Get to know God
If I had one thing that I could wish for you. Scratch that, I don’t like wishing. Let’s put it this way. My primary prayer for you is this: get to know God.
If I only had one thing I could ask God for it would be for my family (and myself) to get to know Him.
Really get to know Him honestly. Not some weird idea of what people think God should be or what people think God is; but God as He reveals Himself through scripture.
I believe firmly, the more you get to know God, everything else will fall into place and salvation and an eternity secured in heaven will be a by-product of getting to know God.
You’ve likely heard that as a Christian you are supposed to love God, and I agree with that. Jesus says it himself: He says “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind.” and “Love your neighbor as yourself.”
Obviously this is not only good advice but essential to understanding how God wants you to be. It prompts in me a thought.
It is very difficult to love somebody you don’t know.
Right now you have things or people in your life that you love. When you first encountered those things or those people you didn’t necessarily love them. You had to get to know them. But repeated exposure and a deeper knowledge leads you to deciding to love or not love.
It is easier to decide how to respond to something or somebody if you know them. I can say to you all your life: Love God, know God, worship God, put God first. That’s just a guy telling you to do a thing. There comes a point when your faith must stop being the faith of your parents or Sunday school teachers and it must become your own..
There comes a point where your thoughts, your decision, your values become your own.
Don’t know where to start? There’s the obvious places, read the bible, attend a church that believes the bible is God’s word, surround yourself with people who already know God. But there’s another perspective that might be even more helpful:
What you focus on comes into focus. You focus on God, He will come into focus more and more.
Can you ever grasp the infinite majesty of God while you are an earthly human? No you can’t. But you know what? You can get to know him better than you do today. Next week you can know him better than you know him tomorrow. It’s a process, just like everything else in your life. Like right now I’m severely overweight so I’m walking while I’m talking because even though this walk isn’t going to change me hugely, it’s a part of the process that will.
Let’s bring it home. Listen close.
This is why I say I want you to get to know the real God not just some weird idea of God.
If you get to know God as He really is, you will be humbled, you will be broken, you will be rebuilt, you will be strengthened, you will be polished, you will be filled with a fire that has a never ending supply of fuel. As you get to know God as he really is, your spark of faith will grow into a towering inferno that will be a bright and shining light in a world that so desperately needs it.
And so, I pray:
Get to know God. It will change your world.