Intimacy Precedes Fruitfulness – Part 2

 

In my last blog I laid out a case for the existence of a principle that says: Intimacy precedes fruitfulness. However, I didn’t give you any application. Since principles unapplied aren’t much help we need to come up with some application. It’s great knowledge, but if we can’t begin to leverage the principle then what good is it? It’s great to know that intimacy precedes fruitfulness, but how do we develop a more intimate relationship with God?

You know when I came to understand that there’s a principle that says that intimacy precedes fruitfulness I was a bit discouraged and sometimes I still am. Like you, I’ve striven and struggled to increase intimacy with God. I’ve done the quiet time thing. I’ve sat and stared at the wall and thought about everything under the sun during my prayer time BUT God. I get it. But here’s the deal. The fact that we’ve struggled doesn’t invalidate the principle. Unless God is exceedingly unfair, then there must be a path to intimacy and fruitfulness, right? There has to be. If God is a good and loving God and sent Jesus to die in order to create the basis for relationship, then there must be some way to actually experience that relationship in terms of growing intimacy which leads to fruitfulness.

I’ve never known God to be formula driven and because what we’re after is spiritual in nature I don’t believe there’s a formula or a foolproof process for growing in intimacy with God. You’re not a formula either. God made you in a special way and there will be a way that you interact with Him that will produce deeper intimacy and increasing fruitfulness. You’re going to have to ask God what creating a more intimate relationship with Him looks like. This is important, because it needs to come from Him through His Spirit so that it’s not a method or ritual that you develop on your own that only becomes drudgery. However, if it’s a process or method that is of the Spirit then it cannot fail to produce intimacy between you and God and more fruit in your life.

Hundreds of years ago the desert fathers went off to be alone and give themselves to the pursuit of intimacy. Some tremendous fruit came out of that. I’m not saying you need to go live in a cave and be a hermit, but you are going to have to be intentional and maybe the starting place for that is asking the Lord what your pursuit of intimacy would look like.

So there’s no program or system. What I am going to suggest to you is this. How about asking God what the process of moving towards ever deepening levels of intimacy would look like? And how about this? How about you don’t sweat it too much until He answers? You should be prepared to hear either very little or perhaps things you didn’t expect. You might not get the response you’re looking for. For instance, I felt a release to put my bible down for a while. I’ve since found out that some others, though not everyone, have had a similar experience and I think the reason is this. God wants you to have a relationship with Him and He’s not the bible. Now don’t freak out on me. I read my bible this morning. I love God’s word. I just needed to come to a place of loving God more than His word.

When I got to the point of deciding that I might never really get to intimacy with God I asked a question and it was this: God, what would it look like for me to pursue a more intimate relationship with You? I also told him I wasn’t going to do anything until I felt Him leading me. Do you know that God led me down a path? I began to have a desire to find out how other people who have achieved greater levels of intimacy did it. To that end I read some books. Through that process I was able to place some options in front of me. Kind of like a menu of different types of spiritual activities, or disciplines. They ranged from praying in specific ways, to contemplating, to meditating, to singing, to spending time in nature and other things. From these I began to pick some activities that I felt I resonated with. I interpreted anything that resonated in my spirit as something I’d like to try, as leading from the Holy Spirit and I tried them. Some worked, some didn’t. The point is that God and I starting having a conversation about what my process for growing in intimacy would look like. There was a process of discovery that is still ongoing, but the great thing is that I’m beginning to increase my level of intimacy with God and produce some new fruit.

So that’s how it’s worked so far for me. Whatever the method He chooses to use with me or you……and it doesn’t matter what it is….the point is that God does want to weigh into this with you and He’s got some ideas about what might be helpful if you’ll ask. One thing will be true of His answer for all of us. He’s going to ask for time.  I don’t know how you’ll spend that time with Him but it will take time. The secret is finding a way or method of spending that time which doesn’t become drudgery or ritual for you. Ask Him about that and tell Him you don’t want another check off list.

