People Connecting to God

“24”

Jeff Jones, Senior Pastor

January 19/21, 2007

Last week on 24: God gives you and me 24 hours, only a short amount of time that is constantly ticking, an urgent mission, and a unique calling. In 24, we are looking at what it means to spend our lives wisely, to know God and fulfill his calling—to know that we are fulfilling the calling he has laid out for us. Last week was the starting gun week, the choice to say, “I’m in the race. I’m going for it. I am all in.”

Today as we talk about what that race is all about, we are looking at connection with God, how to build a real, deep, life-changing relationship with God. Do you know people who seem to have a significant relationship with God, who seem connected? Wouldn’t it be great to be one of those people?

When I read in the Bible the story of some of the Bible guys I think about that…I would love that kind of relationship with God…like Enoch. Enoch was one of the first human beings. His great, great, great granddad was Adam…and Enoch had the closest relationship with God of anyone up to that point.

Slide: ) ___________ Genesis 5:22-24

In Genesis 5:22-24 we read: Enoch walked with God 300 years and had other sons and daughters. Altogether, Enoch lived 365 years. Enoch walked with God; then he was no more, because God took him away.” That’s all we know about him, but that’s a lot to know. He lived a long time, and he walked with God his whole life. He had such a great relationship with God, that the Bible says, “God took him,” a Hebrew expression that means that he did not die. God just snatched him up. Enoch was so close to God; they had such a close relationship, that God just says, “Oh, come on up.” Wow! I would love that kind of relationship with God? My guess you would, too.

How do you develop a relationship with God like that? Today that’s what we are talking about. Let me ask you a question, and just answer honestly. Many of you may be able to raise your hands here. How many of you feel spiritual? How many of you feel like an Enoch? Okay, great. Now, let me talk to the rest of you, people like me, who may not always feel that spiritual, who don’t identify as much with Enoch as his younger brother Ernie, who just never got it all together. That’s especially true for me when I see other people that look a whole lot more spiritual than me, seem like they really have it together. My granddad for example prayed about 2 to 4 hours a day…I don’t do that.

Over my life though I have in my attempt to be godly and spiritual come to a conclusion that the way most of us think about spirituality is all wrong…that most Christians make a mistake that ends up leading some people empty, others falsely arrogant, and just doesn’t work. In fact, when I was preparing this message I almost made the mistake I am talking about, and I changed the message. I changed my whole approach, because it was wrong. When we make the mistake I am talking about, which most people make, the way we think about spiritual maturity ends up making some people who should feel close to God feel like losers and others who aren’t mature at all feel like spiritual giants.

Here is the way I picked up on the mistake I’ll uncover in a few minutes. As I lived my Christian life and got to know various Christians both in my own church circle and in very different church circles, I realized something was wrong. What makes you seem like a spiritual giant in one circle of Christianity makes you seem like a spiritual bozo in another.

In Bible churches, the circle I grew up in, Bible knowledge was the key to spiritual maturity. The church I grew up in was so into Bible knowledge that we had Sunday school classes that taught people Greek and Hebrew, the languages the Bible was originally written in, to better understand it. Those who were really spiritual stepped up to the plate and signed up…the spiritual lightweights, the pansies of the group, just went to some other Bible study. But if you were really godly, you spent hours reading the Bible.

My charismatic friends, however, viewed things very differently. In that circle, it seemed to be about experiences and emotion. It was those who were most open experientially to God who were the spiritual ones, and you could recognize them. In a worship service, they were the ones who were the most demonstrative, hands raised, dancing around.

Later in my life, after seminary, I was exposed to another circle in a more mainline denomination setting, and there spirituality was about spiritual directors and spiritual retreats. They read a lot of Henry Nouwin books and would go away on retreats for a few days where you don’t talk to anybody but God. One of my friends in that world who was really into that at the time gave me these books from these Christians hundreds of years ago called the desert fathers, who went out to live by themselves in the desert as hermits. They were so spiritual that they lived alone and didn’t talk to anyone. She told me how wonderful they were, and I was listening and nodding on the outside but on the inside I was thinking, “Weirdos! Why go off in the desert? God calls us to a mission. What are they thinking?”

