God on the Shelf

I've discovered that I can't relegate God to certain circumstances or big moments and expect to have a relationship that means something. While God promises to always be there for us when we call on Him, He is not content with being a once-in-a-while God either. Honestly, we don't have the power to limit God's ability to work in our lives, but we do get to choose our level of attention and devotion. We fool ourselves however, if we believe we have the power to keep God on a shelf to be used at our convenience. He isn't a magic genie that exists to help us in times of trouble. He will continue to see His will fulfilled through our on-and-off devotion while waiting for us to get serious about following Him. We might think we are keeping Him at a safe distance until we need Him, but He is intimately involved in our lives whether we recognize it or not. He wouldn't be fully God if it was any other way.

It's a Risk

Most of us fear rejection. We don't like to take a risk and then be summarily dismissed. It can be an intimidating prospect to be rejected for a job, a date, or an opportunity. It's much more painful if we feel that action is directed specifically at our identity.

John Powell wrote in his book, Why I Am Afraid To Tell You Who I Am?, "I am afraid to tell you who I am, because, if I tell you who I am, you may not like who I am, and it's all that I have." We avoid personal honesty & transparency because that puts us at tremendous risk of injury if it isn't received well. While we might feel that constructing a facade to hide our true selves behind will keep us safe, it will also ensure the lack of real relationship & community. We won't ever be able to enjoy depth in our most personal relationships and will become increasingly isolated.

I'm not suggesting that we need to rent a billboard to advertise our true selves or spew all of it out via social media. Instead we make an intentional effort with a select few people to share who we really are. It's a risky endeavor, but one that brings depth in its rewards.

Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

Full Disclosure

God desires a relationship with us that is fully engaged. We are the ones that tend to compartmentalize and keep parts locked away in our brain & spirit in an attempt to hide from Him. Theologically speaking this is impossible, but we still convince ourselves that we achieve it. It doesn't prevent God from knowing us, but it will prevent us from completely knowing Him. 

We become fully exposed to God when we humbly engage Him at every level and area of life. This changes our interaction with Him by making our faith commitment more authentic. We struggle with this total surrender because we believe the lie that we can control/limit our sin to parts of our existence. We fail to surrender because we are ashamed of the sin that has entangled us and don't want to relinquish it or don't believe that God can heal us from it.

Removing our mental & spiritual barriers leads to a familiarity with God that will transform our opinion of His desire to be engaged in real life with us. It will open us up to a relationship that is deeply powerful and genuinely intimate. It becomes a force that we live with in all of our life environments and not just a convenient stop-gap on Sunday mornings or when life gets tough. 

Full disclosure leads to full engagement.

Intimate Greetings

We have different levels of intimacy with people that we know. There are some that we would wave to if we saw them across the room. There are others that we would see and work our way to them to embrace them.

Our relationship with God isn't so different from that. There are times when we see Him from a distance and give Him a wave or a wink and a nod. We are comfortable knowing Him, but don't want Him to get to close to us out of fear, apathy or selfishness. There are other times when we would run across the room to see Him and grab Him in a big bear hug that might make other people around us uncomfortable.

What is the difference between these two scenarios? It can't be God-He doesn't change. The shift then is in us. It is in our character-our willingness to be righteous people through His Holy Spirit. Andy Stanley put it this way in his book, Louder Than Words, "...character paves the way to intimacy with God."

It makes me give thought to how I would greet God if I saw Him from across the room today.