2 Timothy 1:12

BAM! Thats how this verse hit me, I tingled all over.

2Timothy 1:12 For this reason I also suffer these things; nevertheless, I am not ashamed for I know whom I have believed and am persuaded that He is able to keep what I have committed to Him until that day.


So. As I mentioned in an early post about getting to know the person of the Holy Spirit, not just about Him. When I read this verse a lot became clear for me, I realized that I knew a lot of God's promises and a lot things that I know to be true about Him based upon certain Scripture that I have read, but that still does not mean that I know Him! Punched in the face...POW!
I realized that this is what seperates Moses from the Israelites. The Israelites knew God's promise for them and lived in a continual state of being in want and cashing in their promise...a cold business transaction that God willingly in His love accepts. But Moses.... Moses saw God face to face, He knew His Presence, He glowed from it. It was from this posture and relationship that Moses could not help but ask God Almighty "Show me your glory." And that was the OT! The lesser covenant! Where the Presence resided in an object, but now...it resides in us. He wants to know us, not for anything we could do or any promise we could keep...(Abrahams faith alone made him righteous, no work, no labor...just faith), and our relationship to Him should be the same, just because His Presence is so sweet, it is where we shine with His glory that we are free to show to the world. It is His presence where Paul can say, "I know Him." Anyone can know the promises of God, but only those who go to the secret place, to the "thick darkness where God was"(Ex20:21). And so I have set off to know Him and to know His Presence and when it comes into the room like a friend, I want to be able to recognize His Presence. I even think we can go so far to say that our physical bodies were built to be able to sense it. After all His desire was to inhabit us.

Psalm 91:1
He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of His wing.

I am learning to practice the Presence, and like Moses refusing to move until it comes.
I was really encouraged, (well sort of) by some of out pastors here who have had incredible encounters with God, some students asked how did it come to you, and they have repeatedly said its crying out in the secret place, creating your own private history with God. When you go into meet Him to not have any agenda and setting all of your affection on Him, and just see what happens....
I have only experienced a little bit, but I have been repeatedly reminded to be thankful for what I do get and have and God will pour out more. Be thankful, be in love.

May anyone who read just fall more and more in love with the Lover of our souls.