People seek out relationships because God has created in us a need for friends and companionship. We have relationships with our employers, employees, coworkers, neighbors, friends and relatives. We have a special relationship with our mate. Our mate should be our very best friend. Whether we realize it or not, we even have a relationship with God.
I’ve loved you the way my Father has loved me. Make yourselves at home in my love. If you keep my commands, you'll remain intimately at home in my love. That's what I've done - kept my Father's commands and made myself at home in his love. "I've told you these things for a purpose: that my joy might be your joy, and your joy wholly mature. Our lives are based upon relationships. John 15:9-11, The Message Bible
TO HAVE A RELATIONSHIP WITH SOMEONE, we must SPEND TIME with them.
Let's use our children
as an example: We should support our children in youth functions at school and
at church. Virtual learning now demands
spending more time with them. Go and do things with them that you’ve previously
not done. What ever we do, we need to
spend time with our children.
TO HAVE A RELATIONSHIP WITH SOMEONE, we must SHARE EXPERIENCES with them.
Prior to the pandemic, we
could go eat a meal together. we could go to a concert together or to the park
with a picnic lunch and play together. We can still share experiences together
although in a different way right now because of the situation we are currently
in.
TO HAVE A RELATIONSHIP WITH SOMEONE, we must COMMUNICATE with them.
Friends talk with each
other. Friends talk about their hopes, their dreams, their successes and their fears.
TO HAVE A RELATIONSHIP WITH SOMEONE, we must RESPECT them.
To respect someone is
to honor them, esteem them, be considerate and polite to them.
The Bible says:
Let nothing be done through
strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than
themselves. Philippians
2:3
There is a lack of
respect in the body of Christ today. We
can see it; in how leaders treat their members. We can see it; in how members
treat each other. We can see it; in how the members of one church will treat
the members of another church. We need
to respect each other. We all need to be careful in what we say to each other
and about each other.
The Bible provides a
clear answer on how to build a relationship with God. We believe in God and trust the Bible because it is the only
“spiritual writing” that has been proven to be true.
A passage helpful for explaining a relationship with God is Matthew 6. In this passage, at His disciples’ request, Jesus is teaching His disciples how to pray. Prayer was not unknown, but a lot of people prayed amiss, so Jesus' disciples wanted to know what He recommended. Jesus gave them this example:
In this manner, therefore, pray: Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done On earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, As we forgive our debtors. And do not lead us into temptation, But deliver us from the evil one. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen. Matthew 6:9-13
The first two words of this model prayer tell us a great deal about relationships. First, that Jesus starts out with the word 'our', not the word 'my'. The reason is that God is not only the father of the person praying, but of others also. In this context, the ‘our’ includes the “horizontal” relationship with other people who are children of God. Today, since we can “Get right with God through Jesus,” the word ‘our’ includes all Christians.
Second, the word Father
implies a “vertical [upright]” relationship with God. Note that the
relationship is not that of a wife to a husband, two people dating one another,
or a neighbor to another neighbor. It is a child to a father relationship. People
who do not acknowledge God do not have
this relationship.
So how do you go from
the “creator-created” relationship you had, (which is not really a relationship
at all) to a “father-child” relationship? The first of two steps is a process
we call “getting right with God.”
The one way to get right with God
is based completely on the Bible, not our opinion. If we are going to follow
what the Bible says about getting right with God, we have to know three important points:
§ 1. I need Jesus
Most people begin with a wrong
view of their condition in relationship to God. If they believe in a life after
this life, they think their own way of getting to heaven is “good enough” to
make it through the “pearly gates.”
The Bible tells us that every
person is totally separated from God by a thing called “sin.”
For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; Romans 3:23
Sin is simply disobeying God. Since God is sinless, He can not abide sin, or
people with sin. We have to be sinless. Think of it this way. If three of us
throw darts at a dart board and one gets two inches away from the bull’s eye,
another four inches away, and another misses the board completely, which one of
us hit the bull’s eye? No one! This is how it is with us compared to God. The
bull’s eye is what God demands (perfection, no sin). Some will come closer
to obeying God than others, but no one ever hits the bull’s eye of perfection.
Thus, everyone is totally lost and they are (literally) enemies of God, even if
they get close to the bull’s eye. Just one sin totally separates us from God.
What makes this worse is that we know that if we sin the cost is to die.
