Our key verse for this series is:
- James 4:8, “Draw close to God, and God will draw close to you.”
- God desires for us to be close to Him, to share intimacy with Him
Last week we talked about intimacy.
- Intimacy isn’t just about sex.
- A close friendship has intimacy, belonging to someone has intimacy
Interesting story about Relationships
If you think your family has problems, consider the marriage mayhem created when 76-year-old Bill Baker of London recently wed Edna Harvey. She happened to be his granddaughter’s husband’s mother. That’s where the confusion began, according to Baker’s granddaughter, Lynn. “My mother-in-law is now my step-grandmother. My grandfather is now my stepfather-in-law. My mom is my sister-in-law and my brother is my nephew. But even crazier is that I’m now married to my uncle and my own children are my cousins.”
There are three things that God Himself has placed within us.
1) Every human desires to have intimacy with another person
2) Every human desires to have intimacy with God
3) You can’t have deep intimacy with another person without having intimacy with God
God simply made us this way.
Let me give you two examples of someone’s desire to have an intimate relationship with God.
1) David wrote in Psalm 63:1, 3-4, 6 & 8 – “O God, you are my God, earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you… Because your love is better than life, my lips will glorify you. I will praise you as long as I live, and in your name I will lift up my hands… I think of you through the watches of the night…my soul clings to you.
- David desired to have something more than just a distant relationship with God.
- He was burdened to be intimate with Him.
- David said, “Your love is better than life!”
- It sounds like a man who is completely lost in his love for a women. But he is craving a different kind of intimacy, he’s craving closeness with the Father.
2) Mary also had a great desire to have an intimate relationship with God.
- Luke 10:38-42, “38As Jesus and the disciples continued on their way to Jerusalem, they came to a village where a woman named Martha welcomed them into her home. 39Her sister, Mary, sat at the Lord’s feet, listening to what he taught. 40But Martha was worrying over the big dinner she was preparing. She came to Jesus and said, "Lord, doesn’t it seem unfair to you that my sister just sits here while I do all the work? Tell her to come and help me." 41But the Lord said to her, "My dear Martha, you are so upset over all these details! 42There is really only one thing worth being concerned about. Mary has discovered it--and I won’t take it away from her.”
- Martha was concerned with all the stuff that didn’t matter and Mary just wanted to have a close to Jesus.
- Even though inside we want to have a close relationship with God, often we make ourselves busy and fill our lives with meaningless stuff.
- We don’t seek after God, we don’t read His word, we don’t pray…we just fill our lives with useless, meaningless junk.
- But God says, “Get rid of all the stuff and focus on Me, desire to be close to Me.”
When we lack the desire to be close with God, it affects our relationship with Him.
Let me ask you a question:
If I go throughout my life without spending quality time with my wife, not trying to develop a close relationship with her, do you think that our relationship will last?
- No. That’s obvious.
- I’m trying to explain to you that it is the same way with God.
- In order for our relationship with God to last and be prosperous, we must spend quality time with Him.
- We need to give him our hearts like Mary. We need to forget about all the stuff in our life: being cool, having the nicest things, going out with the popular kids, etc – and focus on our closeness with the Father.
Not having a close, intimate relationship with God puts us at risk of losing everything in our life.
- There is a story of a man who (within one week) went to a strip club, met a stripper, left his wife, rented an apartment, moved in with the stripper, realized what he had done, kicked out the stripper, consulted his pastor on what he had done and then tried to get back together with his wife.
- Why?
- He had lost intimacy with his wife because he had lost intimacy with God.
- When God gets out of the picture, we are at risk of messing everything up and losing something valuable in our lives.
- Most of you in here are not married yet, but this applies to you too.
- You can mess up other relationships in your life: with friends, family, teachers, potential husbands/wives/, etc. – by not being close to God.
- Being away from God, effects everything in our life.
- People are so unhappy because they try and live their lifes without having a relationship with God.
I want to read you a story about a man who turned his back on God and when he did, his life started to crumble.
One beautiful Saturday afternoon while I was still in high school, I was driving my car along some country roads. The radio was on, but I didn’t notice. All I could hear were harsh voices of regret.
I pressed down on the gas pedal, trying to drive away from what had happened the night before. Yet no matter how fast I drove or how loud I played the radio, I couldn’t escape the fact that last night had really happened.
I had lost my virginity.