While in Seminary at Dallas Seminary, I felt a little stale in my relationship with God. I had been taught how to do a 30 to 45 minute quiet time using my Bible and then journaling my thoughts and had done that since I was 12 years old. That’s what spiritual people did, and I fit right in what that. I felt very spiritual, because I was pretty good at doing these journals. I’m goal oriented, and my goal was to do it every day and fill up a whole bookshelf full of journals with inspiring, deep thoughts…deep thoughts from Jeff Jones. But 20 years into that, it got stale, so I visited with one of my favorite DTS professors for advice. He is very artsy (I am not). He said, “Here’s what you do. Use Gregorian chant, and just meditate and pray as you listen. It is a great way to connect deeply with God.” So, I went out and got this Gregorian chant CD (play it). I stuck it in the player, and sat down at my desk with my eyes closed to meditate…but I didn’t really know what to do. I couldn’t understand these guys. I sat there waiting for something miraculous to happen. I gave it a good shot, but I guess I just wasn’t godly enough to get anything out of it. I tried it two more days to see if I start any spiritual fires in my heart, but not even a spark.

So, here’s my question in light of my own story—who among all these people is right? What does a growing relationship with God really look like? Why can you seem very spiritual in one setting and not spiritual at all in another? How do you grow spiritually?

That gets me to the mistake I was talking about earlier, that I almost made in the way I was going to teach this message. If we don’t avoid this mistake, I really believe it will keep 80% of us from a deep connection with God and make the other 20% falsely proud. Here is the mistake:

Slide: ) ___________ Our natural mistake: reducing spirituality to a formula.

We all do it. We hear a verse like,

Slide: ) ___________ 2 Peter 3:18:

…but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, a great verse, and then we look for the formula. What do I have to do?

Slide: ) ___________ A + B + C = SSX (super-sized Christian).

All you have to do is to a, b, and c in that order, and you got it. You are there. And every circle of Christians has their own formula, which leaves some people feeling quite spiritual and others feeling left out in the cold. In my message originally, I was pretty much going to lay out a formula.

Yet, here’s the problem with the formula thing:

Slide: ) ___________ a) You can do the formula and not get the result.

Trust me, I’ve seen it way too much. In Bible churches for example I’ve known loads of people who do a daily quiet time, memorize whole books of the Bible, and know more theology than some theology professors—but they are not spiritually mature people. Another problem:

Slide: ) ___________ b) You can not do the formula and get the result.

That was troubling to me earlier in my life, because I started to encounter people who were lousy at my formula who happened to be really godly, spiritual mature people…but they didn’t do the formula. That bothered me and made me think, think enough to realize this: Do you know that according to the formula for spiritual maturity that I grew up with, nobody could be spiritual before the 1700s or 1800s, and that today most of the people in the world could never be spiritual since they are illiterate. I’m all for daily Bible intake, but do you realize that before the printing press, hardly any Christian owned a Bible? And that today most people can’t read one if they have one? Are they left out in the cold? Were there no spiritual people before Gutenburg? Then think about Enoch. He knew God so well that God just took him to heaven, but how did he know God? No books of the Bible had been written. There were no TV programs back then. He didn’t do the formula, but he was godly!

And here is the main point of this message:

Slide; ______________ No one formula works for everybody.

There is no formula. That’s why the Bible never gives one. It would be nice if it did. You want to be spiritual? Here’s the formula. But it doesn’t. In fact, when Jesus came he resisted the formula people of his day, the Pharisees, who thought they had spirituality all figured out…but they completely missed it. What Jesus taught was radically different than the formula. Here is what he taught

Slide: ) ___________ True spirituality is not a formula but a relationship.

Jesus did not come to bring the missing formula but to reconnect people to God.

The whole story of the Bible is not a missing formula story. That would be interesting, but it isn’t the story. The story of the Bible is a broken relationship story, how God is restoring a broken relationship with the people he created, with you and me. In light of this, a writer named Daniel Miller says,

Slide: ) ___________ Becoming a Christian might look more like falling in love than baking cookies. Daniel Miller

Spiritual growth is a relationship and not a formula, which means that spiritual growth will look different for you than from me, because you have a different personality and make-up than me. Since it is a relationship, it means that a one-size fits all approach to spirituality, a formula, just doesn’t make sense and isn’t the way spirituality works.

