being the seekers of God who care for nothing but gaining God and obtaining God

The place where we obtain the revelation concerning our situation, our problems, and the direction we should take in life is the sanctuary of God. Outside of the sanctuary of God we don’t really see what is going on – but once we get into our spirit and in the meetings of the church, all things are clear to us!

For this we need to be pure in heart – we need to focus only on the Lord, on the person of Christ, who is everything to us for our enjoyment in our spirit. It is when we are in our spirit that we enjoy God as our everything and we don’t need anything else to satisfy us!

Having a pure heart set only on God

“Who may ascend to the mountain of Jehovah?” (Psa. 24:3) – the answer is in verse 4, “He who has clean hands and a pure heart, / Who has not lifted up his soul to falsehood / Or sworn deceitfully”.

I used to think that this refers to someone who obeys the law – but actually refers to one who purifies his heart, one who doesn’t seek vanity but God! Anything besides God is vanity – idols are vanity, worldly prosperity is vanity, and anything outside of God is vanity! A pure heart is a heart that is set only on God!

How we need to ask the Lord to purify our heart and cooperate with Him for this! We need to have have a heart set only on God, a pure heart that can say just like the psalmist, “Whom do I have in heaven but You? / And besides You there is nothing I desire on earth” (Psa. 73:25).

We daily need to “wash our hands” by regularly confessing and applying the blood of the Lamb. We need to be those who are seeking God, setting our heart on Him, and taking Him as our everything… Such a person who is pure in heart can see God (Matt. 5:8)!

Enjoying God in an absolute way

The psalmist entered into the sanctuary of God and he got the answer to his troublesome questions – he perceived what is going on. He realized that God was continually working to “deprive him of all material things so that he might enjoy God in such an absolute way” (W. Lee). Wow! This is quite a revelation!

We as believers need to clearly see this – God may allow others, not matter how evil or wicked they are, to prosper and be rich, but He may strip us of outward things and worldly prosperity SO THAT we may seek God in an absolute way!

God is faithful to take away anything that replaces Christ as our top and only enjoyment – He is faithful to take away the outward things and replace them with Himself as the One who meets all our needs.

Nothing on earth or in heaven can be our enjoyment except God Himself. This is the story of Job also – God stripped him from his own righteousness, his material possessions, his comfort, and even of his health, so that he might seek God and see God with a pure heart. God’s intention with the seeking saints is to remove the material blessings and the physical enjoyments in order that they might find everything in God!

“I do not care for anything but the tree of life”

It is not a matter of “keeping the law”, “doing the right thing and not the wrong thing”, “being good and not being evil” – all these belong to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. It is a matter of enjoying God, seeking God, obtaining God, and even possessing God as our everything.

God wants us to experience Him and enjoy Him to the extent that we honestly and genuinely say, “Lord, I don’t care for anything but the tree of life – I don’t care for anything other than God Himself“. This is what the psalmist experienced, enjoyed, and spoke about when he wrote Psalm 73.

When we see the situation around us, when we see the wicked men prosper while many material blessings are taken away from us as the Lord’s seekers, we should enter into the sanctuary of God.

Here we can clearly see the reason the wicked men get richer and richer while the loving seekers of God are rather persecuted and even deprived of the riches.

What is this reason? It is that God has given the wicked men up, He lets them just go on their own way, and they have nothing to do with God and the enjoyment of God. Oh, Lord Jesus! We want to be the seekers of God who experience Him, possess Him, and obtain Him – no matter what!

Lord, don’t give us up! No matter what, Lord, have a way in us! Gain our heart to be pure and single for You! May You be our only enjoyment and satisfaction. Lord Jesus, purify our heart, and remove anything in us that takes the first place. We want to care for the enjoyment of God and the experience of God. We want to seek You, possess You, obtain You, and gain You to the uttermost! Make us those who enjoy and experience God absolutely!

References and Further Reading

• Sharing inspired from, Christ and the Church Revealed and Typified in the Psalms (chs. 12-13, by Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on the Crystallization-Study of Psalms (2), week 13.
• Hymns on this topic:
  # O the joy of having nothing and being nothing, seeing nothing / But a living Christ in glory / And His interest here on earth.
  # More of our heart, dear Lord, we’d give You now; / Even more ground to You, Lord, we’d allow.
  # There are times in my life / When my heart is embittered. / There are questions unanswered, / Yet, You’re drawing me / To enter / Into Your blessed sanctuary.
• Picture source: Pure in Heart.