If left untended, friendships wither.
Relationships take effort.
Our relationship with God can be the first one we allow to slack when life gets too challenging, too amazing, or too busy. We forget that this is the most important one, for so many reasons.
When we enter into communion with Jesus, allowing us access to the Father, we need to remember that it cannot be a one-sided relationship. It takes the effort of nurturing as we spend time with him. God’s sovereignty and saving grace through Jesus hopefully motivate us to love him more in gratitude and honor.
I find it helpful to compare components of human relationships with aspects of relationship with the Lord. Both need two-way communication and getting to know each other. Those necessitate time spent together and, ideally, sharing experiences with one another. Let’s correlate this to our relationship with God:
Time spent together – We spend time with God through prayer, reading the Word, and praising him. What anticipatory joy there is in meeting with the One who loves us the most! We have the gift of personally getting to know our creator, who designed us and gives us purpose.
Two-way communication – We talk with God when we offer him thanks, confession, honest sharing of our thoughts and feelings, etc. Jesus so graciously seals our relationship in him with the Holy Spirit, who intercedes on our behalf. We hear God as we are silent before him and as we read and meditate on his Word. God also speaks to us through godly individuals who give us counsel.
Shared experiences – We have the privilege of serving God, being used by him and praying for others. As we seek to do his will and delight in him, we are vessels of his work in others’ lives as he weaves life experiences into a beautiful tapestry. Our vertical relationship with the Father helps us develop horizontal relationships with people.
It is amazing to think about how relational Jesus was while on Earth. He never let people’s weaknesses get him off track from doing the Father’s will. What a goal for us to have.
May we keep on track nurturing our most important relationship!