Do you want to grow and maintain deep intimacy with God?

Over the next six posts, I’m going to empower you with a practical framework for cultivate a deeper relationship with Jesus. Join me for this journey, and your intimacy with God will go deeper than ever before!

What is intimacy?

If we’re going to grow a deep intimacy with God, we need to understand what intimacy is. In a nutshell, intimacy describes what two or more people share. The two circles below have a relationship to each other, but not with each other. There is no intimacy:

Everyone, even the most angry atheist, has a relationship to God; but only some people have a relationship with God: Believers in Jesus, who have been reconciled to God through their faith in Christ’s death and resurrection.

The two circles below have a relationship with each other. That tiny sliver of overlap is the space they share. The rest of the circles represent the parts that are not being shared. The overlap illustrates the scope of their intimacy. Transparency is a personal choice, but intimacy is always mutual.

The final diagram illustrates deeper intimacy. Why? Because the two circles are sharing more of themselves with each other:

The foundation of intimacy

The foundation of intimacy is trust, because without trust, I will not share parts of myself with you—especially the parts I’m not secure in or proud of. Entrusting myself to you means I’m giving you a part of me to steward: A secret, a confession, a dream, a goal, perhaps even my body (in the case of my wife). That’s why some people get more of me than others. They’ve proven that they will carefully steward what I entrust to them. I withhold more of myself from people who don’t treat the part of me I’m giving them as a treasure.

In our human relationships, this entrusting is grown or diminished as we spend time interacting with people. We venture out and share a part of ourselves—an opinion, time, physical space or touch, a struggle we’re having. Intimacy either grows as people steward that well and reciprocate, or intimacy doesn’t germinate because our risk wasn’t received well or reciprocated. I think you get the idea.

Intimacy with God

Well, intimacy with God works the same way. He wants to give more of Himself to us—for us to experience more of Him and His heart towards us. In fact, He always takes the initiative. But since intimacy is mutual by definition, His gestures don’t result in intimacy unless we steward what He’s sharing as a treasure and reciprocate by entrusting ourselves to Him in return. God fills what we give Him, but He usually waits for us to respond before giving more.

So if you’re waiting for God to reveal Himself to you, or to feel His presence and hear His voice, you’re craving intimacy. He’s already taken the initiative by giving Himself to you through Jesus; He’s waiting for you to return the gesture. So give (entrust) yourself fully to Him through Jesus! If you want more of God, then you’re going to have to give Him more of you.

In my next post, I’m going to start unpacking how we can interact with Jesus to grow intimacy with God. You’re not going to want to miss it! Here’s a video summary of this post. 🙂