Intimacy Chapel
|
|
| ||||||||
Intimacy with God—Week 1
This morning, I’d like to share with you a little bit about where I am in my own life. That’s probably always the best place to start. I have no interest in teaching you theory or good ideas I’ve not put into practice. Today, I’d like to share with you who God is for me.
I grew up in a Christian family. I read through the Bible I don’t know how many times by the time I graduated from high school. As I matured in the faith, I went through the normal shifts in development and thinking. In high school, I decided that my parents’ faith was my own. In college, I learned how to listen to God in prayer. Post college, I tried to figure out how to do the ‘Christian thing’ without the support structure I had in college. But several years back everything shifted again for me. I was doing my normal Bible reading. The particular passage was from John.
[slide]
“You study the Scriptures diligently because you think that in them you possess eternal life. These are the very Scriptures that testify about me, yet you refuse to come to me to have life. (John 5:39-40)
The Holy Spirit put his finger on my heart and said, “This is you”. Thus began my journey of developing intimacy with God. No longer was it okay for me to go through the religious exercises without engaging my heart. I had to learn to take my entire set of Christian disciplines and set them to the purpose of fulfilling the greatest commandment: to love the Lord with all my heart, mind, soul, and strength. Over the last 6 years I’ve learned quite a bit about the shift from learning about God to learning to love Him; both by failing and succeeding. I’ve also gone through a shift in identity. What I think is important—the way I define success—all of it changed. That’s what I want to talk about this morning.
However, before we can get into that we’ve got to cover some common ground, a foundation if you will, so there is at least a reference point for where I’m coming from. Let’s start with some Scriptures, which talk about our position as Believers in Jesus.
[slide]
On that day [the giving of the Holy Spirit] you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you. (John 14:20)
The Holy Spirit is in us, and we in turn are hidden in Christ. And again later on in John:
[slide]
“…that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— I in them and you in me—...” (John 17:21-23)
The Father is in the Son and the Son is in the Father. We are in both of them. God gave us his glory (the Holy Spirit) so that we can enter into this divine relationship. We are actually invited into the community of the Trinity.
[slide]
“But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus…” (Eph 2:4-6)
According to Paul in Eph, even though you are here, sitting in these rather comfortable plastic chairs, you are currently seated in heaven with Christ. Why? Because Jesus ascended into heaven after the resurrection and you are in Christ. You are where He is.
"I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. (John 15:5)
Everything we do that has lasting impact comes from our relationship with Christ. Notice also that your calling here is to remain in Jesus.
[slide]
"As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. (John 15:9)
Okay, the ramifications of this one are huge. God the Son loves you just like God the Father loves God the Son. The persons of the Trinity love you just like they love each other. You are loved absolutely and perfectly. And again, God calls you to remain in his love. Which means: you have the ability to ‘not remain’. We’ll talk about that later. God’s not going stop loving you; he’s pretty much made up his mind there. While we were still at war with him, love motivated the Father to send his Son to redeem us.
So, remaining in Christ’s love must have something to do with our end of the relationship—our experience of his love. Our identity and self-worth root themselves in that relationship. Our personal holiness stems from that relationship. Our interactions with other people and all our good deeds blossom from this relationship with the God of the Universe. It’s the place we live from.
Okay, let’s do a little visual aid. When you got saved, you entered into the middle of a love relationship that’s been happening since before the world began; the love between God the Father and God the Son.
[slide x3] [explain as the images appear]
God, in his sovereignty and complete intentionality, places you in the Son. You are now involved in the most dynamic love relationship ever because you are in Christ. God designed it so you can enter into this community because he is in the process of preparing a Bride for the Son. By design, you are in the way of the love between the Father and the Son. By design, you are meant to get caught up in it. The Father loves you. The Son loves you. The Holy Spirit loves you and it’s his job to make sure you remain in that place of love between the Father and the Son. It’s also your job to remain there.
Let’s come at this from a different angle.
