborness, in our own numbness and insensitivity to His promptings, maybe the difficulties (could be guilt, struggles, emptiness, sickness, tragedy, etc.) in our lives is His way of reminding us that all the things that we ever ask for are things that we can only have through Him. And it starts with a relationship with Him. A relationship where we can be humble and where we repent, and He is always there to forgive.

Are there any hardships in your life right now? Better check your spiritual phones. Maybe God is calling.