CALL TO GOD
How many of us call out to God when we need help, or when we are hurting, or even when we are all alone? We’ll fill our days with mind-numbing activities, routines and rituals, we’ll sit quietly in despair, we’ll spend our down time scrolling through other people’s Instagram posts, we’ll binge-watch Netflix – all the while, putting ourselves on ‘mute’ with God.
Yet God has given us an open invitation to reach out to Him. We find it in Jeremiah 33:3: “Call to Me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know.” God’s line of communication is always open to all believers with no expiration.
If ‘999’ is an emergency number to request immediate assistance, Jeremiah ‘333’ is an open line for check-back with God along the unpredictable journey of our lives so that He can help us get back on course if we have veered off track, made unwise moves, or acted on ambiguous values.
Below are three timeless truths distilled from Jeremiah 33:3:
“CALL TO ME”
Let’s face it: we are not very good when it comes to initiating the process of seeking help for ourselves. Ordinarily, we have no problem calling on God to help others, or to save the world from the current pandemic, but we find it hard to muster the humanity and humility to say, ‘God, help me!’ We are comfortable when we are helping others, but not when we ourselves need help.
‘Call’, ‘seek’, and ‘cry out’ are a common refrain in the Bible that mean the same thing. God’s idea of relationship with humans is always conversational and always mutually responsive because He is not a mute and lifeless deity. Our relationship with God should not exist primarily in silent mental dialogues.
‘Call to Me’ is God’s cry to remind us to not leave Him out in the cold. We’re told in James 4:8 (NLT) to come close to God, and God will come close to us. He wants us to check back with Him, especially during times when we need a little clarity, a little strength, a little comfort, a little direction and when we seem to be heading nowhere.
When we call to God, we acknowledge His divine help available to us. Throughout the book of Psalms, words like ‘answer’, ‘deliver’, ‘rescue’, ‘hear’, ‘guide’, ‘lead’ and ‘direct’ appear many times to describe the distinct manifestations of God’s help. Indeed, God’s help is not so spiritual that it cannot be put into practical terms.
“AND I WILL ANSWER YOU”
This is God’s timeless promise that’s matched with the promise of His response. This is reiterated in Isaiah 58:9, Then you will call, and the Lord will answer; you will cry for help, and He will say: Here am I. It’s an assurance that God will be fully present and emotionally available whenever we call on Him.
Although God is all powerful, He doesn’t override the human agency of trust in the decision to let Him into our lives. The hard part is letting our guards down before God, loosening our fierce need for extreme privacy and control, and acknowledging our humanity, vulnerability and need for Him.
When king David dealt with the pain of a family betrayal, he humbly turned to God without restrain: But I will call on God, and the Lord will rescue me. Morning, noon, and night I cry out in my distress, and the Lord hears my voice. (Psalm 55:16-17)
A dead end is usually a good place to tell God, “I don’t know what to do.” Even when we are at a loss for words, crying out to Him with a simple “God, help me” is a great start. Why? Because it’s humbling, it removes the fear of vulnerability and our fixation on the details of the problem, and it invites God into an issue that’s weighing heavily on our hearts. If we’re honest, we like to present God with our solutions and opinions, but we should really quiet down and be open to His response.
“AND TELL YOU GREAT AND UNSEARCHABLE THINGS YOU DO NOT KNOW.”
There isn’t a place too hidden or too hard that God will not enter. When Jonah tried to escape from God and famously ended up calling to Him from the filthy bowels of a big fish, the Lord responded. God does not rely on hi-speed internet connection or water-proof mobile devices to respond to us!
I cried out to the Lord in my great trouble, and He answered me.
I called to You from the land of the dead, and Lord, You heard me!
Jonah 2:2
Consider for a moment: is something troubling you today? Something that’s becoming harder and harder to push out of your mind. You try to dismiss it but it’s keeping you up at night.
For the record, the Lord doesn’t sleep nor slumber (Psalm 121:4) and no topic is off-limits to Him. He doesn’t hold it against anyone who have hurt us so that it is safe for us to bring any issues to Him. (Yes, we’re even afraid of offending people in our prayers!)
The Bible also tells us that the Lord is close to all who call on him, yes, to all who call on him in truth, and that the Lord is close to the brokenhearted; He rescues those whose spirits are crushed. (Psalm 34:18, 145:18). If God is always close, it means that we are always closer to the ‘great and unsearchable things’ He wants to reveal to us than we realize.
None of us are created to go it alone: without God and others, we will crack at some point. It is not a matter of when, but how severe we will crash. God sends people into our lives in all seasons to pivot us to Him. Think about the people who are helping you develop greater vulnerability and trust in God.
Go ahead, unmute yourself and go further with God. Call on Him and He will answer you and reveal to you marvelous and wondrous things that you could never figure out on your own. (The Message, Jeremiah 33:3)
