Do you truly want to have an intimate relationship with God? That is the question. We are going to begin a long series of blogs and sending out emails to our friends and partners about HOW to develop intimacy with God, and why it is so very important.
If we desire to be part of His corporate Bride, we must be willing to be “processed” by the Lord. We will be separated from all that is less than His best, and we will be drawn out from among the present day “Daughters of Jerusalem”. Many are called, but few are chosen. Matthew 22:14. The many refers to the Daughters of Jerusalem or the church or Body of Christ as a whole. We are all called, but only the ones willing to become His true Bride are chosen. The Bride are those who are willing to come apart and seek Him.
Many have said that the weak condition of the church is due to lack of prayer. This is partly true. The weak condition of any Christian is due to lack of intimacy with Christ. We become what we behold. We become what we focus on. The only way to usher in the manifest presence of God corporately, is if we, as individuals have learned to usher in His manifest presence at home. God’s perfect will for us is to be transformed into Jesus’s likeness and image. That simply will not happen until we learn to surrender self and self love, in an intimate relationship with Christ.
The potential to experience a beautiful love relationship with the Lord is available within each one of us. This time of preparation begins with our becoming willing to receive correction concerning all self-centeredness, along with our desire or self-fulfillment and satisfaction. Progressively we will be enabled to discover the “secrets” that will set us free as we move upward with Him, becoming so transparent that His life will be seen through our lives.
As we walk “with” Jesus, instead of working “for” Him, a growing sense of our identity with Him will develop and our life will increasingly become the expression of His life and ministry. We will learn to give, rather than always seeking to receive. Others will begin to see Jesus, rather than being impressed with us. ( or our gifts ).
Our cooperation with the “process” of sanctification will determine how far we will progress upward into the “secret place” of intimacy, in order to develop a relationship of of deep communion with Jesus. In love, He will call us away from the borders of worldly things with all their enticements.
We simply cannot truly meet the spiritual needs of others, like Jesus did, if we ourselves do not receive directly from God the deep spiritual needs for ourselves. This dying to self can only happen in intimate communion with Christ. We cannot give what we have not received from Him.
Many sincere God loving Christians are so busy doing ministry that they neglect intimacy with God. They may feel they are ok because God, in His grace is moving through their gifts and touching others lives through them but they are only operating through their giftings, which are without repentance. ( God will not remove their gifting even though they are not in intimacy with Him, or even if they are practicing sin.) I do not want to be one who heals and prophecies but who the Lord says, ” depart from me, you worker of iniquity, I never KNEW you. ( see Matt. 7:23 ) There is a much higher place for us than only gifts. There is a secret place available to us, to operate with God, not just for God. A place where we actually carry His glory and the very nature of Jesus Himself in us. A place where people do not see us, they rather see Him.
Blesssed are they that are called to the marriage supper of the Lamb. Revelation 19:9 As you pray, “draw me” in sincerity, and respond to the Lord’s leading into intimacy, you will gain spiritual understanding and insight. You will discover, with a thankful heart, that the experiences of the Bride are being relived within your heart.
We will be doing regular ongoing blogs, commenting from Wade Taylor’s book, “The Secret of the Stairs”, for those who have a burning hunger for intimacy with Him.