My Foolish But Seeking Heart

Psalm 53:1-2 [English Standard Version]

1 The fool says in his heart, “There is no God.”
They are corrupt, doing abominable iniquity;
there is none who does good.

2 God looks down from heaven
on the children of man
to see if there are any who understand,
who seek after God.

We are all of us fools. There is not one human person born who does not make this dreadful mistake.

I believe in God, but there are times when I don't.

It isn't that I stop believing in him logically. In fact, aside from one faith struggle I went through in college, I don't think there has been a time when I've really doubted the existance of God. I know he's real.

But if I look at my behavior, I have to conclude that there are times when my heart doesn't believe what my head knows is true. It isn't so much that I think with my head, "I chose not to believe in God." It's that my heart decides, "I don't want to do what is right, I want to do this instead."

I think this is the way of fallen people - we may want to believe in God, but we just don't do it all the time. Not when we are acting out our sinfulness, because if we believed in an Almighty, God, we would never treat people the way that we do. His wrath would terrify us! We would never dare to act on our lusts, or lash out in anger, or decieve people, or take what is not ours to take. We wouldn't do these things if we believed in God in our hearts, because fear of him would keep us from it. Even if the love of God did not inspire us to behave ourselves, the terror of him would do it.

But we don't really believe. We think we can get away with it. We think that if he exists at all, he'll wink at our evil misbehavior, and give us a pass. Our hearts decide that God is not God, and it won't really matter.

And God watches all this unbelief, searching our hearts and minds and behaviors to see if there is anyone who realizes what this unbelief is doing to us. Do any of us really understand our state? Is there anyone on earth who comprehends what sin does to us, the distortion and death it brings into us, and the estrangement from Him.

And is there anyone who will turn from all that mess and try to find Him again?

If you don't know God, the idea of him looking down from heaven is a pretty creepy picture - an All-powerful Being watching us to see what we are going to do, and perhaps trying to decide how best to kill us.

But if you do know God, then it isn't scarry. It's hopeful.

To think that God has not given up. To think that even though I acted like I didn't believe in Him, He has not stopped believing in me. He's looking for me, to see if I will look for him.

This Psalm leaves it up in the air - if I do seek him, what then? Will that matter? If I have acted in ways that say "there is no God," will he let me come back from that?

And this is where I think of Jesus promise to me - If I will seek, I will find. God is there to be found, and because of the cross, I am not so alienated from Him that He cannot bring me back.

If we will seek him, his salvation waits for us.