Longing for Intimacy

Have you ever seen a romantic movie and wished that you were the girl falling in love, that you were the guy who was going to live happily ever after? Have you ever been in a relationship and felt like you couldn't trust the other person with your heart? Have you ever cried yourself to sleep at night because you felt like you were all alone and there was no one who understood?

Each of us longs to be loved. We crave to be important to someone. We desperately want to have the intimacy of a relationship where we can pour out our secrets dreams and doubts without fear.

The desire for intimacy goes deep into the soul of every person. We were created with the need for a relationship. There is a confidence and a happiness that comes from knowing that you are truly loved. If we don't feel loved, we begin looking for it in any way we can.

Our search for love takes on many different forms. We often look to fulfill ourselves through a relationship with another person. The relationship may go well for a while, but eventually the other person will break our trust, hurt our feelings, or not be able to live up to our needs. Depending on the situation, many decide to begin a new relationship or to try to find happiness in an activity or substance.

There is no amount of activity and no substance on earth that will satisfy our inner desire. The longing runs too deep to ever be filled with only a relationship or friendship with another person. Don't despair. Our need for intimacy was placed within us for a reason. God wants us to desire Him.

God is the ultimate romantic. He placed a longing deep inside our hearts because He wants us to come chasing after Him, like two lovers playing tag. He flirts with us through the situations in our lives, trying to get us to seek Him out. He longs to come riding to the rescue at the last moment, sweeping us off our feet and saving us from disaster.

King David described God's desire to be the hero in our lives in 2 Samuel 22:7-20:

"In my distress I called to the LORD; I called out to my God. From his temple he heard my voice; my cry came to his ears. The earth trembled and quaked, the foundations of the heavens shook; they trembled because he was angry. Smoke rose from his nostrils; consuming fire came from his mouth, burning coals blazed out of it. He parted the heavens and came down; dark clouds were under his feet. He mounted the cherubim and flew; he soared on the wings of the wind. He made darkness his canopy around him- the dark rain clouds of the sky. Out of the brightness of his presence bolts of lightning blazed forth.

"The LORD thundered from heaven; the voice of the Most High resounded. He shot arrows and scattered the enemies, bolts of lightning and routed them. The valleys of the sea were exposed and the foundations of the earth laid bare at the rebuke of the LORD, at the blast of breath from his nostrils. He reached down from on high and took hold of me; he drew me out of deep waters. He rescued me from my powerful enemy, from my foes, who were too strong for me. They confronted me in the day of my disaster, but the LORD was my support. He brought me out into a spacious place; he rescued me because he delighted in me."

God delights in us? He wants to rescue us? Wow! That's a little bit different than a god who created the earth and then just left mankind to itself. It certainly isn't a god who is out to inflict us with pain and suffering.

God wants to have an intimate relationship with us. It isn't a sexual intimacy at all; rather, He wants to be the lover of our hearts and souls. In the New Testament, the Church is often called the bride of Christ. When we finally reach heaven, we are immediately invited to a party, the marriage feast between the Christ and His bride, us.

Intimacy with God isn't like intimacy with another person. God will never let you down, He will never break your trust, and He will always be there for you. He wants to be your best friend. He wants you to share your heart with Him, all your secrets, fears, doubts, dreams, thoughts, and jokes. And do you know what? He wants to share His heart with us as well. He wants to share His personality, His words, His passions, and His dreams with everyone who is willing to listen.

The idea of being intimate with God may sound odd at first, but consider this: When you are intimate with another person, you desire to know everything about them and want to be with them as much as possible. That's exactly what God wants with us.

If you've never begun a relationship with God, He doesn't require you to become perfect before He'll talk with you. He'll accept you just as you are, no matter what you've done, no matter where you've been. Like King David, all you have to do is call on the name of the Lord. Romans 10:9-13 says:

"If you confess with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved. As the Scripture says, "Anyone who trusts in him will never be put to shame." For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile-the same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, for, "Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.""

To call on the name of the Lord, you can talk to Him out loud just like you would talk any friend. There isn't any special position or way to go about it. Just be sincere and He will be able to see the intentions of your heart.

If you call out to God and begin a relationship with Him, I would love to hear about it. I encourage you to begin reading the Bible and telling others about what you have done. As you move forward in your relationship with God, He may also reveal some things in your life that need to be changed. He wants what is best for us and so He often points out where we could improve, how we can avoid hurt, and how we can heal the wounds from our past. He speaks to us through the Bible, through others, and in the quiet of our hearts.

If you have already begun a relationship with God, but don't feel like it has been very intimate, I want to encourage you to pursue that intimacy until you find it. Jeremiah 29:11-12 says, "Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart."

When you don't talk with your best friend for a long time, the relationship will naturally go stale. Simply going to church will not make you more intimate with God. Would going to a meeting where someone talked about a friend of yours make you feel closer to that friend? Would your friendship improve? We cannot rely on others to bring us closer to God. James 4:8 says, "Come near to God and He will come near to you." Our relationships with God need to be personal relationships, relationships between us and God alone.

Have you ever looked at the characters in the Bible and marveled at the things they said, the miracles they performed, the way God provided for them? Have you ever wondered what they had that you don't, even though you are a Christian? I've had those thoughts before. I'm discovering that what I was missing was intimacy in my relationship with God.

How do you improve that relationship? Well, how much time do you spend with God? And how do you spend it? There is a direct correlation between our level of intimacy with God and how much we seek Him. Daily we are to enter His presence, with worship and prayer. Ephesians 6:10-18 talks about the armor of God, armor that we are to put on every day.

If you have trouble reading the Bible because it doesn't make sense or it seems boring, I encourage you to try two different things: Look for ways to apply what you read to your life and then do it. The Bible will come alive in a way that it never has before. Also, when you read, look for verses that reveal the character and personality of God. Write down each aspect on a sheet of paper and keep it in your Bible. You will find intimacy with God is easier when you know Him better.

In prayer, pour out your heart to God, but don't forget to listen as well. Ask Him to reveal His heart to you and He will. It may take practice to distinguish the voice of God, but you will learn to know His voice because He will first begin revealing areas in your life that aren't in line with His will.

Worship is the forgotten area in our approach to our relationships with God. I will devote a future blog entirely to worship, but for now I will say that there is a special anointing in worship that ushers us into the presence of God. You don't have to know any songs or be able to sing well to worship God, if you have to, just make up a single line and sing it over and over again. You can do it in your bedroom, in the shower, in the car, it doesn't matter, but it is vital that you learn to incorporate worship into your relationship with God.

If you're not where God wants you to be, you won't find Him, you won't feel His presence, and you won't experience His full blessing on your life. Seek God out with all of your heart. Find out where He wants you to be in your life and go there, because that is where you will experience the intimacy of His presence.

As you pursue God and discover the intimacy of a personal relationship with Him, I'd love to hear what happens in your life, either by email or in this blog. The same Spirit and power that raised Christ from the dead is available for all who call on God's name. I believe that as we experience greater intimacy with God, the even greater things than those that happened in the book of Acts will begin happening in our lives. Look for it.

It's going to be an adventure...