Jesus Christ is the same

yesterday and today,

yes and forever.

Hebrews 13:8 (NAS)

We get many prayer requests because of our Prayer Community site. If you haven’t noticed it, investigate and become a part’it is totally private and your anonymity is secure. The neat thing is that you can be completely truthful and tell everything’your deepest needs/hurts.

There are many concerns for healing and salvation mentioned with these requests, but there’s one that appears more than any other: “I want a closer relationship with the Lord. How do I get that? What do I need to do?”

Let’s just think about closeness in relationships for a minute. I’ve told you about Wesley, our mostly Jack Russell terrier. He rarely lets me out of his sight. Why? Well, the main reason, I’m confident, is because I know where his food dish is, where the food is, and can tell time. But, Wes knows me. We do a lot of things together. He has come to know that I will let him sit with me, that I will walk with him around the block, that I let him go in the car with me, that I love to pet him, that I laugh at his antics, and will play with him. Yes. Wes knows me. We have a very close relationship.

Hopefully there is someone in your life who has the ability to calm you when things go wrong just by listening to you and saying, “It’s going to be all right. I’ll be here with you.” (This defines security and is to be conveyed most importantly by your wife or your husband. That’s why “listening” is one of the most important facets of a marriage.) There may be someone in your life who has been your main confidant over the years and you know’unequivocally’that person would never betray a confidence. I know him. He would never do that. Case closed!

But how do close relationships come about? It is so simple’spending time with each other, doing things together, being transparent and trusting each other with the deepest thoughts’secrets’in your life. You build trust through experiences and find that this person has those two qualities that spell closeness: Loyal and Truthful.

How well do you know Jesus Christ? Is He a loyal Friend? Oh, is He loyal! That’s one of His main characteristics, isn’t it? How about truthful? Is He truthful with you? He can be no other way! This is part of His being! God cannot lie![1] So, when someone shares something with you that brings into question His truthfulness or His loyalty, it’s your turn to say’emphatically’I know Him. He is not that way! Case closed! If I cannot trust Him completely’without a shadow of doubt’then I cannot trust Him at all! One episode of His failure to be truthful will shatter my trust for Him. That simply cannot be!

How do you establish a close relationship with Jesus? By getting to know Him’spending time with Him’sharing yourself with Him’and listening as He shares with you’and believing what He tells you. “But Anabel, He doesn’t talk to me!” Oh, yes He does. He has “written” a love letter to you’the Bible’choose those special parts that reveal His love to you and read them again, and again, and again.

Read Isaiah 40:11. Picture it. Put yourself in that scene.

Read Matthew 11:28-20. Picture it. Are you there?

Read Ephesians 3:17-21. Read it again. Is He talking to you?

Read Deuteronomy 31:8. Is this truth? Then walk in it.

Lovingly, Anabel

[1] Numbers 23:19, Titus 1:2