It is similar to my relationship with my two boys, Collin and Caleb. If you know my two boys, then you know that there are some similarities between the two: they both love sports, they both are good-looking like their mom, and they are very active, bright kids. Yet, if you know them you also know that they are 2 very different people and personalities. Collin is very social and relational, and for him that is what life is about. Caleb is very goal-oriented and is very aggressive about pursuing those. If I related to Collin the same way I related to Caleb as a dad, I would miss the boat. I would make one feel close to me and the other distant, with a one-size-fits-all approach to parenting. I’m the same dad, but my two boys are very different so our relationship is going to be different.

Same with God. He is the same heavenly Father who wants a relationship with us, but we as his children are very different…therefore our way of relating to God and his way of relating to us are going to be different. And I believe God likes it that way. I know I get a kick out of that as a dad, and I’m sure God does, too—otherwise, he wouldn’t have created us with such different personalities.

So, with all that in mind then, how do we grow in our relationship with God? How do we as unique people with the time God gives us on this planet, relate to God in a way that leads to spiritual growth and maturity? If there is not set formula, then how can we relate to God with our own personalities in a way that builds depth in our relationship?

Slide: ) ___________ Our spiritual pursuit: Finding a way of relating to God that works for you.

Well, as we each build a plan and way of relating to God, let’s talk about some common elements that will be true for anybody who wants a close relationship with God. Though we may very well apply these elements differently, let’s look at what the Bible says is true for any of us who want to God richly. There are three components of a relationship with God that we all have in common and has to be part of our lives if we want to be godly people:

Slide: ) ___________

1) God’s commands

Though each of us as his children is different, the house rules are the same. That’s how it works in my house. Collin and Caleb are unique, but that doesn’t mean that the house rules change for each one of them. Collin can’t say, “No, dad, I am not going to be cleaning up after dinner because it just doesn’t fit my personality profile. I’m more in the messy son category, so why don’t you ask Caleb to do it.” That wouldn’t work. The house rules apply to all of us in the family.

Same with God and us. He is our Father, and our relationship with him is one that requires obedience to what he has commanded. We are all different, but the house rules are the same. Turn with me, if you have your Bibles, to John 14. John 14 is when Jesus spends time with his disciples just before his crucifixion. The passage is an important one, because part of what he is telling them is how they can build a relationship with God after Jesus is gone. Read with me, starting in verse 15:

Slide: ) ___________ John 14:15-24

"If you love me, you will obey what I command. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever—the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you. I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. Before long, the world will not see me anymore, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live. On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you. Whoever has my commands and obeys them, he is the one who loves me. He who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love him and show myself to him." Then Judas (not Judas Iscariot) said, "But, Lord, why do you intend to show yourself to us and not to the world?" 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. One day I’ll come back and do a message just on this passage; it is so rich. But let’s hear what Jesus is making very clear. Multiple times he says that he who loves him is the one who obeys him, and that God will make himself at home in the life of the one who lives in obedience to him, not disobedience. Here’s the principle:

Slide: ) ___________ A close relationship with God requires obedience.

Jesus couldn’t be clearer about that.

Jesus is not saying that we have to obey perfectly, be perfect little angels in his household. He knows we will sin. But if you are a parent or have ever been a child yourself, you know the difference between an obedient child and a disobedient one, one who really does want to do the right thing, though they are going to blow it from time to time, and the one who just blows off the parent’s authority and has a disobedient attitude of either defiance or indifference to the wishes of the parent.

God will not reward the defiant believer or the indifferent believer with a close relationship with him. From time to time I’ll talk with someone who is frustrated with God because they just don’t feel close to him, and they are doing what they think the formula is. When I dig in to his or her life, it becomes clear that they are living in disobedience to God, and I can honestly say to them, “Until you submit to God in that area of your life, you are never going to be close to God.”

For example, Jesus tells us in very strong words that we are to forgive others who do us wrong. Yet, forgiveness is a hard choice. When someone hurts me, I want to get even. I don’t want to forgive. Some of you may be living in the disobedient state of unforgiveness, and you are holding on to a hurt, perhaps even bitter toward someone in your life…and until you let it go and get back in line with obedience, don’t expect to have a close, intimate relationship with God.