[slide]
“The way we come into salvation is the way it is sustained.” – Graham Cooke
When you became a Christian was it your idea? Did you say to yourself “Self, I think I’ll believe in Jesus today”? No. The Holy Spirit invaded your life and you responded. We are saved by faith through grace and that itself is a gift from God.
[slide]
The rest of the Christian life is like that; everything begins with God. He initiates; we respond. We love because he first loved us (1 John 4:19). We don’t need to perform in order for God to love us. In fact, that’s the anti-gospel. You do absolutely nothing to earn God’s love. His love is totally and completely self-reliant. He loves because that’s who He is; that’s what He’s like. Your loved and there’s nothing you can do about it so you might as well get used to it. You are in Christ.
So then, as a Christian, what’s your primary purpose and responsibility? You are called to stay in that place of love. All of your actions; all of your thoughts; all of your dreams are to this purpose: remain in that place of love. You don’t have to work to get there. If you believe in Jesus, you are already in Christ. There are no special prayers; no secret words; you begin your journey in that place of love.
Some of you, like me, have stepped out of that place of intimacy and the Lord is calling you back this morning. He’s calling you back from the works-based righteousness. He’s calling you back from salvation through good grades. He’s calling you back from self-hatred. He’s calling you back from just not caring any more. He’s calling you back to the beginning—he’s calling you to remain in His love.
Let’s pray. Father, we ask you to restore us to our first love. Restore us to the simplicity of being loved by you. Teach us to remain in your love. Father, we want to relate to you based on your consistent nature and not based on our fickle emotions. We want to agree with who You say You are and who You say we are. You say you will never change your heart towards us. You say we are loved. You say you are faithful. You say you will never leave us or turn your back on us. We want our lives to come into alignment with your word. Father, we ask for a revelation of your love for us. Give us a glimpse of the fiery passion you feel towards your church. God, we ask that you would teach us to remain in your love.
End Week 1
This morning, I’d like to share with you a little bit about where I am in my own life. That’s probably always the best place to start. I have no interest in teaching you theory or good ideas I’ve not put into practice. Today, I’d like to share with you who God is for me.
I grew up in a Christian family. I read through the Bible I don’t know how many times by the time I graduated from high school. As I matured in the faith, I went through the normal shifts in development and thinking. In high school, I decided that my parents’ faith was my own. In college, I learned how to listen to God in prayer. Post college, I tried to figure out how to do the ‘Christian thing’ without the support structure I had in college. But several years back everything shifted again for me. I was doing my normal Bible reading. The particular passage was from John.
[slide]
“You study the Scriptures diligently because you think that in them you possess eternal life. These are the very Scriptures that testify about me, yet you refuse to come to me to have life. (John 5:39-40)
The Holy Spirit put his finger on my heart and said, “This is you”. Thus began my journey of developing intimacy with God. No longer was it okay for me to go through the religious exercises without engaging my heart. I had to learn to take my entire set of Christian disciplines and set them to the purpose of fulfilling the greatest commandment: to love the Lord with all my heart, mind, soul, and strength. Over the last 6 years I’ve learned quite a bit about the shift from learning about God to learning to love Him; both by failing and succeeding. I’ve also gone through a shift in identity. What I think is important—the way I define success—all of it changed. That’s what I want to talk about this morning.
However, before we can get into that we’ve got to cover some common ground, a foundation if you will, so there is at least a reference point for where I’m coming from. Let’s start with some Scriptures, which talk about our position as Believers in Jesus.
[slide]
On that day [the giving of the Holy Spirit] you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you. (John 14:20)
The Holy Spirit is in us, and we in turn are hidden in Christ. And again later on in John:
[slide]
“…that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— I in them and you in me—...” (John 17:21-23)
The Father is in the Son and the Son is in the Father. We are in both of them. God gave us his glory (the Holy Spirit) so that we can enter into this divine relationship. We are actually invited into the community of the Trinity.
