“To get to know God is to love Him.”
I’ve been meditating on something my minister had talked about during last Sunday’s service. He was talking about the right attitude believers should have towards prayer with a look at Ephesians 1:15 which says:
“I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better.” (Eph 1:17 NIV)
My minister broke down the above verse and asserted that in essence this needs to be the prayer all believers say – that they receive a spirit of wisdom and revelation so that they may know the Lord better.
What made a light switch on for me was when he used an analogy to expound on this – getting to know Mr or Mrs Right.
When we meet a potential spouse for the first time, we don’t necessarily ‘love’ them to the same degree as we do when we are married to them for ages. In some cases like my own, we may develop the relationship without really knowing the person such that later on down the road the person may turn out to be someone we fall out of love with, e.g. an abuser, an adulterer, or someone addicted to drugs. In contrast, with some relationships the couple spend significant time with each other which in turn gets them to get the know the real person inside out and to fall in love with them over time. Some marriages like this tend to last longer than those where the couples do not actually take time to know and understand each other.
Hence considering the above verse. In our busy lives, do we really get to spend time with God in prayer and His Word? I don’t get as much time as I use to especially since my son has been born. Compared to when my first child was born my prayer time and reading the Bible is pretty much a rushed thing. However during those years when my daughter was a baby, I have never felt as close as I did when I would spend hours just talking to Him, letting Him know what I’m getting up to, my fears, the fun times, thanking Him when things go right, having toddler tantrums (sometimes) when things do not go quite as planned. I would argue that when we first believe we may have a base level awareness of God and a ‘wow’ kind of love but we may not yet fully know Him to where through any and every circumstance we can deeply love Him on a very personal and deeper level.
Part of our Christian walk is to get to know God, by doing so we get to love Him on a much much more deeper level and in turn enables our faith in Him to be unshakable.
I thought I would log this here as it was very much an “Aha!” kind of moment for me at church when I heard it. I am still kicking myself that I did not tweet the phrase on behalf of my minister.
However this was such a good moment for me to continue to grow in my understanding of God’s Word.
Showshannahs Little Space 