220. A Heart to Know the Lord
Jeremiah 24:7And I will give them an heart to know me, that I am the Lord: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God: for they shall return unto me with their whole heart.
God promises to give us a heart to know the Lord. This is the work of the Holy Spirit, who is God. Through the Gospel the Spirit gives us faith in the heart. This faith receives Jesus Christ, who is the Lord God. If we believe in Jesus we have seen the Father, and we know that He is the Lord God. We know especially that the Lord will be our God. With the work of the Spirit we may and can return unto the Lord with the whole heart any time.
Whenever we need to, and that is all the time, we return to the Lord in repentance and faith. Our hearts are filled God and with His Life. We may neglect or forget this truth from time to time, but when we hear the Gospel we return again and He is our God and we are His people. Just to know He is our God means that we are never alone, never without help, and never stuck in guilt, despair, doubt, depression, anxiety, or even worry. We find ourselves in these various negative moods usually because we forget that He is our God and we are His people.
If we are His people, then God is responsible for us and for our wellbeing, and if He is responsible then I can confidently leave it all in God’s good hands, rest in His comforts, trust in His care, and relax and know that the Lord is God. This is hard to believe when things are going badly, and it does not seem necessary to believe when things are going well. Therefore, we make every effort to tell ourselves the Gospel daily and hear the Gospel weekly, for in both good times and in bad we need to hear this Gospel promise: He is my God and I am His people. “I am my beloved’s, and my beloved is mine [Song of Songs 6:3].”