[slide]
“But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus…” (Eph 2:4-6)
According to Paul in Eph, even though you are here, sitting in these rather comfortable plastic chairs, you are currently seated in heaven with Christ. Why? Because Jesus ascended into heaven after the resurrection and you are in Christ. You are where He is.
"I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. (John 15:5)
Everything we do that has lasting impact comes from our relationship with Christ. Notice also that your calling here is to remain in Jesus.
[slide]
"As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. (John 15:9)
Okay, the ramifications of this one are huge. God the Son loves you just like God the Father loves God the Son. The persons of the Trinity love you just like they love each other. You are loved absolutely and perfectly. And again, God calls you to remain in his love. Which means: you have the ability to ‘not remain’. We’ll talk about that later. God’s not going stop loving you; he’s pretty much made up his mind there. While we were still at war with him, love motivated the Father to send his Son to redeem us.
So, remaining in Christ’s love must have something to do with our end of the relationship—our experience of his love. Our identity and self-worth root themselves in that relationship. Our personal holiness stems from that relationship. Our interactions with other people and all our good deeds blossom from this relationship with the God of the Universe. It’s the place we live from.
Okay, let’s do a little visual aid. When you got saved, you entered into the middle of a love relationship that’s been happening since before the world began; the love between God the Father and God the Son.
[slide x3] [explain as the images appear]
God, in his sovereignty and complete intentionality, places you in the Son. You are now involved in the most dynamic love relationship ever because you are in Christ. God designed it so you can enter into this community because he is in the process of preparing a Bride for the Son. By design, you are in the way of the love between the Father and the Son. By design, you are meant to get caught up in it. The Father loves you. The Son loves you. The Holy Spirit loves you and it’s his job to make sure you remain in that place of love between the Father and the Son. It’s also your job to remain there.
Let’s come at this from a different angle.
[slide]
“The way we come into salvation is the way it is sustained.” – Graham Cooke
When you became a Christian was it your idea? Did you say to yourself “Self, I think I’ll believe in Jesus today”? No. The Holy Spirit invaded your life and you responded. We are saved by faith through grace and that itself is a gift from God.
[slide]
The rest of the Christian life is like that; everything begins with God. He initiates; we respond. We love because he first loved us (1 John 4:19). We don’t need to perform in order for God to love us. In fact, that’s the anti-gospel. You do absolutely nothing to earn God’s love. His love is totally and completely self-reliant. He loves because that’s who He is; that’s what He’s like. Your loved and there’s nothing you can do about it so you might as well get used to it. You are in Christ.
So then, as a Christian, what’s your primary purpose and responsibility? You are called to stay in that place of love. All of your actions; all of your thoughts; all of your dreams are to this purpose: remain in that place of love. You don’t have to work to get there. If you believe in Jesus, you are already in Christ. There are no special prayers; no secret words; you begin your journey in that place of love.
Some of you, like me, have stepped out of that place of intimacy and the Lord is calling you back this morning. He’s calling you back from the works-based righteousness. He’s calling you back from salvation through good grades. He’s calling you back from self-hatred. He’s calling you back from just not caring any more. He’s calling you back to the beginning—he’s calling you to remain in His love.
Let’s pray. Father, we ask you to restore us to our first love. Restore us to the simplicity of being loved by you. Teach us to remain in your love. Father, we want to relate to you based on your consistent nature and not based on our fickle emotions. We want to agree with who You say You are and who You say we are. You say you will never change your heart towards us. You say we are loved. You say you are faithful. You say you will never leave us or turn your back on us. We want our lives to come into alignment with your word. Father, we ask for a revelation of your love for us. Give us a glimpse of the fiery passion you feel towards your church. God, we ask that you would teach us to remain in your love.
End Week 1
Intimacy with God: Week 2—Christian Success
Last week we talked about God’s call in our lives to remain—to be with him. We talked about how the Lord invites us into the community of the Trinity. Remember, we had the cute Fisher Price Godhead? Today I want to pick up on that theme and expand it a little bit. Last week we only focused on Jesus’ sayings. But he’s not the only one who beat this drum.
