Relating Versus Obtaining Information

There is a difference between relating to Jesus and simply pursuing a knowledge of him. I love reading articles that give me the answers to deep questions. I have no finished answers for this topic. I am a man in process. There is some things that must be lived out though, so it is useful to share the questions.

As Americans, we understanding “knowing” as having received a set of information. God desires a different sort of knowing. It requires a process of getting to know God and just as important, it requires us letting God get to know us.

When I was a teen, I prayed with fervor and focused intently on spiritual pursuits. I kept a constant moral inventory of my inner life. I wanted to know God. I thought that trying hard enough was the price that spiritual people were referring to when they encouraged me to know God. At one point, a prophetic person in my life gave me a word of encouragement. He said, “You want to know God, but God wants to know you more than you want to know him”. I took the word as something like, “You are on the right track, but you are only scratching the surface of passionate pursuit of knowing God. You are underestimating what is involved in pursuing God. You need to keep at it and maybe try harder”.  The other day, I had a moment where that older word became fresh, and I understood it in a different light.

Relationship with God is always about two beings that are getting to know each other. What God was telling me so many years ago is that he wanted to know me, not just for me to know him. To know information requires mental focus. To be known in a relational manner requires vulnerability and oftentimes, it requires that we allow a space of time and availability for someone to get to know us.

"Rather, let our lives lovingly express truth [in all things, speaking truly, dealing truly, living truly]. Enfolded in love, let us grow up in every way and in all things into Him Who is the Head, [even] Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed One). For because of Him the whole body (the church, in all its various parts), closely joined and firmly knit together by the joints and ligaments with which it is supplied, when each part [with power adapted to its need] is working properly [in all its functions], grows to full maturity, building itself up in love." – Ephesians 4:15-16

The risk of a post like this one is that some will read it and feel that they need to struggle more to know God. Others will justify themselves in their place of apathy.  There are truths that we cannot comprehend apart from growth and maturity. Each of us needs…an ongoing revelation of what it means to be loved by God and what it looks like to live out that love in our daily life with other broken, incomplete people.