You might be indifferent toward a biblical command in some other area of your life, like sexuality or finances or some relational issue. You know what the Bible teaches; you know the house rules, but you are choosing to just let that slide. That’s your choice, but don’t expect God’s presence in your life to be close.

Yet, if you want a close relationship with God, then submit in that area of your life. If you love God, Jesus says you will be motivated to do so anyway. When you love someone, you really do want to please them.

That reminds me of the first time I ate sushi. I thought I was going to die, but I acted like it was really great. You know why? Because I was on a date with a girl who was both really hot and who really loved Jesus—that’s a double whammy that doesn’t come around very often, and I didn’t want to blow it with her. And I did okay, because she is now my wife. We were dating, and she was going to Japan for the summer and was all excited about Japan. We were on a date, and guess what type of restaurant she wanted to go to? She asked if I wanted to split this sushi platter with her, and I said, “Sure. You order whatever you want, and I’ll jump in, too. I’ve been waiting for someone to eat sushi with. It will be great.” One of the things she ordered was this thing of fish eggs, wrapped in seaweed. Now, hear that again: fish eggs wrapped in seaweed. Is there anything right about that? She hands me one, and I look at it. It looked like the bait I sometimes used to catch fish, you’d use fish eggs. And now I was about to eat it. I prayed to myself extra hard and bit into it. Disgusting, and there was no hiding it. She started to laugh as my face contorted and I struggled to both swallow this stuff and survive. But she knew I was doing it for her. When you love someone, you are motivated to do all kinds of things you wouldn’t naturally do otherwise.

In what area of your life are you violating love for God? Is there an area you are just blowing off? If you want a close relationship with God, submit that area of life to him.

Slide: ) ___________

2) The need for discipline

A close relationship with God will not just naturally happen, anymore than a close relationship with anybody will just naturally happen. Relationships are high maintenance; they take time and intention to develop. If I want a close marriage, I have to work really hard at it. If I want a close relationship with God, it takes intent and discipline, too.

That’s why Paul tells us to, “discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness.” Or hear Paul talk about his own approach to his relationship with God:

Slide: ) ___________ Phil 3:10-14

10I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, 11and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead. Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.. Do you hear the intensity? The drive? The discipline?

Even though the way we live that discipline out my look different because we are all unique, one common component for any of us who want a close relationship with God is discipline. We have to prioritize our relationship with God and add some disciplines into our lives if we want to grow in our relationship with God.

Slide: ) ___________

3) The disciplines that lead to growth

(the tools of relationship building). As you consider how you will build a stronger relationship with God, one thing that is common for all of us are the tools themselves, the disciplines that lead to spiritual growth. God does not give us a formula, but he does let us know some of the disciplines we must have in our life if we are going to grow to spiritual maturity. The way we practice these may look very different, but they are all essential. Let’s look briefly at some of those disciplines that you and I need to work into our approach to spiritual growth.

Slide: ) ___________ The discipline of the Word of God

I’m talking about God’s revelation to us, the Bible, when I say the “word of God.” Jesus described it as our spiritual food, when he said, “Man shall not live on bread alone but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.” If a baby is going to grow, it has to eat. It isn’t nice to starve a baby. If you and I are going to grow spiritually, we must eat, and Jesus is clear that it is the Word of God that is our spiritual food.

James described the Bible as a mirror. Two things are important about the mirror: one, you need to look in the mirror regularly. How often to you look in a mirror? Some of you maybe not so much, but most of you look pretty good. Most of us wouldn’t leave for work or church without looking in the mirror and making sure there is no major problem going on—our hair going crazy, a booger hanging out of our nose, something. The Bible is what God uses to speak to us, to share with us what we need to hear. It may not always be what we want to hear about our lives, but it is how God encourages us and challenges us. The second thing that is important about the mirror is the need to do something about what you see. If your hair is going crazy, you wet your hair down and brush it out or take a shower. The way we grow spiritually with the Word of God is not just looking in the mirror but doing something about what we see.