There are stories we gloss over in the Bible when this isn’t our paradigm. Most of them are familiar, but we miss the details.
[slide]
“Jesus went up on a mountainside and called to him those he wanted, and they came to him. He appointed twelve—designating them apostles—that they might be with him and that he might send them out to preach” (Mark 3:13,14)
In the following verses, the apostles are given the authority to heal the sick, cast out demons, and raise the dead. Yet, their primary calling was to be with him. The same goes for you; you are called to be with him.
We actually see this later on in the book on Acts when the Sanhedrin grills Peter and John about preaching Jesus in the Temple.
“When they saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus” (Acts 4: 13).
The Apostle’s calling was to be with Jesus, and here those opposing the Gospel recognize the calling. These guys had been with Jesus.
Lest you think this a New Testament phenomenon, let’s take a look at an Old Testament example. Here, Moses has just successfully saved the Israelites from destruction after the golden calf incident at Mount Sinai. In Exodus 33, we pick up in the middle of a conversation between God and Moses, which illustrates the point. God has just told Moses that He’s not going with the Israelites because He might destroy them. Moses protests and here’s where we pick up the conversation.
[slide]
‘The LORD replied, "My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest." Then Moses said to him, "If your Presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here. How will anyone know that you are pleased with me and with your people unless you go with us? What else will distinguish me and your people from all the other people on the face of the earth?"’ (Ex 33:14-16)
The Presence of the Most High, not signs and wonders, distinguishes us as His people in the earth. God has been completely intentional about this throughout Scripture. We are made to be a people of his presence.
With this as our backdrop—the centrality of remaining in relationship with the Lord—then how should we live? What does a successful life look like? Let’s even take it down a notch; what does normal success in the Christian life look like? Is it a good night at youth group? Is it a chapel that’s mildly entertaining? Is it your friends coming to know Jesus? Is it holiness breaking forth in our community? Is it revival in our schools? Those are all good things but you cannot make any of them happen. When you set your self-worth on achieving things you cannot control, you set yourself up for failure. As a child of the Most High, your only measure of success is that God loves you and that you love God. As a child of the King, my priority isn’t to ‘do’ stuff for the Kingdom; it’s to be with him, to remain. Everything else is peripheral. Important? Yes, but secondary non-the-less. Absolutely everything comes down to remaining in relationship with Jesus.
I can almost hear the objections. ‘But we’re to live lives of holiness.’ ‘Evangelism is important.’ ‘Our lives are supposed to produce fruit.’ I agree with every one of those statements. However, those are not the motivations of our lives. I do not live a life of holiness because it is expected of me. I do live a holy life but that’s because when I sin my heart is saddened. I feel as though I’ve put up a barrier between the Lord and myself. My ability to receive His love for me is distorted. The sweetness of knowing his embrace turns sin to dust and ashes in my mouth. Why do I stay away from sin? Pure and simple—there is no joy in it. I cannot have both God and the evil desires of my heart at the same time. He won’t let me. He’s a jealous God. He wants my heart for himself. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.
We don’t fix an area of our life simply by deciding we’re going to be nicer, or more honest, or more pure in our thought life. It’s a start and it may even work for a while. But on our own, we cannot resist the working of sin in our lives and hearts. This of course flies in the face of our middle class work ethic. It’s not as though once we got saved we can simply say to God “okay Jesus, thanks for the jump start but I’ll take it from here”. We change by being changed. It is something, which happens to us. Granted, we partner in the process but we do not initiate the process. We spend time with the One who is kind, who is truth, and who is righteous and we find, slowly, we begin to look like him. Paul talks about this in 2 Corinthians.
[slide]
“And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord's glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.” (2 Cor. 3:18)
Notice how we are transformed. As we contemplate the Lord’s glory—as we gaze upon his beauty we begin to look like him. We become what we behold.
