Taking Our Emotions to God

Hey everyone! I am excited to finally be able to write to you again. I have had alot of pain in the joints of my hands this past week and it was too difficult to type. Please continue to pray for my health.God continues to remain faithful to me and my family. Today, God has placed the following verse on my heart and I wanted to share it with you: "The Lord says: These people come near me with their mouth and honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me." Isaiah 29:13 My goal in my life now is to find out how to be as close to God as I possibly can. I want to find this out for myself and to be able tell other people also. I believe that one of the main ways to accomplish that closeness is to use our Bible. I feel like that is one reason we have God's word. We can actually look at people in the Bible and know what 'to do' or what 'not to do' based on their lives. Years ago, when God called me to begin Filling the Gap ministry, He led me to "investigate" the lives of two people who had phenomenal (that is the best word to describe) relationships with God: David and Abraham. As I began to study David, I noticed many things. I saw how he failed God with an affair, plotting of murder, etc. But the Bible describes David as a 'man after God's on heart'. I wondered, "what does this mean and how can we actually use this to draw closer to God?" I believe that David's quest in life was to make His heart mirror God's. I also believe that over time, he did just that. How? He was honest with God about what was IN his heart and David did this by taking God his emotions. I believe that God is telling us in Isaiah that we pray to him and maybe we say the right words but 'our hearts' (our emotions) say something totally different. I have thought at times, "God knows my heart, so why tell Him how I feel?" It is true that God is all-knowing. But the important part is for me to know what is wrong in my heart. By wrong, I mean incomplete; not content. Psalm 78: 70-72 discusses how and why God chose David to be a leader of people. Verse 72 says, "And David shepherded them with integrity of heart; with skillful hands he led them." By definition, integrity means: a state of being complete; honest. God desires us to possess a heart that is complete. He wants to be wanted and needed in our lives. He wants to be depended on. That's why He gives us free-will. We lie about our emotions to so many people. Why do we lie to God? The one person who can actually do something about the way we feel. I believe the real reason is that we are not completely aware of our emotions that are hidden so deeply. Perhaps they are became hidden because of events in our past or even present circumstances. Nevertheless, God asks us to bring Him our emotions so that He can give us peace of mind and freedom from emotional strongholds. For me, this was a treasure to find. It gives me something else to work on to bring me closer to the God I love. Love, Corrie My prayer today: Lord, how thankful I am for David. Thank you for teaching me that you want me to tell you everything I feel. You want to be included in every aspect of my life. Help me to remember to tell you my emotions and seek your face in dealing with them...