God has recently brought me back to a place that I love very dearly, and He’s been speaking to me a lot about the meaning and purpose of me being here - aside from the fact that I love it so much. Today I had the incredible opportunity to join a ministry session held by a very well known and highly respected spiritual leader. It was a total surprise to me, and was definitely a gift from God!
As I observed the young students enjoying the experience with me, an alarm was raised in my heart that many of them are defining their relationship with God by high-contact moments like these. This was something I have no doubt they would consider an “encounter” with God, but truly encountering God is not the same thing as having a “mountaintop experience.” The term is usually used in reference to some powerful evening of worship where the Holy Spirit falls and people are weeping on the floor. Limbs flail, catchers stand at the ready, prophecies get thrown left and right, and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with feeling the presence of the Holy Spirit in this context! But that does not necessarily make it an encounter. To encounter the living and holy presence of God, you must first spend time getting to know Him. Relationships are built on trust, and while His Spirit will love us unconditionally without hesitation or question, that doesn’t mean that we have gained His TRUST. Trust is built over time and through consistency. It is the fruit of two hearts being equally committed to working through life’s trials in such a way that benefits and honors both sides of said relationship. This is true no matter what type of relationship you are approaching, so why would we ever presume to approach God without the same reverence and care?! That night at the conference when the speaker was on fire and so was your heart was definitely amazing! But if that was the first time you felt that presence of God meet you, it wasn’t an encounter - it was an introduction. I say this because it is impossible to truly encounter the living God without being permanently changed, but many people walk away from these introductions without it ever impacting their life in the long term. Sadly I have seen and known many people to jump from introduction to introduction with long periods of silence in between. Many Christians live their lives chasing the high of the “mountain top experience” without actually taking the time to steward the presence of God for themselves in the quiet and real moments of life. That isn’t a friendship you’re building, it’s an addiction. Chasing a high for the happy tingling feeling it gives you is no more intimate than lighting up a joint in a parking lot. Yet still, in God’s infinite grace and mercy, He never stops introducing Himself to us. Just because we misunderstand the purpose of that meeting, doesn’t make Him any less hopeful that someday we’ll come back for something more than that. Maybe a coffee date or a simple walk in the park. Building relationship really doesn’t have to be complicated at all! It just takes intentionality and time. God is the definition of an eternal optimist. He will give us a million and one chances to know Him because He knows that any one of them might someday become the beginning of something more. Only He knows what it will take for each of our hearts to cry out and hunger for something true - something real. Something, if I dare say it, far more real than having your palms tingle when the preacher prayed for you in the fire tunnel. (Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE fire tunnels! That’s not the point I’m trying to make here.) Our relationship with God is not defined by how high we can get or how many of those conferences we can go to. It’s defined by who we are with God when no one else is looking. When things are hard and don’t make sense. When it feels like He is giving you promises without answers or bringing you into a wilderness and then going silent. Relationship is tested and defined by how we react in those situations when the chips are down and life genuinely sucks. Learning to trust God is crucial, but once you’ve gone through enough of those tests and hard seasons, you’ll suddenly find yourself in a place where God trusts you back too. That’s when you actually have a relationship, and that’s when you get to see the true depth and richness of His love at work in your life - true encounter. That’s when a fit of uncontrollable giggles goes from a supernatural ab workout to a personal and intimate moment of shared joy. It carries the sweetness of knowing and being known, tied to concrete memories and examples of how His goodness has met you in both your highest and lowest places. It’s the difference between the butterflies of a first date and the depth of love between a married couple that has gone through hell and back together. There’s nothing wrong with butterflies and first dates! But you miss out on so much if you spend your life flitting from first date to first date. At some point you have to settle in and commit if you want to share the fruit of a lifelong walk together.
1 Comment
SUSAN STRONG
3/23/2019 09:46:26 pm
Thank you for sharing such mature and thoughtful insight, dear Erika. What a privilege for me to call you my granddaughter!!
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