A Walk with God

Bro Koay Kheng Hin

I know when we talk about a walk it can be sensitive. Like walking Petaling Street during the street rally. But this is a blessed walk when you walk with God. I believe it's a message for the season.

I just want to ask a few questions for a start. I feel they are relevant.

1. Are you going through a spiritual desert experience? You just feel God is far away. And things overwhelm your life. And anxiety has come back. And worries and there's a spiritual vacuum.
2. Are you tired of serving in a ministry? You wake up Monday and you think about resigning. Friday you prepare for cell and Saturday you feel better because no longer have to prepare.
3. Are you tired of being a Christian? Perhaps the worst scenario. In other words, are you spiritually weary?

If you are then this message is to lift you up. Some of us here have grown and is on fire. And is fresh and vibrant but this message is also for you to guard you against spiritual weariness. In our spiritual journey there will be ups and downs. So this message is for both. To lift you or to guard you.

Spiritual journey weariness is about those who are putting their hands on the plough. Not those who for one reason or another is sitting idly. Our church is a serving church.  No problems getting people to serve.

The question is are you walking with God or working for God? This is a message I speak from experience.

After I accepted the Lord I went to cell at Bro Wilbur’s house under Bro Jason as cell leader.  Those days I was really working for God. From 1994, I would do anything that is to do with serving the church. I was found in church and put my hands on the plough. I served as usher, Sunday school, cell leadership, youth. Almost anything.

Then one night I had a chat of Pastor Geoffrey. I told him I'm burned out. I used that word. My mom was very angry with me back in 1995. My wife had Rebecca and those days I always had something in church. My mom was excited because it's her first grand daughter. My mom will ask me to run errands. And I remember telling her I'm not free. Have to go to church.

My mom was not happy. She is saying I'm now a new father but I told her I've to go to church. I just work and work. It's not about right or wrong but that was my experience.

I told pastor I want to stop and I want to take a year off. I took a year off. People asked me why I'm no longer a cell leader? I went for some studies at Baptist Seminary but I told pastor I will be back. Not the Terminator kind ya.

One Friday afternoon I told pastor, I am back! I went to see him and he wondered where to fit me in because it's been a while. I believe there may be people here who can relate to me.

I was trying to work for God in which I am not called for because I'm called to walk with God. That's just the introduction.

Genesis 5:24

And Enoch walked with God; and he was not, for God took him.

Enoch did not see death. He was translated to heaven. But I want to focus on Enoch walked with God. What did Moses see when he said Enoch walked with God?

The commentary by Matthew Henry looked at it this way.

When you want to walk with someone, you have to be in agreement with the person. Moses must have in mind that Enoch had agreed with God in all things.

One problem we have is we do two things we're not supposed to. We do what we want and then we turn to God and say God now you do something. The second is that everything is God's business but we leave God out of the picture. The thing is if things are bad, we blame God. If things are good we take all the credit.

Enoch is constantly someone who wants to please God and not offend him and look into the interest and glory of God. He is always aware that God is always there for him, a refuge for him. That there is no fear in him because the Lord that is beside will always be his fortress.

That he will always be spiritually vibrant because God is working through him. Our hands are called to the plough, we are not meant to be idle. A godly walk will always express itself in godly works.

One day my daughter Esther in my car saw a monk and she asked me about monks. So I tried my best to explain to her. She then said, oh, then you can be a monk.

There were Christian monks in the early church history. Some would be spiritually close to God and would go out to do good works. There are also those who just want to have a spiritual experience with God without going into the world to work.

John 17:14-15

14 I have given them Your word; and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. 15 I do not pray that You should take them out of the world, but that You should keep them from the evil one.

When we walk with God, we will work for him and him working through us. It's a joy to allow God to work through us.

To cell leaders, who is going to be having a cell at 8.00pm and you're quarrelling with your wife at 7.30pm  that the food is not ready and the place is not ready, then it seems like you are working for God, like a job.

The Lord will set in order all things and in his timing all things will work for good. Let God work through you rather than you work for God.

Every time you commune with God, it is a deep personal experience. It's an experience that will give you that spiritual strength. Walking with God is something no one has except the children of God. It has to be cultivated. I like watching TV and movies, I play badminton and do other stuff but to spend time with God needs to be cultivated. Today if you go back and you've not spent time with God, spend some time with him. Some use the word communion, or prayer, or devotion, or worship. Whatever it is, spend some time with the Lord.

Hebrews 11:5

By faith Enoch was taken away so that he did not see death, “and was not found, because God had taken him”; for before he was taken he had this testimony, that he pleased God.

The Hebrew writer said Enoch pleased God. God is a relational God, so Enoch had a relationship with God that pleases God.

The same was with Jesus.

