While enjoying our family dinner the other night I noticed that Peepoo had performed her K9 disappearing act once again. This usually means she has found something sweet, chewy, or chocolatey in the trash or conveniently left on someone’s bed or even night stand. Sure enough, Peepoo had dug through our bedroom trash and discovered an empty Starbucks cup with a few precious drops of “bottom of the cup” mocha chocolate and coffee.
I don’t think I’ve ever known a dog that had a keener sense of smell for chocolate or greater passion for scrounging up even a small taste of it. When it comes to chocolate, she really has a revelation of what it means to seek. What if we as believers sought the Lord the way the little fur ball seeks out the sweet stuff? What if our spiritual senses were so trained to pick up even the slightest indication of the Lord’s presence that beckons us to pursue Him?
The Bible declares boldly that we will find the Lord if we seek for Him with all our hearts (Jeremiah 29:12-13). Amos, speaking prophetically for the Lord, said, “Seek me and live” (Amos 5:4). This Scripture means that we are to seek and require the Lord as one requires food. Unlike the temporary buzz derived from varied pleasures, possessions, and legal stimulants like the cafe mocha (don’t say anything but I know a staff member at Hope Harbor Church that plans travel routes based on Starbucks locations), the Lord imparts eternal and ongoing life as we seek Him and connect with Him in vital living union and contact.
The key to perpetual and uninterrupted intimacy with God, spiritual growth, blessing, and well-being is seeking God fervently and consistently. To “seek” means to visit frequently, to inquire of, to quest for, search often for, learn from, resort to (what you always turn to), and hunger after (God will always fill us in direct proportion to our hunger). No one seeking God is ever turned away empty-handed. Isaiah 55:6 tells us to, “Seek the LORD while he may be found; call on him while he is near.” When King Uzziah sought the Lord he was successful, but when he turned away in self-sufficiency, self-promotion, and human pride he lost everything (2 Chronicles 26).
I want to encourage you to make the Lord your number one vital need in your life from this day on. Vital means “pertaining to life” and includes such needs as oxygen, water, or food. Because Jesus is our life and literally the source of our life, we should seek the Lord more diligently than we would for any natural vital need. Take your cue from a six pound poodle who tirelessly pursues the source of even the slightest hint of chocolate in the air and go after the fragrance of the Lord’s presence like never before.
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