Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now, and don’t get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes. Matthew 6:34 MSG.

See, the former things have taken place, and new things I declare; before they spring into being I announce them to you. Isaiah 42:9.

But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness…Matthew 6:33.

I realized this morning as I sat in prayer with Creator God – Father, Son, Spirit, that all of my experiences in this life have ballooned out from the first truth I knew as a young child – that I dearly loved God and wanted to live with Him. I have been so blessed in this life. And as I see pillars of safety in this world being taken away, I realize just how fragile is the safety we cling to. Our jobs, health, security in money saved for retirement, living in a country without war in its lands. And yet, all of that can change. Natural disasters, instability in markets, drought, punishing floods, devastating fires happen. Where then do we find our safety? What seemed so far away from happening to us becomes real and how can we prepare for that? Slowly and surely, God is helping me see that it is to Him that I need to turn. It is the same message He is telling all of us and He’s telling the same thing to Ezekiel in our chapter, Ezekiel 44. As our world becomes more unstable we are just like all the other people and nations who needed reminding to return to God. Then the man brought me back to the outer gate of the sanctuary, the one facing east, and it was shut. The Lord said to me, “This gate is to remain shut. It must not be opened; no one may enter through it. It is to remain shut because the Lord, the God of Israel, has entered through it. The prince himself is the only one who may sit inside the gateway to eat in the presence of the Lord. He is to enter by way of the portico of the gateway and go out the same way.” Then the man brought me by way of the north gate to the front of the temple. I looked and saw the glory of the Lord filling the temple of the Lord, and I fell facedown. v. 1-4. The glory of the Lord. How different from any of us. “Say to rebellious Israel, ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: Enough of your detestable practices, people of Israel! In addition to all your other detestable practices, you brought foreigners uncircumcised in heart and flesh into My sanctuary, desecrating My temple while you offered Me food, fat and blood, and you broke My covenant. Instead of carrying out your duty in regard to My holy things, you put others in charge of My sanctuary. This is what the Sovereign Lord says: No foreigner uncircumcised in heart and flesh is to enter My sanctuary, not even the foreigners who live among the Israelites…But the Levitical priests, who are descendants of Zadok and who guarded My sanctuary when the Israelites went astray from Me, are to come near to minister before Me; they are to stand before Me to offer sacrifices of fat and blood, declares the Sovereign Lord. They alone are to enter My sanctuary; they alone are to come near My table to minister before Me and serve Me as guards.’” v. 6-9, 15-16. The glory of the Lord. Can we not see how our hearts are uncircumcised? Are we foreigners not truly knowing God? He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8. To walk humbly with our God, we first need to return to Him. The Lord, the Son, came to live among us so that He could show us what faithfulness to the Father looks like as we live in a broken world of uncertainty. And He went into a synagogue and spoke the words Isaiah had written centuries before that told about Him coming to be with us: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He has anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed.” Luke 4:18. Without our walk with Him, we are the poor, the brokenhearted, the captives, the blind, the oppressed living in a broken, oppressive world that turns away from God. We don’t need to stay there. We can take His hand and let Him guide us forward with Him as He preaches, heals, gives sight, sets at liberty our souls hungering for what is true – to seek first His Kingdom and His righteousness. As we do, we return to Him, our Father, our Lord and Savior, our Comforter. With Him we are no longer foreigners. The Lord Himself will give us a new heart and put His Spirit within us. That’s how we walk with Him!