Sometimes we are tempted to view God as distant; uninterested, perhaps, in human affairs. Does God care about my life and works? But the Bible displays a God who treasures intrusion–who deeply cares about our affairs and the state of our godliness.
“For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him.” (Phil. 2:13)
God could never be a deist. He is too involved to let his human project go. As Peter Leithart observes: “God doesn’t let us be the way we would like to be.”
We should pray that God would send someone to our lives today that will intrude in our stubbornness and selfishness; someone who will be used as an instrument of God to change our comfort with complacency. We should pray that God uses our spouse or even our own children to show us a better way–the way of death. God’s instruments of intrusion are all around us. Will we listen?
Lent reminds us that God does not want us to get away with sin, but he intrudes through people and means to ensure that his saints live Coram Deo, before his face. At the cross, Jesus intruded in the world’s status quo; he gave himself so that death would no longer have the last word. Blessed be the Lord’s intrusion. In these remaining thirty-two days, may our hearts desire the intrusion of God conforming us to the image of his Son.
Prayer: O blessed Lord, we thank you for comforting us in our grief and causing us discomfort in our sin. Continue to rule our hearts and interfere in the ways of our flesh through Christ our Lord, amen.
Hymn of the Day: Lord, Keep Us Steadfast in Thy Word (Martin Luther)
