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David the Prophet says in the Psalm (34:8):
“Taste and see that the Lord is good.”
So what is our meditation on this saying? And what is:
The tasting of the Kingdom?
We all know that we will live with the Lord forever in eternity, as Saint Paul the Apostle said: “And thus we shall always be with the Lord” (1 Thessalonians 4:17). Here an important question stands before us:
Have we tried to live with the Lord here on earth, so that we may rejoice in life with Him there in eternity? Or will we enter into a life that we have not been accustomed to, and have not previously delighted in?
That is, before we enter the Kingdom, have we rejoiced in tasting this Kingdom?
And if the most beautiful thing in the Kingdom is enjoyment of God, then how can we enjoy what David the Prophet said: “Taste and see that the Lord is good” (Psalm 34:8)?
Therefore, it is assumed that a person experiences life with God.
He experiences on earth what he will live in heaven.
He tests this, even at the smallest possible degree.
He begins the relationship with God.
Unfortunately, very many have not begun this relationship, because they have not yet known God with true knowledge, nor have they experienced life with Him, and of course they have neither tasted nor seen life with Him.
All their knowledge of God is merely theoretical knowledge that they have read in books or heard in sermons and lectures, or in theological colleges, or in what they repeat from the articles of the Creed. As for God Himself, they have not yet known Him.
For this reason our Lord Jesus Christ said: “O righteous Father, the world has not known You”; and He said about His disciples: “And I have declared to them Your name, and will declare it, that the love with which You loved Me may be in them, and I in them” (John 17:25, 26).
How deep is the knowledge of God: it begins here on earth as “partial knowledge” (1 Corinthians 13:12). And this knowledge is completed in the other life so that it never ends. As our Lord Jesus Christ said to God the Father: “And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God” (John 17:3).
By knowledge you love Him, and by loving Him you know Him. And if you know Him, you form a relationship with Him. And the more a relationship is formed with Him, the more you know Him, and the more you love Him.
So what does it mean to know God? It means to know His love for you, His care for you, and His work on your behalf. And to know His constant pursuit to form a relationship with you. And every time you flee from this relationship, He seeks to reconcile you!
This is the most amazing thing in the spiritual life: that God, the Creator of heaven and earth, pursues this “dust and ashes,” while the dust flees from Him!!
God wants to bring you into the Kingdom, while you are preoccupied with many things away from the Kingdom (Luke 10:41). He wants to let you taste His sweetness, while you do not wish to, because your taste finds rest in other things! God knocks at your door (Revelation 3:20), and you do not open! The tasting of the Kingdom does not occupy you, nor is it among your goals and desires!!
It is astonishing that some do not taste the Lord, not even in their prayers!
They say: “Our Father who art in heaven.” And in their thinking, God is there in the heavens, far, far away from them! Where are they from His saying about them: “I in them” (John 17:26)? Or from the saying of Saint Paul the Apostle: “It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me” (Galatians 2:20)?
Do not say that God is only in heaven, but say to Him with the poet:
You are truly in heaven indeed,
Yet every heart that lived by love called You its heaven.
Your most holy throne is a heart emptied
Of all desires, containing none but You.
Here I ask you: does God occupy you? How much are you occupied with Him?
Do you give Him one day a week as He commanded us from the beginning? That which we call “the Lord’s Day,” in which we devote ourselves to God, a day in which we do no work (Exodus 20; Deuteronomy 5). Or do we begrudge the Lord even one day?!
Do you give God the firstfruits of your day, beginning with Him every day? And also ending with Him every day, so that He is the first and the last in your days? Do you occupy yourself with Him during the day, cutting its hours from time to time with conversation with God? Or do you find prayer burdensome, and justify that with many excuses!
As though you have no time to give to God in prayer.
While prayer is time that God gives to you, to enjoy Him in it.
So how will you live with Him all the time in heaven?!
It is strange that God is always occupied with us, while we do not find time to be occupied with God! He never forgets us, and we always forget Him!! We continually place Him at the end of our list of concerns: “If we get an opportunity, we will call for you,” as Felix the governor said to Paul the Apostle! (Acts 24:25). He loves us as His own to the end (John 13:1). And we, with all our hearts, love others instead of Him!
Truly what Saint John the Baptist said about Christ applies to us:
“There stands One among you whom you do not know” (John 1:26).
Sometimes we may think, in being occupied with God, that the relationship with Him is a relationship of words, or merely a mental relationship!
We speak about Him, and believe in Him mentally, and may even preach about Him or teach about Him, without Him being in our hearts and in our feelings, and without tasting and seeing that the Lord is good! And the Lord becomes for us merely a lesson in theology, or merely an icon in the church!!
