I think it’s natural for us to feel alone as women.

You and I have burdens we carry — emotionally and spiritually. And God will often draw us out to a lonely place so we can get to know Him in a deeper way and hand those burdens to Him. I’ve learned through the years that our alone times can be doorways to discovering a deeper intimacy with God. When we feel alone, we can sense His presence in a way that perhaps we couldn’t before.

In my second week of focusing on God’s gifts, I can’t help but think how blessed we are because of God’s presence.

God is bent on relationship. And that’s why He offers us His presence so that we are never truly alone.

I love how the Psalmists wrote about God’s presence,  especially when they felt alone.

One of my favorite songs in Scripture is Psalm 27, written by David who sang:

One thing I ask from the Lord,
    this only do I seek:
that I may dwell in the house of the Lord
    all the days of my life,
to gaze on the beauty of the Lord
    and to seek him in his temple (verse 4).

David was saying the one thing he wanted the most was God’s presence.

Do you realize that David wrote this Psalm at a time when the presence of God was not accessible to anyone as it is to us today through the power of the Holy Spirit?

David longed to “dwell in God’s presence” which could only happen if he lived in the temple, because that’s where God’s presence dwelt. But David could not live in the temple because he was not a priest. And even if he were, the presence of God dwelt in the Holy of Holies, that inner chamber where only the High Priest could enter once a year, and after a lengthy ritualistic cleansing process so that he wouldn’t be struck dead by the holiness of God.

Under the Old Covenant, the Holy Spirit only visited certain people at a certain time for a certain purpose. God’s spirit came upon the prophets of the Old Testament and they were able to demonstrate the power of God and perform miracles. God’s anointing spirit came upon Samson and he experienced tremendous strength. The Holy Spirit came upon David and he was able to kill a bear and a lion with his hands. The Holy Spirit came upon Elijah and he was able to call down rain and  fire from heaven. But other than those temporary moments of the Holy Spirit’s presence, the people under the Old Covenant were pretty much separated from God by their sin.

But when Christ died on the cross as the ultimate sacrifice for our sins, He removed that separation and there was instant access between God and those who come to Him by faith on the merit of what Jesus did for them.

Today we have a Savior who has made it possible for us to be in the presence of God – always. We have the indwelling Holy Spirit, when we come to God through faith in Jesus, and that means God’s presence is always with us.

We can experience today what David only longed for.

Can you, like David, say “there is one thing I need…”?

Oh, that you and I would realize there really IS only ONE thing we need…and it’s to be in God’s presence. And we can be.