It comes down to this: you cannot produce spiritual fruit in you life simply by trying really hard. It’s grace. Apple trees don’t produce apples because they’re really dedicated to the cause of producing fruit. They produce apples whether they want to or not. If you are investing your time in the Lord and deepening your relationship with Him, your life will produce fruit. If you are properly connected to the vine, you will produce fruit. Can you resist the Lord’s work in your life? Yes, that’s why Jesus continually gave the command to remain in his love and to not grieve the Holy Spirit. But if you’re constantly resisting the promptings of the Holy Spirit in your life then you need to check your relationship with Him.
Okay being a person of the Reformed persuasion I fell compelled to make a side comment about this because of my community’s strong attraction to an acronym: TULIP.
[slide]
When we talk about Irresistible Grace, we have to be clear about what we’re talking about.
[Series of slides for Canons of Dordt--don’t explain them just cycle through them] (3rd and 4th point Rejection of Errors 8, and 5th point, Articles 4 and 5)
When the Cannons of Dordt discuss the fact that “humans cannot resist God’s grace to bend their wills to faith and conversion”, it is only talking about conversion. It’s referring to justification not sanctification.
[slide]
When you were dead in your sin, you could not choose God. Now that you are alive in Christ, in essence, you are learning how to choose God. The Holy Spirit is teaching you how to partner with him in the redemptive process.
Doctrine is great stuff. In fact our faith is never less than Doctrine and Creeds. But what you may not do is assume that an intellectual assent to a set of rules, which are simply meant to serve as demarcation barriers, as boundary lines in the faith, substitutes a life giving relationship with the Savior of the Universe. The Pharisees did that and Jesus ripped them up one side and down the other for their mistake and he did the same thing to me. Let’s make sure in our life of faith, we do not lose sight that the purpose of learning about God is to lead us deeper into relationship with him.
All that was to say, you can’t take your lack of a relationship with the Lord and make it His fault. It’s completely inappropriate to say that since God feels far away from you right now that he hasn’t given you the grace to pursue him. Those are excuses, not truth. The truth is: if you’ve accepted Jesus as your Savior, God lives inside of you. All you have to do is return to the place of remaining in his love. Simply start over. The Bible calls that ‘returning to your first love’. God, in his sovereignty, has set up this relationship with certain parameters. He will always do his part, but he won’t do your part for you.
You have to put time and effort into this relationship. He won’t force you to remain in him. You have to hole yourself up in your room, unplug the computer and turn off the phone and learn to be with him. You have a very real choice. He won’t force your heart towards him. It is a decision only you can make. That’s why the Bible tells us not to resist the Holy Spirit—because it can be done. Cultivating a relationship with the Lord takes diligent and consistent work. This takes time. If you say ‘yes’ to the Lord in this, realize that every ‘yes’ is followed by hundreds of ‘no’s.
Let’s end with some prayer. Father, we ask your forgiveness for not doing our part in this relationship. Forgive us for wanting everything else more than we want you. We ask for the grace to start over. Teach us to create space in our lives for you. Teach us to steal spare moments just to be with you. Father, from that deepening of relationship, we ask that you would begin to change our hearts. Help us begin to find our identity in you. Change our definitions of success. God, teach us to remain in your love.
Last week we talked about God’s call in our lives to remain—to be with him. We talked about how the Lord invites us into the community of the Trinity. Remember, we had the cute Fisher Price Godhead? Today I want to pick up on that theme and expand it a little bit. Last week we only focused on Jesus’ sayings. But he’s not the only one who beat this drum.
There are stories we gloss over in the Bible when this isn’t our paradigm. Most of them are familiar, but we miss the details.
[slide]
“Jesus went up on a mountainside and called to him those he wanted, and they came to him. He appointed twelve—designating them apostles—that they might be with him and that he might send them out to preach” (Mark 3:13,14)
In the following verses, the apostles are given the authority to heal the sick, cast out demons, and raise the dead. Yet, their primary calling was to be with him. The same goes for you; you are called to be with him.