When then do we become occupied with God? When do we care to be in His presence? When do we say to Him with the Psalm: “My soul thirsts for You”; “My soul follows close behind You” (Psalm 63:1, 8)?
A person may serve in the church, and teach in Sunday School, and his lessons are merely knowledge; he teaches the journeys of Paul the Apostle as a history professor teaches the wars of Napoleon Bonaparte! God is not in them, or He is in them merely as a name, without a relationship with Him.
When will the time come when God becomes for you like the breath that comes out of your chest, like the pulse in your heart, and like the blood that runs in your veins, such that you cannot do without any of them?
Then you will long to go to heaven and be with the Lord always, as Saint Paul the Apostle said: “For I have a desire to depart and be with Christ, which is far better” (Philippians 1:23).
Religion is not merely information. Religion is not religion without God. And it is not religion without a relationship between God and people.
There is a great difference between telling people that God created man on the sixth day, and telling them that God, out of the abundance of His love—before He created man—first created for him the sun and the moon; created for him light, and earth and water, and trees and fruit, and animals for his service. And out of the abundance of His love, when He created man, He created for him the mind and conscience, and the sense of feeling.
Do you praise the mighty intellect that invented spacecraft and reached the moon and Mars, and that invented the fax, the computer, and the mobile phone? It is God who granted man this mind and this ability to invent. So the credit is His first and last. Blessed are You, O Lord, in all that You have given us. May we repay a little of Your kindness and say to You: “Of Your own we have given You” (1 Chronicles 29:14).
Why do we separate the human mind from God who created it and granted it its abilities?!
Our problem is that we do not bring God into all the affairs of our lives.
We praise scientists who invent a medicine extracted from a certain plant. But unfortunately we do not say: how profound is the power of God who placed healing properties in this plant, and granted scientists the ability to know them, extract them, and manufacture them as medicine.
Unfortunately, we forget God. So we do not form a relationship with Him.
Or we make our relationship with God merely a marginal relationship.
We form relationships with the mind, with thought, with science, with people, with scientists. But we do not form a relationship with God. Because God is not in our interest all the time. Nor do we attribute to Him all that He does with us. We say: how skillful that doctor was in the surgical operation he performed. And we do not say: we thank You, O Lord, for Your care and providence, because Your hand was with the doctor’s hand during the operation.
An important question I would like to ask you is:
Is God inside you, or outside you?
How beautiful is the saying of Saint Paul the Apostle: “It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me” (Galatians 2:20). Can you say such a statement? This saint labored in his ministry more than all the apostles. Yet he says: “Yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me”; “By the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me was not in vain” (1 Corinthians 15:10).
He lives constantly within the circle of God and His grace. He mentions God’s work with him and in him, and repeats the phrase: “not I.” Are you like this: God in you, and God working with you, while you continually remember His saying: “Without Me you can do nothing” (John 15:5)? Thus you abide in Him always, as the branch abides in the vine, so that you may bear fruit, and that your fruit may remain.
Or are you occupied with many things, except God! As the Lord said to Martha: “You are worried and troubled about many things. But one thing is needed” (Luke 10:41–42). And what benefit are all those things without God?! “For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?” (Matthew 16:26).
Look at Saint Paul the Apostle who said:
“I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in Him” (Philippians 3:8–9).
It is the love of God that makes everything, in a person’s eyes, rubbish, in order that he may gain the Lord and be found in Him. But the world is not like this: it is occupied with things, and you find it full of many varied news items and large headlines. But where is God in people’s lives? This is what you do not find!! You find news of politics, economy, sports, and art, even news of crimes. But God—you may not find any news of Him, nor does He receive any of that great attention. Why?
Because people’s enjoyment is in other tastes, not the taste of the Kingdom.
People may think that it is enough to remember God only in places of worship! Why? Is not God present everywhere?! Yes, He is present everywhere, but we do not feel Him, we do not sense Him, we do not taste Him. And we do not feel His importance to us unless we need Him for an important matter!
Thus we seek Him out of need and necessity, not out of love.
And what is astonishing is that after He responds to our requests and grants us what we need, we return once again and forget Him!!
Where are we from the saying of David the Prophet:
“Bless the Lord, O my soul; and all that is within me, bless His holy name!”
“Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all His benefits” (Psalm 103:1–2).
When then do we enter into the tasting of the Kingdom? When do we love God and His Kingdom, and find our happiness in it, so that when we reach eternity, we find that it has a taste?
When do we say to God as David said: “My soul thirsts for You” (Psalm 63:1); “As the deer pants for the water brooks, so pants my soul for You, O God” (Psalm 42:1).
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