Matthew 3:16-17

16 When He had been baptized, Jesus came up immediately from the water; and behold, the heavens were opened to Him, and He saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting upon Him. 17 And suddenly a voice came from heaven, saying, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”

Notice that this was before Jesus began his ministry. He was commended for his walk with the Father. Not because of his work. If we are to please the Almighty, it's about our walk with him and not our work.

Somehow or another we just cannot put this into practice. If we were to do a survey, whether we will spend 3 hours to pray or 3 hours to move the furniture, I would think most would tick move furniture. 3 hours may seem like an eternity praying for some, like after 10 minutes, you don't know what else to say. Where else, when you put your hands to moving the furniture, 3 hours seem to pass by quickly. The more we spend time with the person we love, the more we can relate to the person. Every time we spend time with him, we open up the communication channel.

Many of us believe that as long as we are working for God, God is pleased. If we do not have a corresponding walk with God, then it is self commission.

If you are not serving, you will be on self omission. You will also be cold. Your walk with God would also be cold. Sin separates us from God. We are all not perfect. Pastor is not perfect. I am not perfect. Vive is not perfect. The board is not perfect. My father, just before he died, he told me I'm not perfect but he said I look forward, forgetting my pass failures and that I need Jesus. I know he is saved.

What God wants of us is a desire not to sin. It is not the perfect state of not sinning. But that desire not to sin. People justify by saying they cannot relate to God because they have sin. What is our path for coming back to God? Here we have to look at the one person, the source of all this problem. We have to look at Adam.

Adam when he sinned what did he do? He made a cardinal error.

Genesis 3:8-10

8 And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden.

9 Then the Lord God called to Adam and said to him, “Where are you?”

10 So he said, “I heard Your voice in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; and I hid myself.”

From these verses you know it was not the first time God was walking into the garden. But this time Adam was not to be found. He hid himself and he saw himself unworthy to be in God's presence. And God asked where are you? Different people have interpreted this differently.

The question did not give you the tone of his voice. If God said "WHERE ARE YOU!!!" No wonder Adam hid. If me I'd run.

But careful exegete tells us this.

Genesis 3:15

And I will put enmity

Between you and the woman,

And between your seed and her Seed;

He shall bruise your head,

And you shall bruise His heel.”

God is already saying that  Jesus will crush the serpents head.

Genesis 3:21

Also for Adam and his wife the Lord God made tunics of skin, and clothed them.

If God is angry he would not have clothed Adam. Let him run naked better. This tells us that God cared for Adam. God was grieved like a father, but God was also gracious.

God probably said "where are you?" Like a father looking for his son. A father who would want to restore the situation. Adam got it wrong. And this is where I tell you this, when you sin, you moved away. Not God. And when he comes to you, he does not want you to do it again. Look at David.

He is called a man after God's heart but he sinned terribly. The sin of Bathsheba and the murder he committed. It was a public sin because Bathsheba got pregnant. The people knew what the King David did when he sent her husband to the death, but just didn’t dare say it in public or confront him. It took one whole year until the Lord spoke to Nathan and Nathan confronted him. Nathan approach David in a round about way and David was convicted. I have sinned against the Lord. And look at his confession in Psalms 51.

Psalms 51:1-4

A Prayer of Repentance

To the Chief Musician. A Psalm of David when Nathan the prophet went to him, after he had gone in to Bathsheba.

​1 Have mercy upon me, O God,

According to Your lovingkindness;

According to the multitude of Your tender mercies,

Blot out my transgressions.

2 Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity,

And cleanse me from my sin.

3 For I acknowledge my transgressions,

And my sin is always before me.

4 Against You, You only, have I sinned,

And done this evil in Your sight—

That You may be found just when You speak,

And blameless when You judge.

He repented. If you sinned against God, just get on your knees and repent and you'll be completely restored. When you have a cold heart, God is waiting and asking "where are you?".

My mom said being a pastor is not easy. Her pastor called her and asked why she's not in church? So she responded and said "just don't go to church three weeks only and Pastor called"! So she went back to church. Another time after three weeks she didn't go to church, she complained "three weeks didn't go to church pastor also didn't call". Call also wrong didn't call also wrong. Difficult to be a pastor.

We have much to learn from David the psalmist. Moses is known as the man of the mountain.  But David is called a man after God's heart. David spent a lot of time reflecting on God. Read the Psalms and you find it's theology in poetry form. It's not something he did in one week. It was a continuous thing. Throughout his whole life he wrote many many songs.

Walking with God is simple. Think of him all the time. During your work, driving, praying or studying the bible. Think of him.

I want to end with this.

Matthew 11:28-30

28 Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. 29 Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”

Come to him to follow him. To follow him is to walk with him. A man who walks with God is a man who will always have the rest of the soul.