That’s the problem with us in our modern area after the printing press. We have so much access to the Bible. In the NT days, they had to go to church and listen to the Bible being read. If you were here last week, we read a passage that mentioned the “public reading of Scripture”; that’s the only way people could connect with God’s word. But in our case, the good news is that we have access any time we want. Yet, the bad news can be that we get used to reading it or studying it or hearing it but not applying it. We grow not by knowing more about the Bible but applying more of what we know. That’s why James says

Slide: ) ___________ James 1:22-25

Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it—he will be blessed in what he does…James 1:22-25

You and I have a great opportunity this year to be in the Word and apply it. Summit, the reading program through the New Testament, is an awesome opportunity. It only takes 5 minutes a day, so you don’t have to be some introverted person who loves to read voraciously to pull it off. A few years ago, I launched a program to read through the whole Bible in a year, and for most people that was over the top. How many of you started that? How many of you got through Leviticus? The good news is that the New Testament in a year is much more manageable and there is no Leviticus in the New Testament. Also, there are devotionals to help you pull out truths to apply that day. The people involved have done an awesome job, so let’s commit as a church to the Summit. It is a great opportunity, regardless of your personality make-up. In fact, some people who are more relational and less inclined to sit at home alone and read are reading it together and meeting once a week to talk about it. What a great idea!

Slide: ) ___________ The discipline of gathering

What you are doing right now is a spiritual discipline, for which there is no substitute. That’s why the bible says that we are not to forsake the gathering, because God does things in our lives here that he just doesn’t do anywhere else. When we plan services, our entire goal is to help people (us) connect to God, to encounter his presence. The Bible says that God is uniquely present when his people gather, and boy have I found that to be true.

Often people who are new to church or to our church will say, “Jeff, I can’t explain it, but there is something really authentic and powerful I experience when I come into this place.” Or others will say, “Man, I felt like you were talking to me today.” You know what that is? It is God. He is present in a unique way when we gather, and that is why people who are devoted to their relationship with God make the gathering a big part of their lives.

Slide: ) ___________ The discipline of community

Here I am talking about deep relationships with other believers that support each other and help each other grow. The Bible is clear that we cannot grow spiritually apart from those kinds of relationships. That is what our life groups are all about.

Slide: ) ___________The discipline of prayer

We may not all be like Martin Luther who prayed for 4-6 hours a day. After hearing that, I tried one time and made it for about 40 minutes. That was after praying for every person I’d ever met, every missionary I could think of. I was out of steam. Some people are wired like Martin, but prayer is how we connect with God, as we both speak and share our concerns and listen and be open to God’s leading and conviction in our lives. Prayer doesn’t have to be long or fancy or flowery to be effective, but prayer is part of the package for any of us.

Slide: ) ___________ The discipline of serving

Another discipline is serving others, both inside and outside the church. It is part of how we will grow; how God shapes us and challenges us. We’ll talk more about that in a future week when we talk about how to find our unique calling from God.

I could keep going, but these disciplines that I’ve mentioned are some of the major ones that all of us—regardless of our personalities—have to be disciplined to bring into our lives. The way we do so may look quite different from person to person, but these are the ways we grow in relationship with God.

So, what does all that mean? Let’s avoid the mistake that we will all naturally make, and that is to make spirituality more about a formula than a relationship. As A.W. Tozer says,

Slide: ) ___________ The whole transaction of religious conversion has been made mechanical and spiritless. We have almost forgotten that God is a person, and, as such, can be cultivated as any person can. A. W. Tozer

Let’s avoid the spiritual emptiness that comes with the formulaic, one-sized-fits all approach to spirituality that leaves about 20% of people feeling pretty godly and 80% feeling like they are the left-out children in God’s family.

This is good news. It means that any of us can develop a great relationship with God, whether you are introverted and highly cerebral, extraverted and activistic, artistic and creative—however God made you. It means we can give space to each other to each pursue God uniquely, though certainly that pursuit of the same God, the same Father, will have some common elements. He is after all the same God.

Be disciplined this year. Look over those disciplines on the outline, and circle the one you would like to emphasize over these next months. Perhaps commit to the Summit. Experiment a little with ways of expressing those disciplines that may work for you, and keep what works for you—throw out the rest.

Prayer.