If you’re younger this is good for you to hear, because there are lots of opportunities for you to get sidetracked by strategies and methods of growing in spiritual maturity that won’t really grow you that much. You can read books like I did and books may be helpful from time to time, but books are not going to be the thing that gets you to go deep with the Lord. It’s also highly unlikely that going to a study, or a seminar, or filling in the blanks in a workbook is going to facilitate a lot of intimacy.  Can I say this as well? A human discipling relationship isn’t going to do it either, though it may play a role and be helpful. My relationship with Max produced fruit and was positive, but Max wasn’t the thing or the person that spurred me in the direction of intimacy. It was the Holy Spirit that did that. Paul said, ” I planted and Apollos watered, but God gave the increase”. So if that’s true it would be foolish for you to put all your eggs in the basket of finding someone to disciple you as the means of growing in intimacy. Pursue the discipling relationship, but pursue the Lord as well.

If you’re older, maybe you’re like me and you’ve experienced some pain in your life and some disappointment and out of that you’ve grown and matured and you can see more clearly the priority of developing a more intimate relationship with the Lord. Maybe you’re hearing the whisper of the Holy Spirit calling you to intimacy, but you’ve got no idea how to make that happen. And besides that, your attempts in the past may have ended in failure and that thought of giving it another shot just makes you ill. I’ve been there. But if the principle is true, if intimacy really does precede fruitfulness, and if we want to be fruitful, then what choice do we have?

 So I know it’s hard and intimidating, but I want you to forget about that for a moment and I want you to dream. What might change in your life if you were able to come to ever increasing levels of intimacy? What might be possible if you came into deeper relationship with God?

How do you think increased intimacy would impact your ability to disciple someone? How many of you have been discipled by someone who didn’t seem to know God any better than you did?  You don’t want to be that person do you? It might be important for you to get to a level of intimacy and what if you did? Think about the fruit God might produce if you were discipling someone out of your own intimate relationship with God.

How do you think your relationships with your friends might change if you were more intimate with God? What about your relationship with your spouse? Parents? Children? What might happen if you were constantly going deeper with God?  What fruit might be born in those relationships?

What if you moved to intimacy and in that process God began to reveal some things to you about yourself and you engaged with God and worked with God in fixing them?  You’d have a basis for helping someone with the same problem.

What if through a process of growing intimacy you came to an understanding of who you are? One of the most powerful prayers you can pray when it comes to getting identity sorted out is this: “Lord, I want to see myself the way You see me.” This is a great prayer because God does two things – in no particular order. First He begins to show you how special and wonderful you are and how precious you are. Second, He begins to show you some things about yourself that aren’t so nice to look at. However, it is necessary for you to see those things and if you’ll face them and then allow God to bring you through them and change you in the process you’ll grow in both intimacy and fruitfulness. You see, the hard work of sorting out your identity only happens as you press in to God. This is because God created you and He’s in the best position to talk to you about who you really are. Once you come to understand and see yourself the way God sees you, you’re positioned to produce a lot of fruit. That understanding only comes through a process of increasing intimacy.

What if you grew in intimacy with the Lord to the point that you always knew, in every moment, that He loved you? How would that understanding change you and the people around you? One thing that might change is your critical spirit (if you have one). You’d begin to see the same struggles in others that you’ve seen in yourself and instead of being critical, you’d be compassionate. Do you see how intimacy could produce fruit? We could go on and on.

If this principle is true then it’s also a requirement that all of us grow more intimate with God or our lives won’t count as much as they could. So here’s my hope for you. I hope and pray that you’ll give the intimacy thing a try. And if your first response is, – “I’ve tried that before and it just didn’t work for me” –  I’d ask you to take a moment and think about that experience you had and ask yourself some questions.

If you haven’t then I hope you’ll give it another shot. But this time I hope you’ll ask this question first: “Lord if intimacy really does precede fruitfulness, then would You show me what steps to take so that my life can be a life that is characterized by intimacy with You and becomes a life that bears fruit in Your kingdom?” If you ask that question sincerely here’s what I think will happen. I think that God, who is the author and creator of intimacy and the one who thought up the idea of fruitfulness, won’t disappoint you.