“I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm – neither hot nor cold – I am about to spit you out of my mouth…. Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me.” -Revelation 3:15-17, 20
If any verse in the Bible used to scare me, it was this one. Maybe it still does. God will spit someone out if they’re lukewarm, He’d rather have us be completely against Him! It’s just a verse that has always hit me pretty hard.
God not only wants a respectful relationship with us, he wants an intimate one. God cannot force us to love Him, to let Him into our lives. It’s the one thing He cannot do. Yet, it’s the one thing He desires most. “I stand at the door and knock.” He waits for us to let Him in, asks for our permission. What do we do in return? We create and follow rules. Instead of a relationship characterized by intimacy, we’ve opted for a relationship full of religious guidelines. Religion is all about getting what we can from God. We do the right thing in the hope that God will reward us in return. We get so engrossed in following the rules, crossing the T’s and dotting the I’s, that we become hardened. We put God into a religious box that we’ve created for Him. We design what we want Him to look like, and because of this, we become judgmental of others’ relationships and walks with God. They don’t follow Him the way that we do, therefore it must be wrong. “All this I have told you so that you will not fall away. They will put you out of the synagogue; in fact, the time is coming when anyone who kills you will think they are offering a service to God. They will do such things because they have not known the Father or me.” -John 16:1-3 Religion is not a relationship, it is not knowing God. Religion makes you a stranger to God’s love.
So what does an intimate relationship with God look like? My aunt bought me the devotional My Utmost for His Highest to read this year. In today’s entry, I read the most beautiful paragraph on an intimate friendship with God.
“When once we get intimate with Jesus, we are never lonely, we never need sympathy, we can pour out all the time without being pathetic. The saint who is intimate with Jesus will never leave impressions of himself, but only the impression that Jesus is having His unhindered way, because the last abyss of his nature has been satisfied by Jesus. The only impression left by such a life is that of the strong, calm sanity that our Lord gives to those who are intimate with Him.”
I love this imagery! What would it be like to be fully satisfied by Jesus? To have such a strong, unshakeable faith? To be completely, head over heels in love with our Savior? This is such a deep desire for me. I constantly ask God to give me a hunger and desire that only He can fulfill, and I’m always asking and looking for ways to get into a deeper relationship with Him. In one of Andy Stanley’s sermons, he gives three points of advice to have a more intimate relationship with God.
- Give God time. We get so busy with our lives, putting our time into others, our jobs, and life that we forget to give our time to the most important person. God wants to spend time each day with you. Un-rushed, unscripted, private time with His child. He wants to know you and let you get to know Him. How can we get to a deeper point with Him if we refuse to spend any quality time with Him?
- Be transparent with God. No matter how pathetic or unimportant you feel that your feelings are, God wants to hear them. He wants you to be real with Him. Pour out your heart to Him, every honest detail. Know that God accepts and loves every part of you. Besides, He already knows it all anyway right? Why not invite Him into every part of your heart?
- Be submissive to God. Andy stated that for a relationship to work, both people must be submissive to each other. They must both be looking out for the good of the other person above the good of themselves. The same is true between us and God. The difference is, God has already made the first move. He already laid down His life so that we can be with Him. It’s the ultimate form of submission, the ultimate sacrifice. God’s already made His move, His show of love for us. What will we do in return? Are we willing to submit and live our lives in an intimate relationship with our Savior?
God does not want to be a part of our lives because He has forced His way in, He wants to be invited in. He wants you to want Him in your life. “Here I am! I stand at the door and knock.” He is patiently waiting for us to invite Him into our lives.
This is what I want. I guess you could say it’s my goal for the year, something I’m striving for. I want an intimate relationship with God. I want to be fully satisfied by Him, to have my life feel fulfilled and be able to say that it’s only because of Jesus that I live and feel the way I do. I’m so excited about this year! I can’t wait to see what God has in store for me and the adventures He has waiting. But more than anything, I’m excited to grow closer to God than I ever have before, to get to know Him in such a way that His presence is undeniable to me in every part of my life, and to live my life moment by moment, giving each and every one up to Him.
Can I sit with You a while?
Can you hold me? I’m Your child.
Can I come to You with words so few and
rest inside Your arms?
Can I sit with You a while?
Can I listen to Your heart?
Can I feel it beat with mine?
I’ve come to love the way You cover me
with who You are.
Can I listen to Your heart?
What better friend, what better Father?
No greater King, no other Savior.
My only God, my perfect lover,
here I am for you.
-Steve Fee
