Gen. 30:20 Zebulun, “God has given me a good gift.”
“Now my husband will dwell with me,” says Leah after giving Jacob his sixth son by her and the eleventh in the family line. This child given towards the end of her life represents the deeper desires of a mother and the recognition or our most rewarding gift—dwelling together.
As you overcome challenges and temptations, as you receive rewards and accolades, these will gradually pale in comparison to the value of simply dwelling in God’s presence.
I have noticed that I say less and less in prayer now than before. I am still and listening, because there is really just one answer that I desire. I no longer wait or seek a word. I am not anxious about getting the daily bread or resources I need to survive. I am even less concerned about my sins which need to be forgiven as I have seen again and again His willingness to restore, forgive, and repeatedly deliver me from temptations which were too great for me to endure.
Instead, the pursuit of my prayer now is His presence. I am not happy with an answer or a simple acknowledgement of His hearing me. The gift I desire is Him dwelling with me.
“This one thing I desire,” says David in Psalm 27:4, “That I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in His temple.” Nothing else satisfies. Nothing else is needed.
If you have ever tasted and seen the goodness of the Lord, been enlightened by His heavenly presence and captured by His love, you are now officially ruined. No drug, pleasure, gossip or temporal victory compares. Laurels and earthly accolades are just fleeting gestures.
Instead, I am asking God later in my life to turn up the glory of His presence. I am hungry for more, and the initial feelings and goose bumps of the Holy Spirit are no longer sufficient. Says David, “I will be satisfied when I awake in Your likeness.”
When the Lord withdraws His presence, we pray, “My God, My God. Why are you so far from the words of my groanings? In the night season, I am not silent, and in the daytime, my prayer shall come before you.” (Ps. 22)
When He withdraws Himself from me, my yearning only increases. I think in heaven we will be on a perpetual chase falling ever and ever deeper into the depths of His love. An endless fall into grace.
The Joseph Factor 