Searching the Whole Earth

There's been a lot of coverage on the Holy Spirit in the Scripture readings lately. Yesterday I was reminded in Romans 8 that the Holy Spirit prays for us. Imagine that - the One whose breath gives us life prays for us. The One who can pray perfectly, whether or not His groanings can be heard or uttered by humans, is praying for us. That's empowering! As if that weren't enough, the Lord reminded me today that His Spirit searches the whole earth in order to strengthen those whose hearts are completely His (2 Chr 16:9)! The first person to whom that message was told was seeking after God and military strength. Thus, that word was meant to encourage him to place his trust fully in the Lord. It seems to me, though, that we do similar things. We place our trust in the Lord, remain faithful to Him with all the faith we can muster, and also seek our "best" interests on the side. The obvious problem with this is that our trust in the Lord isn't wholehearted if we're not trusting Him with our best interests. It encourages us that the Lord who made us is looking for faithful hearts to strengthen. He doesn't ask for our worship and leave us to figure it out alone; He strengthens us! He doesn't ask for our ministry only to sit and watch whether we can do it; He strengthens us! Yet again, the law of sowing and reaping comes into play in the common expression "Draw near to the Lord, and He will draw near to you."