Hope for Restless Souls
By Tom Campisi, Managing Editor
O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you. — Psalm 63:1
What does it mean to “earnestly” seek the Lord? According to Oxford Languages, the adverb earnestly means “with sincere and intense conviction; seriously.”
As a young adult, I lacked conviction in my relationship with the Lord. In college, I was part of a campus ministry, but I was also living with one foot in the world. I would attend a Bible study on Wednesday nights, but go to the parties and the campus pub on Thursday nights. My life lacked peace, and, deep inside, I knew there was something better.
Looking back, I now understand that my dissatisfaction was best summarized in Augustine’s timeless adage about yielding to God’s will, “You have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless, until they can find rest in you.”
Thankfully, my restlessness came to an end. Soon after college, I came across a Bible verse that changed my life forever. I read Malachi 3:8-10, realizing that I was robbing God by not giving Him my whole heart, not living for Him:
Will a man rob God? Yet you are robbing me. But you say, ‘How have we robbed you?’ In your tithes and contributions. You are cursed with a curse, for you are robbing me, the whole nation of you. Bring the full tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. And thereby put me to the test, says the LORD of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is no more need.
Although this verse is often used during church offerings, the Lord spoke to me through these precious words. I was, indeed, robbing God by not seeking Him with sincere and intense conviction and something needed to change. Soon after that revelation, I was all in for the Lord. I found a good church, studied the Word daily, and connected with a group of believers who also desired to seek God.
I never looked back, and over thirty years later, I can honestly say that God “opened up the window of heaven and poured out a blessing” that was overflowing. By God’s grace, I have lived an incredibly abundant life.
In Matthew 22:36-37, a Pharisee tested Jesus by asking Him, “which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” Jesus answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment.”
In John 4, when Jesus talked to a Samaritan woman at a well, the conversation centered on who was worshipping God in the right manner. Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father…But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him.”
Today, let us consider what it means to earnestly seek God. Let us not rob the giver of all good gifts. Let us love Him with all our heart and soul and mind. And let us worship Him in Spirit and in Truth.
Tom Campisi is the managing editor of Christian Union: The Magazine. To read more articles like this one and for more news about how Christian Union is making an impact at some of our nation's leading universities and in key cities, click here.