For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Romans 6:23
Keep reading; all is not lost! Needless to say, we have a
problem. This is where Jesus comes in. God knew that there was no possible
way that we could ever have any association with Him because of our sin.
Knowing that we could not erase even one sin on our own, He loved us so much
that He sent His Son Jesus into the world.
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. John
3:16-17
Since Jesus never sinned, He did not have to die. Still, He
chose to die on the cross for the sins of all people. He became the “perfect
sacrifice” for all our sins, and God accepted His death for our sins as payment
in full! Therefore, Jesus became the “bridge” between us and God. It is only
through what He did that we can have any association with God.
Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. John 14:6
All we have to do is accept Jesus as our Savior and Lord and
then live for Him. That brings us to our next question.
§ 2. Accept Jesus
The Bible reveals four steps:
Ø
Believe
in Jesus and put your faith in Him.
For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: 9 Not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them. Ephesians 2:8-10
Christianity is not a blind faith,
but rather a faith based on facts. That is, it can be verified and proven to be
true.
Ø Repent
of your sins.
And the times of this ignorance God winked at ; but now commandeth all men every where to repent: Because he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained ; whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead. Acts 17:30-31
What does “repent” mean? Imagine that you were going to the store when you realized that you forgot your money. What would you do? You would probably be disappointed that you wasted so much time, but you would still turn around and go home to get your money. Repentance is like that. A repentant person simply says, “God, I behaved badly in my past, and I want to turn around and live the way that You want me to live from now on.” You can talk to God like you would talk to a respected friend and repent of any sin that has been a part of your life.
Ø Confess Jesus as Lord.
Whosoever therefore shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in heaven. But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in heaven. Matthew
10:32-33
That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. Romans 10:9-10
In the Bible, God always places
emphasis on what we say—probably because whatever is in your heart determines
what you say:
O generation of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak good things? for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. Matthew 12:34
Therefore God wants us to verbally
commit to Jesus (as Lord of our life) to someone.
Ø Be baptized.
Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call. Acts 2:38-39
Being baptized means being
immersed in water. The significance of
this act can be seen in:
What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein? Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death? Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection: Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin. For he that is dead is freed from sin. Romans
6:1-7
and an example of it in:
. . . Then Philip opened his mouth, and began at the same scripture, and preached unto him Jesus. And as they went on their way, they came unto certain water: and the eunuch said, See, here is water; what doth hinder me to be baptized? And Philip said, If thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest. And he answered and said, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. And he commanded the chariot to stand still: and they went down both into the water, both Philip and the eunuch; and he baptized him. Acts 8:36-38
Some people do not think that
baptism is part of accepting Jesus. However, one thing is clear in the
Bible—belief and baptism are always together, never separated. Therefore, it is
obvious that baptism is part of accepting Jesus. According to the Bible, this
four-step process gets you on the straight path with God.
§ 3. Stay Right With God Through Jesus
Many times people think that God is
going to forgive their past sins, but after becoming a Christian, they can
never sin again or God will reject them. This is not the case at all, so let’s
get an understanding of how we are to live after accepting Christ as our Savior
and Lord.
But whoso keepeth his word, in him verily is the love of God perfected: hereby know we that we are in him. He that saith he abideth in him ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked. This then is the message which we have heard of him,
and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with him,
and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth: 1 John 2:5-6
This passage describes people who
are right with God, and explains to them that they will still struggle with and
fall into sin at times. At these times, it says that the blood of Jesus
cleanses them from all sin. However, it first qualifies how believers must live
to apply this promise to themselves. It uses the terms “walking
in the light” and “walking in the darkness.”
The big issues here are foundation, motivation, and consistency. If our foundation is the
Bible, and if our motivation is being Christ- like, and if we consistently seek
to live like Christ, then we know that Jesus covers our sins, and we are still
right with God.
These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God; that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God. 1
John 5:13
However, if we say that we know
God, and yet do not consistently seek to live like Christ by obeying Him (that
is, we continue to “walk in darkness”) God says that we are liars and the truth
is not in us.
And hereby we do know that we know him, if we keep his commandments. He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him. 1 John 2:3-4
If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth: 1 John 1:6
Thus, if we make a decision to
accept Christ, we must understand that it means a lifetime commitment
toward seeking to be like Jesus in the way that we think and live. This is what “staying
right with God” is all about—becoming more like Jesus!
Biblical Studies
03/01/22
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