Intimacy with Jesus.
It means being seen and known.
It is not just a feeling.
It is the truth of the soul, the depth of a person.
It is vulnerable.
It is trusting.
It is naked.
It is sweet.
It is refining.
It is every thought, desire and emotion laid bare before the totality of who Jesus is.
It is inviting.
This is what I have asked Jesus for for a long time now. I didn’t realize that I was frightened of being seen, of being known to such a deep level. I didn’t realize that He wanted to free me from that fear and that is why I had to face the fact that my flesh fears rejection. I didn’t realize that intimacy with Jesus meant addressing the pride I was carrying and being so broken that I would have to learn to ask my community for help, confessing every time that I experienced feeling or thinking pride.
But now I see, that Jesus brings these things to my attention to free me from them. What wondrous love is this! Just as Jesus embraced humanity, taking our sin within Himself and conquering it eternally, His Spirit within us allows us to face our human nature and be sanctified from the inside out. He has shown me that asking for help is strength, that confessing my pride and fear is freedom and that experiencing grief, anger and frustration are not sins, but opportunities to come to my Father.
It has taken me such a long time to come even to this place of saying that though I am still working out where I am, I love where I am. My walk can be walked by no one but me and I can walk no one elses walk for them. The only standard that exists is Jesus Christ and He already met that standard for me.
There are days where I sob at my brokenness at the ache of not feeling the Presence of the Holy Spirit and there are other times where I feel the depth of the work that the Holy Spirit is working in me and all I can say is that I experience wonder beyond words.
We are weak, but the Spirit within us is strong and so we throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. We count it all as garbage in the light of the eternal reward of Jesus. I want to encourage anyone reading this, that even if you feel nothing, if you are hurting or angry, if you are even doubting in the existence of God, continue to come to the foot of the cross. You are choosing reality. You are choosing Truth. If you feel like the least of these, if you are afraid to voice your deepest struggle, tell someone and when you feel that way or do that thing again, tell someone again! There is no condemnation only growth and freedom.
“Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 3:13-14)
If intimacy with Jesus seems daunting ask for it anyway. It is the best thing that I have ever received in my life! This is sanctification, this is a lifetime commitment with an eternal reward.
