True Relationship With Jesus
A true relationship with Jesus starts when we have come to Him for forgiveness and confessed our sins and invited Him into our heart and life. We recognize that we were hell-bound but, through the blood of Jesus and through His great sacrifice in which He paid the penalty for sin for us, we can turn 180 degrees and be Heaven bound. But this is only the start of a relationship. There is so much more for us.
Some people think that going to church, or going to religious events, or having head knowledge is good enough. But though these things are good, and we should do them, a relationship with Jesus is deeper than these.
This relationship we are talking about is something that is as intimate, or more intimate, than any other relationship we may have. Just that fact that Christ dwells in us, as Ephesians 3:17 intimates, reveals to us the depth of the relationship Jesus desires. As one says, He is “an indwelling presence rather than a distant association.”
A personal association with the Lord involves something that is constant, a fellowship with Him that is regular and special. We all have friends with whom we like to be and like to get together. We enjoy being with them and enjoy the fellowship. Jesus, in John 15:15, says that He does not call us servants but He calls us friends. There is no friend like Jesus. He is a friend that sticks closer than a brother. He desires fellowship and enjoyment. He desires our company. And He desires it more than every once in a while. He wants it to be daily.
One writer says, “. It is natural for Christians to long to experience the closeness of an intimate relationship with God. But true intimacy with God is not simply a feeling on a par with a romantic relationship. It goes much deeper than emotion, down to our very souls and reflected by our actions.”
I finish with this statement from A.W. Tozer: “I have often wished that there were some way to bring modern Christians into a deeper spiritual life painlessly by short easy lessons, but such wishes are vain. No shortcut exists! God has not bowed to our nervous haste nor embraced the methods of our … age. It is well that we accept the hard truth now: the man who would know God must give time to Him! He must count no time wasted, which is spent in the cultivation of His acquaintance.”
I trust God will help all of us to do what it takes to have this true relationship with Jesus!