We actually see this later on in the book on Acts when the Sanhedrin grills Peter and John about preaching Jesus in the Temple.
“When they saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus” (Acts 4: 13).
The Apostle’s calling was to be with Jesus, and here those opposing the Gospel recognize the calling. These guys had been with Jesus.
Lest you think this a New Testament phenomenon, let’s take a look at an Old Testament example. Here, Moses has just successfully saved the Israelites from destruction after the golden calf incident at Mount Sinai. In Exodus 33, we pick up in the middle of a conversation between God and Moses, which illustrates the point. God has just told Moses that He’s not going with the Israelites because He might destroy them. Moses protests and here’s where we pick up the conversation.
[slide]
‘The LORD replied, "My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest." Then Moses said to him, "If your Presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here. How will anyone know that you are pleased with me and with your people unless you go with us? What else will distinguish me and your people from all the other people on the face of the earth?"’ (Ex 33:14-16)
The Presence of the Most High, not signs and wonders, distinguishes us as His people in the earth. God has been completely intentional about this throughout Scripture. We are made to be a people of his presence.
With this as our backdrop—the centrality of remaining in relationship with the Lord—then how should we live? What does a successful life look like? Let’s even take it down a notch; what does normal success in the Christian life look like? Is it a good night at youth group? Is it a chapel that’s mildly entertaining? Is it your friends coming to know Jesus? Is it holiness breaking forth in our community? Is it revival in our schools? Those are all good things but you cannot make any of them happen. When you set your self-worth on achieving things you cannot control, you set yourself up for failure. As a child of the Most High, your only measure of success is that God loves you and that you love God. As a child of the King, my priority isn’t to ‘do’ stuff for the Kingdom; it’s to be with him, to remain. Everything else is peripheral. Important? Yes, but secondary non-the-less. Absolutely everything comes down to remaining in relationship with Jesus.
I can almost hear the objections. ‘But we’re to live lives of holiness.’ ‘Evangelism is important.’ ‘Our lives are supposed to produce fruit.’ I agree with every one of those statements. However, those are not the motivations of our lives. I do not live a life of holiness because it is expected of me. I do live a holy life but that’s because when I sin my heart is saddened. I feel as though I’ve put up a barrier between the Lord and myself. My ability to receive His love for me is distorted. The sweetness of knowing his embrace turns sin to dust and ashes in my mouth. Why do I stay away from sin? Pure and simple—there is no joy in it. I cannot have both God and the evil desires of my heart at the same time. He won’t let me. He’s a jealous God. He wants my heart for himself. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.
We don’t fix an area of our life simply by deciding we’re going to be nicer, or more honest, or more pure in our thought life. It’s a start and it may even work for a while. But on our own, we cannot resist the working of sin in our lives and hearts. This of course flies in the face of our middle class work ethic. It’s not as though once we got saved we can simply say to God “okay Jesus, thanks for the jump start but I’ll take it from here”. We change by being changed. It is something, which happens to us. Granted, we partner in the process but we do not initiate the process. We spend time with the One who is kind, who is truth, and who is righteous and we find, slowly, we begin to look like him. Paul talks about this in 2 Corinthians.
[slide]
“And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord's glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.” (2 Cor. 3:18)
Notice how we are transformed. As we contemplate the Lord’s glory—as we gaze upon his beauty we begin to look like him. We become what we behold.
It comes down to this: you cannot produce spiritual fruit in you life simply by trying really hard. It’s grace. Apple trees don’t produce apples because they’re really dedicated to the cause of producing fruit. They produce apples whether they want to or not. If you are investing your time in the Lord and deepening your relationship with Him, your life will produce fruit. If you are properly connected to the vine, you will produce fruit. Can you resist the Lord’s work in your life? Yes, that’s why Jesus continually gave the command to remain in his love and to not grieve the Holy Spirit. But if you’re constantly resisting the promptings of the Holy Spirit in your life then you need to check your relationship with Him.