And I was angry at myself, at others, and at the culture around me that said sex was no big deal. I had bought the lie. The guys in the locker room had made it sound so cool. They didn’t tell me that the next morning—this morning—would be full of emptiness, pain, regret and sorrow. I felt stupid and dirty, like I’d traded the most precious diamond in the world for a cheap, dime-store trinket.
I drove for hours. I passed by my house and then by our church, where my dad is pastor. I thought of the lessons I’d learned in both places—lessons of morality, strength and godly character. I had been taught to live differently from the world, to resist temptation, and most important, to obey the Bible.
My failure the night before wasn’t the result of one momentary lapse in judgment. I’d been headed that way for a long time, trying to see how far I could go without actually having sex. It was a dangerous game, but it was fun. What I didn’t realize was that this game had no winners.
I’d always wanted to be just like everybody else, and most of the people I looked up to at school were sexually active.
I began to wonder why I was holding out. It’s no fun feeling like an oddball, especially when your friends are telling you all about their sexual escapades. After awhile, I decided I could be like everybody else.
Once I lost my virginity, I told myself, "I’ve messed up big time, so I guess it doesn’t matter what I do from now on. I might as well enjoy my rebellion as long as I’m here."
I should have run from my sin at that point; instead, I embraced it.
That was the beginning of a full-on rebellion. My heart hardened as the months went by. I struggled with thoughts of worthlessness. I felt like since I’d opened the forbidden door of premarital sex, there was no going back. I could never be pure again.
And though I felt guilty, I continued rebelling. A few months later, a friend asked me to a party where I knew there would be drinking. I said no at first, but then I thought, I’ve already fallen into sin, so I guess there’s nothing left to lose.
So I went to the party and started drinking. I had never tasted alcohol before, but I acted like drinking was normal for me. I drank until I passed out.
The next morning, I couldn’t remember anything, but my friends said I’d been the life of the party. I felt like I finally fit in.
Two days after the party, I was playing drums and singing in the choir at church—and still trying to get over my first hangover.
Over the next few months, I went to more parties and did more stupid things. Word was getting around that Jason Perry was going out and acting pretty wild. I thought it was cool.
On Friday and Saturday nights I was out living like the devil, then on Sunday mornings I would listen to my dad’s sermons and not blink an eye. I lost all desire to sing, and went from leading worship every Sunday to singing only now and then.
One Saturday night I got home late after being out with friends. I walked in quietly, trying not to wake my mom. I tiptoed into the bathroom, and looked at myself in the mirror. My eyes were bloodshot, and I barely recognized the unkempt person staring back at me.
"Jason, what are you doing?" I asked myself.
The next day, I went to church, and I was ready to make a change. My dad ended his sermon with an altar call, and I went down front to get right with God. I asked him to forgive me for the foolish way I’d been living.
Immediately I sensed his cleansing, forgiveness and peace. It felt so good to be home.
I stopped my rebellious lifestyle and started living for God again. Yet I was still overwhelmed by guilt, and it affected the way I thought about everything.
For example, I thought about my future wedding day—standing before my bride, my dad performing the ceremony. But instead of feeling happiness, I thought about the fact that I wasn’t a virgin. I had robbed my future wife of something precious, and I struggled with the fact that someone besides my bride knew me in a way that should have been reserved only for her.
The guilt stayed with me even after I joined Plus One. I eventually told the other guys in the group about my past, and they were cool with how I’d changed. Still, I continued to carry guilt and shame.
About a year after Plus One formed, I met a pastor in Nashville who changed my life. Pastor Tim didn’t care that I was some sort of "celebrity." I acted like I had it all together, but he had a way of seeing past the mask and looking right into my heart.
The first night we met, Pastor Tim led me in an intense prayer. And right away, I began to experience release from my guilt and shame.
That night, Pastor Tim challenged me to surrender everything to Jesus. Now I’m living a life of purity and hope. And in a very real sense, I am a virgin once again. Jesus Christ has made me new. God has set me free.
God wants us to have a close relationship with Him
He wants us to be ONE with Him.
Why is it important to be ONE with God.
Write these three things down.
O – Our
N – Natural
E – Element (ingredient)
I said in the beginning of this message that God has placed within us a desire to have an intimate relationship with Him.
There is a Natural Ingredient within us that longs for Him.
He is waiting for us to Draw Close First, so that He can draw close to us.
