What are you haunted by? You will say--By nothing, but we are all haunted by something, generally by ourselves, or if are Christians, by our experience. The Psalmist says we are to be haunted by God. The abiding consciousness of the life is to be God, not thinking about Him. The whole of our life inside and out is to be absolutely haunted by the presence of God. A child's consciousness is so mother-haunted that although the child is not consciously thinking of his mother, yet when calamity arises, the relationship that abides is that of the mother. So we are to live and move and have our being in God (see Acts 17:28), to look at everything in relation to God, because the abiding consciousness of God pushes itself to the front all the time.
If we are haunted by God, nothing else can get in, no cares, no tribulation, no anxieties. We see now why Our Lord so emphasized the sin of worry. How can we dare be so utterly unbelieving when God is round about us? To be haunted by God is to have an effective barricade against all the onslaughts of the enemy.
"His soul shall dwell at ease. (Psalm 25:13)" In tribulation, misunderstanding, slander, in the midst of all these things, if our life is hid with Christ in God (Colossians 3:3), He will keep us at ease. We rob ourselves of the marvelous revelation of this abiding companionship of God. "God is our Refuge (Psalm 46:1)"--nothing can come through that shelter.
- From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition
Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition
My thoughts
The modern edition changes the word "haunted" to "obsessed." It seems like that changes the meaning and yet, haunted is a tough word to figure out. The dictionary says that "haunted" is showing signs of mental anguish or torment. It seems to be speaking of a power that overcomes a person. And then also today is "consciousness" which is changed to "awareness." That seems to be more in line with the idea. Yet, he speaks of a close relationship between a child to his mother. In that relationship it seems he is saying that the child may experience a difficulty and because there is so an intense closeness with his mother, the child immediately goes to mother. I saw this in our family with our children. Mom was the first name called in most situations, almost like it was unconscious. And so this is the relationship we as Christians are to have with God and to that end, the idea of "haunted" starts to make more sense. It speaks of this special connection or dependence the Christian has with God. And if that is occurring then worry really has no place in the life of the Christian. And that makes sense. When we are hid with Christ in God we are at ease. Thus, the word "haunted" seems to work better for it is a sort of antithesis of what we think with that word; a good "haunted."
I, too had some difficulty wrapping my head around the idea of being "haunted" by God. Especially given it's modern definition. In my research for my devotional journal I stumbled upon this page. Thank you for your insight!
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