Okay being a person of the Reformed persuasion I fell compelled to make a side comment about this because of my community’s strong attraction to an acronym: TULIP.
[slide]
When we talk about Irresistible Grace, we have to be clear about what we’re talking about.
[Series of slides for Canons of Dordt--don’t explain them just cycle through them] (3rd and 4th point Rejection of Errors 8, and 5th point, Articles 4 and 5)
When the Cannons of Dordt discuss the fact that “humans cannot resist God’s grace to bend their wills to faith and conversion”, it is only talking about conversion. It’s referring to justification not sanctification.
[slide]
When you were dead in your sin, you could not choose God. Now that you are alive in Christ, in essence, you are learning how to choose God. The Holy Spirit is teaching you how to partner with him in the redemptive process.
Doctrine is great stuff. In fact our faith is never less than Doctrine and Creeds. But what you may not do is assume that an intellectual assent to a set of rules, which are simply meant to serve as demarcation barriers, as boundary lines in the faith, substitutes a life giving relationship with the Savior of the Universe. The Pharisees did that and Jesus ripped them up one side and down the other for their mistake and he did the same thing to me. Let’s make sure in our life of faith, we do not lose sight that the purpose of learning about God is to lead us deeper into relationship with him.
All that was to say, you can’t take your lack of a relationship with the Lord and make it His fault. It’s completely inappropriate to say that since God feels far away from you right now that he hasn’t given you the grace to pursue him. Those are excuses, not truth. The truth is: if you’ve accepted Jesus as your Savior, God lives inside of you. All you have to do is return to the place of remaining in his love. Simply start over. The Bible calls that ‘returning to your first love’. God, in his sovereignty, has set up this relationship with certain parameters. He will always do his part, but he won’t do your part for you.
You have to put time and effort into this relationship. He won’t force you to remain in him. You have to hole yourself up in your room, unplug the computer and turn off the phone and learn to be with him. You have a very real choice. He won’t force your heart towards him. It is a decision only you can make. That’s why the Bible tells us not to resist the Holy Spirit—because it can be done. Cultivating a relationship with the Lord takes diligent and consistent work. This takes time. If you say ‘yes’ to the Lord in this, realize that every ‘yes’ is followed by hundreds of ‘no’s.
Let’s end with some prayer. Father, we ask your forgiveness for not doing our part in this relationship. Forgive us for wanting everything else more than we want you. We ask for the grace to start over. Teach us to create space in our lives for you. Teach us to steal spare moments just to be with you. Father, from that deepening of relationship, we ask that you would begin to change our hearts. Help us begin to find our identity in you. Change our definitions of success. God, teach us to remain in your love.
Intimacy - additional thoughts
But what does ‘intimacy’ with God look like? How do we ‘go deeper’. Those are phrases we can use a lot in the Christian life, but until we attach real meanings to them, they simply become jargon we use to make ourselves feel guilty for not doing them. How do we bridge the gap between what Scripture says and the reality of our experience? How do we begin to move into a place where the beauty of Christ rivals the television, or sports, or music, or whatever you hold dear in life? I’ve already been talking for a long time and this is a dangerous topic because I could talk for weeks on it. In fact, I teach a Prayer Class at NMCS devoted to this one thing: A place actually exists, in this life, where we can pursue the greatest commandment: to love the Lord God with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength.
So how do you develop intimacy? You read your Bible. You Pray. You attend church regularly. You serve in your local community. You already know all that. I already knew all that. But there is much more to each of those simple answers. We don’t just read the Bible like we read a novel. We don’t just come to God with our list of requests and complaints. Cultivating a relationship with the Lord takes diligent and consistent work. If you say ‘yes’ to the Lord in this, realize that every ‘yes’ is followed by hundreds of ‘no’s. This will take time.
