Location, Location, Location

Location matters. We’ll pay a premium for a better seat at a ball game or concert because there’s something special about being close. But what about the location of our heart? In this episode of Our Journey to Hope, we explore how drawing near to God changes our perspective, strengthens our hope, and helps us see life’s challenges in the presence of the One who is greater than them.

Transcript

Hello friends, I’m your host, Dr. Dave Laton. Thank you for joining me on Our Journey to Hope.

 This podcast is a place where together we explore how to discover, sustain, and sometimes regain hope.

 Wherever you’re listening, let’s take a deep breath, open our hearts, and continue this journey toward hope.

 And remember — no one walks alone.

 Today's episode is brought to you by Come and See Publications. If today's message encouraged you, I invite you to visit comeandseepublications.com. You'll discover devotional books, Bible studies, and other Christ-centered resources to help you continue growing in your faith. That's comeandseepublications.com.

You’ve probably heard the old saying about real estate. The three most important things are location, location, location.

 Apparently, location matters in sports too.

 I was looking at ticket prices recently and found that an average courtside seat at professional basketball games can run somewhere around $1,500 to $2,000. Want a good seat near the 50-yard line at professional football games? You might spend $400 to $700.  That’s during regular season.  By the way, it comes to playoffs or the Super Bowl, ouch!  It can be as much as $12,000.  I am not criticizing someone who pays that much for a ticket, it is just amazing to me that the game is that important.  

 Why are these tickets so expensive? Because location matters.

 Some people are willing to pay a premium to get close to the action. We want to see better. We want to hear better. We want to experience everything that’s happening. There’s something special about being close.

 Then Sunday morning rolls around.

 We walk into a church building where the front-row seats are absolutely free.

And remarkably available.

 There’s a little humor in that, but I don’t want to make too much of it. Where someone sits during worship certainly isn’t an indication of faithfulness. Sitting on the front pew doesn’t put us closer to God, and sitting on the back pew doesn’t move us farther away from Him.

 In fact, we’ve gone to considerable effort to make physical location less important.

We elevate the speaker’s stand so everyone can see. We install good lighting and sound systems so everyone can hear. Many church buildings have monitors so that even people sitting farther away can clearly see the speaker, the words to the songs, Scripture passages, and presentation slides. 

 We’ve done a pretty good job of overcoming physical distance.

But that got me thinking.

 Maybe there’s another kind of location we ought to think about.

 What are we doing to improve the location of our heart?

And perhaps even more importantly for our conversation about hope, what happens to our hope when our heart draws nearer to God?

 In James 4:8, James gives us a wonderfully simple invitation: “Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you”.

 Draw near.  That’s location language.

 James isn’t talking about moving to a different seat. He’s talking about relationship. He’s talking about the orientation of our heart toward God.

 And the more I think about it, the more convinced I am that the location of our heart in relation to God has a tremendous impact on our hope.

 There’s a wonderful example of this in Psalm 73.

 Asaph is struggling. He looks around and sees people who seem to prosper while living without regard for God. Meanwhile, he’s trying to remain faithful, and life doesn’t seem particularly fair.

 He admits that his feet had almost slipped. I appreciate that honesty.

 Here’s a man of faith admitting that what he sees around him has shaken him. His circumstances have affected his perspective, and his perspective is beginning to affect his hope.

 Have you ever been there?

 We look around and wonder why things are happening as they are. We wonder why someone else seems to have an easier road. We wonder why the prayer hasn’t been answered the way we hoped. We wonder why illness came, why someone we love died, why a relationship failed, or why something we counted on suddenly disappeared.

 And if we stare at those things long enough, they can begin to fill our field of vision.

That’s what was happening to Asaph.

 Then something changes. He enters the sanctuary of God.

 His circumstances don’t suddenly disappear. The people who troubled him are still there. The problems he has been thinking about haven’t magically vanished.

But Asaph has changed location. He has drawn near to God.

And from that location, he begins to see things differently.

 By the end of the psalm he can say, “But for me it is good to be near God”.

 It is good to be near God.

 That may be one of the simplest descriptions of a hopeful life we can find.

Think about standing some distance from a mountain and then walking toward it. The mountain itself doesn’t grow as we approach it. But something does change.

It occupies more of our field of vision.

 Maybe something similar happens when we intentionally draw nearer to God.

God doesn’t become greater because we move closer to Him. He is already great. His faithfulness doesn’t increase. His promises don’t become more dependable. His love doesn’t suddenly become stronger.

 What changes is our perspective.

 God begins to occupy more of our field of vision.

 The problem may still be there.

The diagnosis may still be there.

The grief may still be there.

The uncertainty about tomorrow may still be there.

 But now we are viewing those things from a different location.

 We’re viewing them from nearer to God. And that can make an enormous difference in hope.

 I find it interesting that the writer of Hebrews brings these same ideas together. In Hebrews 10:22 he says, “let us draw near,” and then in the very next verse he tells us to “hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful” 

Draw near. Hold fast to hope.

 Those ideas belong together.

 Our hope becomes stronger as our attention moves away from simply measuring the size of our circumstances and toward remembering the faithfulness of the One who has promised.

 So how do we improve the location of our heart?

 We spend time in God's Word, allowing His truth to shape how we see what’s happening around us.

 We pray, bringing our fears, questions, gratitude, and needs into His presence.

 We worship, deliberately turning our attention toward who God is.

 We remember what He has already done.

 We spend time with other believers who remind us of His faithfulness when our own vision becomes clouded.

 We spend time serving others in the name of our Lord.

 And sometimes we simply become still long enough to recognize that God has been there all along.

 None of those things earn us a better location with God. They help orient our hearts toward the God who has already invited us to draw near.

 You know, we understand the value of proximity.

 We know that location can change an experience.

 Some spend $500 for a better view of a football field. Some folks will spend $2,000 to sit courtside at a basketball game.

 Maybe the question for us is whether we place the same value on the location of our heart.

 Because when life becomes difficult, hope is influenced greatly by what fills our field of vision.

 If all we can see is the problem, hope can become difficult to hold.

 But as we draw near to God, we begin seeing the problem in the presence of the One who is greater than the problem.

 We remember His character.

We remember His promises.

We remember His faithfulness.

And hope has room to breathe again.

 Location really does matter.

 Maybe the most important location in our lives doesn’t have a row number or a seat number.

 It’s the location of our heart in relation to God.

 Asaph discovered it.

 The writer of Hebrews encouraged it.

 James invited us to do it.

 “Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you.”

 So today, wherever you may be physically, perhaps there’s a more important question worth asking:

 Where is my heart?

 And perhaps one more:

What can I do today to draw a little nearer to the One in whom my hope rests?

Because when it comes to hope…location, location, location is important.