Develop, Grow and Maintain… NWHM but W – pt 9

Many years ago, my dearly departed wife sweetly asked me if I would tell her that I loved her everyday… Well, she didn’t have to work very hard to twist my arm on that one!  We had always had a very close relationship and I had already been doing that since our dating days in the early 1970’s.  She just wanted to remind me and to let me know how special those few words made her feel!

In a way that wasn’t that much different from my wife’s simple request, the Apostle John wrote to his readers in I John 3:18 saying, “My dear children, let's not just talk about love; let's practice real love.” (The Message Bible)

As I began to draw this ten-part series on “It’s not WHAT or HOW MUCH, but WHO” to a close, I got to thinking… “How do you develop, grow and maintain a close loving relationship with someone special?”  And in the crux of this series… Say… someone really special like God?

Well, the answer to that question was actually pretty simple for me!  In the darkest and most difficult of times during Piper’s and my final journey in the last years of her life, the Lord would quietly show me how intimately He loved me… by comparing His relationship with me… to that of my wife and I… and that was something very EASY for me to understand and put great faith in!  So, that is what I will attempt to do in today’s blog post.

Over the weekend I began to think about how Piper and I got and stayed so close with each other, and my immediate response was that we made a point to make and take the time to be ALONE together!  But it’s not like we just dropped everything, left the kids alone and spent hours together.  Instead, in practice, we enjoyed small amounts of time in each other’s company whenever opportunity presented itself.

When we were dating it was easy to be together because apart from school and work, we had all the time in the world to be together… so whether it was in the physical presence of each other or the hours we spent on the phone, we talked… and talked… and talked… which was an easy habit that we never seemed to lose!  I was telling one of Piper’s cousins in California yesterday, that even when Piper couldn’t communicate and was confined to her wheelchair… I would still talk to her all the time… in the house, on walks, in the car and while shopping at the store!  And it wasn’t unusual to get funny looks from people around us!

Once married and consumed with our growing family, homeschooling, church and my normal two to three jobs, we made time to walk around the neighborhood numerous times a week, if not daily, go grocery shopping together, occasionally driving out to the coast together, and grabbing a burger when we could and eating alone in my Camaro up on a nearby hill overlooking the city.  When we could fit it into our daily schedule, we also got in the habit of reading Christian teaching books aloud together or watching a ministry program on TV.

I’m not sure why, but we also always went to bed at the same time every night.  That afforded us the opportunity to spend quality time together after the kids had gone to sleep to discuss each other’s day, unwind and laugh and most important… to snuggle!  We also made it a priority to get away alone, at least once a year for a two-night holiday, usually on the coast.  And even that didn’t have to cost much money.  When finances were tight, we either found a lodge running a mid-week special and on a couple of occasions, were able to barter our time at a resort with one of the side businesses I had going on!  So, my point is… If there is a will, then there is a way!

Now the same priority, commitment and perseverance can be dedicated to your personal relationship with God!  If you want to have that “SECRET PLACE” type of life where you are able to know Him in a close and intimate way… just like you would have with a spouse or another very special person, then you’ve got to make and take the time to be together with Him alone as well!

And how do you do that?  Again, it’s rather simple!  The best two ways to spend time alone with the Creator of the universe is through prayer and most importantly, by reading/study and practice of the Word of God.  The words written in our Bibles are called “The Living Word” of God for a reason…  Through the action of the Holy Spirit living in you, the Word comes alive and personally meaningful to you when you study it!  Piper would say, and I would concur, that our Bibles should be like a good friend to us!  The more we read and becomes familiar with God’s truths in His Word, the more personally we get to know Him.

In referencing my first paragraph in today’s blog, I would have to say that Piper knew that my biggest aim in our relationship was to love and please her.  I absolutely loved to make her laugh… as she did with me!  But I also wanted to know how to best communicate with her, meet her needs and do the things for her that she really enjoyed and made her feel special.

And in that regard, she would sometimes gently tell me personal ways in which I could talk with her, touch her, encourage her and like I said, all around love her and make her to know that she was the most special person in the world to me.

I can recall one time a while back, when I came home feeling rather needy and approached her saying, “Give me a hug…” and by the reaction on her face I knew that I had definitely taken the wrong approach!  She wasn’t necessarily angry with me, but also had a tough day and would have enjoyed a little compassion from me before demanding of her.  So, in her normal “take an event and turn it into a teachable moment” character, she softly asked if I could ask for a hug and not just demand one!  And that made perfect sense to me, (also made me feel a bit foolish at my selfish antics) and defiantly was another tool that I added to my Jim and Piper relationship toolbox!

Those same approaches or relationship tools are also discovered when we spend time with God.  His Word is filled with all kinds of vital information that can help us in our interactions with Him.  Contrary to some common misconceptions, communication with God does not have to be a hit and miss event.  I know of many people whose prayers are nothing but a bunch of words that the individual praying is “just a hope‘in and a pray‘in” that God might answer… But that’s not the way God designed it to be.  The Bible tells of specific ways to pray for different kinds of needs! *

When we spend regular time in the Word, we learn more and more about our heavenly Father.  We learn the things that He enjoys from us, we learn how to best approach Him with the various needs in our lives, we get more comfortable in His presence and… I firmly believe that He gets more comfortable with us as He gets to know us better and better.

My favorite verse of Scripture on the subject of knowing God is found in Ephesians 3:19 where the Apostle Paul prays for us saying, “You will know Christ's love, which goes far beyond any knowledge. I am praying this so that you may be completely filled with God.” (God’s Word ©).  In the original Greek, the word “know” used to explain our knowledge of Christ’s love, refers to a close and very intimate kind of love and is the “The Jewish idiom for sexual intercourse between a husband and wife.” (Thayer’s Greek Definitions). 

Is that the way that you “KNOW” the love of Christ… or WANT TO KNOW His love toward you?  Is that the type of relationship that you have with our Heavenly Father… or want to have? 

Well… it’s available for you and me… but we just need to make and take the time on a regular basis to DEVELOP, GROW and MAINTAIN that intimate level of relationship with Him!

… and in the process, have fun doing it!

 

*Take a look at books like “The Art of Prayer – A handbook on prayer” by Kenneth E. Hagin available at bookstores (Amazon) or at www.rhema.org