[slide]
There are 4 areas I think worth mentioning but I’ll only talk about the first two.
Bible Reading: Devotional vs. Informational
Prayer: Listening and Asking
Community: Journeying with others
Fasting: Speeding up the process
Father, we come to you this evening as your children. We love how you love us. We don’t understand it, but we love it. We ask that you would give us a revelation of your heart for us. Give us understanding about who you are and what you’re like. We ask you to teach us how to pray. Teach us how to develop our relationship with you. We’re tired of excuses. We’re done with all the rationalizations. Father, we hear your call and by your grace we say ‘yes’.
Holy Spirit, we invite you to move in this place. Hover over us. Birth life in us. Change our hearts. Give us a willingness to lay down our rights in order to receive the best. Don’t let us be satisfied with meaningless things. Don’t let our hearts be so easily entertained that we never get around to hungering and thirsting after more of you. Remove the callousness. Remove the hard parts of our hearts and replace them with willingness and a desire to be with you God.
Awaken a groan in our hearts for your Presence. We want to hunger and thirst. We want our bodies to long for more of you Jesus. We don’t want to be satisfied with other peoples’ stories. We don’t want to be satisfied with stories of how you’ve moved in previous generations. With the psalmist, we want to see your power and your glory. We want our faces to shine like Moses. We want to gaze on your beauty and be transformed into your likeness. We want you. We want nothing but you. Teach us to tend our hearts. Teach us to remain in you.
But what does ‘intimacy’ with God look like? How do we ‘go deeper’. Those are phrases we can use a lot in the Christian life, but until we attach real meanings to them, they simply become jargon we use to make ourselves feel guilty for not doing them. How do we bridge the gap between what Scripture says and the reality of our experience? How do we begin to move into a place where the beauty of Christ rivals the television, or sports, or music, or whatever you hold dear in life? I’ve already been talking for a long time and this is a dangerous topic because I could talk for weeks on it. In fact, I teach a Prayer Class at NMCS devoted to this one thing: A place actually exists, in this life, where we can pursue the greatest commandment: to love the Lord God with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength.
So how do you develop intimacy? You read your Bible. You Pray. You attend church regularly. You serve in your local community. You already know all that. I already knew all that. But there is much more to each of those simple answers. We don’t just read the Bible like we read a novel. We don’t just come to God with our list of requests and complaints. Cultivating a relationship with the Lord takes diligent and consistent work. If you say ‘yes’ to the Lord in this, realize that every ‘yes’ is followed by hundreds of ‘no’s. This will take time.
[slide]
There are 4 areas I think worth mentioning but I’ll only talk about the first two.
Bible Reading: Devotional vs. Informational
Prayer: Listening and Asking
Community: Journeying with others
Fasting: Speeding up the process
Father, we come to you this evening as your children. We love how you love us. We don’t understand it, but we love it. We ask that you would give us a revelation of your heart for us. Give us understanding about who you are and what you’re like. We ask you to teach us how to pray. Teach us how to develop our relationship with you. We’re tired of excuses. We’re done with all the rationalizations. Father, we hear your call and by your grace we say ‘yes’.
Holy Spirit, we invite you to move in this place. Hover over us. Birth life in us. Change our hearts. Give us a willingness to lay down our rights in order to receive the best. Don’t let us be satisfied with meaningless things. Don’t let our hearts be so easily entertained that we never get around to hungering and thirsting after more of you. Remove the callousness. Remove the hard parts of our hearts and replace them with willingness and a desire to be with you God.
Awaken a groan in our hearts for your Presence. We want to hunger and thirst. We want our bodies to long for more of you Jesus. We don’t want to be satisfied with other peoples’ stories. We don’t want to be satisfied with stories of how you’ve moved in previous generations. With the psalmist, we want to see your power and your glory. We want our faces to shine like Moses. We want to gaze on your beauty and be transformed into your likeness. We want you. We want nothing but you. Teach us to tend our hearts. Teach us to remain in you.
