I’m reading through Isaiah in my devotions and it struck me this morning how often it takes calamity to create momentum toward God for the people of Israel.  Here is a quick couple of verses to show this in Chapter 30 of Isaiah:

12b “Because you despise what I tell you and trust instead in oppression and lies,
13 calamity will come upon you suddenly— like a bulging wall that bursts and falls.
In an instant it will collapse and come crashing down.

¹⁸ So the Lord must wait for you to come to him so he can show you his love and compassion. For the Lord is a faithful God. Blessed are those who wait for his help.

God waits for us to come to him so he can show you his love and compassion.  And why so often does it take calamity to cause us to turn to God?  Why can’t it be in the good seasons of life?  If I could change one thing about human nature, it would be that the good times in life create a desire to draw close to God like the difficult times.

The Bible tries to warn us.  The Old Testament speaks of times of remembrance and sacrifices of thanksgiving that bring us to God in and out of seasons of life.  It is the genuine desire of God for us to stay close at all times.  But let’s face it.  We tend to drop our guard during good times and begin to rely upon our own strength.  I don’t know why that happens, but from personal experience I know that is the case at least for me.

So here is the bottom line:  Why wait for a difficult season to re-establish or strengthen your relationship with God?  Why not make the turn today and not wait for things to get bad?  I believe God wants to be our first response and not our last chance in life.  Why wait?  As a new school year starts for many of us, let’s make it a new start in our faith journey as well.