5 Steps Closer to God – Taking Step 2

There are so many people who ache for intimacy with God; who hunger to know Him in their day to day experience … and yet for whom such intimacy is such an elusive thing. It should never be so!

Because God’s plan is to come and live with us; to actually set up home in us.

And that’s a concept worth wrapping our hearts around.

Okay, so the first step in drawing closer to God is believing with our lives that God wants to be close to us, that He’s opened the Way for us to be close to Him, and that when we take one small step in His direction, we run into the mighty, God-sized step that He’s already taken in our direction (check out Step 1).

And today, I am inviting you to take a second step with me into a dynamic, intimate relationship with Jesus – by discovering the second part of this truth of intimacy with God.

Again, this second step is so simple. So straightforward. It’s laying hold of the truth that the moment we believe in Jesus, the moment we set course on a life lived for Him, He sets up home … in us.

Have a listen to this powerful promise from Jesus’ own lips:

Jesus replied, “If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. He who does not love me will not obey my teaching. These words you hear are not my own; they belong to the Father who sent me”. (John 14:23 – click here for the full passage)

What does this actually mean? What’s the full force of what He’s saying here?

I remember when Jacqui and I were married. It was a great wedding, but do you know the best part of it for me? The best part was … leaving!

That’s right. The best part was leaving all the other people behind, and going and starting our new life together as one. The best part was setting up home together.

Can you imagine a man and a woman getting married and then heading off to live back in separate houses again after the wedding? It’s a crazy idea. Why would you do that? The whole point of being married is living as one under the one roof, in the one bed. The whole point of marriage is intimacy and togetherness.

And for God … read Jesus’ words again if you have any doubt … the whole point of the Cross, the whole point of you and me being forgiven through faith in Jesus … is moving in with Him and being as one with Him. Could you imagine living apart from God? It’s a crazy idea. Why would you do that?

In that wonderful prayer of Jesus’ just before He was led away to be crucified, Jesus prayed to His Dad (Abba) and revealed to us the reason for what He was about to suffer:

As you, Father, 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.  (John 17:21b)

In other words, the reason that Jesus went to that Cross, was so that we could have the very same level of intimacy with God, as He the Son has with His Father. Just imagine that! What a plan!

My friend, whatever the world may throw at you today, whatever pain or doubt or trial or dark place you may ever walk through, if you have put your trust in Jesus, then He – through His Spirit – has made His home in you.

May you forever live in the powerful reality of that truth.  For it’s knowing the truth … that sets us free!