Download Friendship with God Session 3: Staying in Conversation I. Talking to

Friendship with God
Session 3: Staying in Conversation
I.
Talking to God:
Communication is the building block of all of our relationships, the better the
communication, the stronger the relationship. In our relationship with God
communication boils down to us being intentional to talk to Him.
A. Open Door for Greater Intimacy:
Confronted with the reality that God desires deep friendship with us we
have an open door to seek greater intimacy with Him. That door is all
about our choosing to increase and communication and we want to do all
within our power to find ways to strengthen our communication with
Jesus.
B. Talking to Him All Day Long:
Since this is our objective we will spend this last session looking at how
we can engage Him more and seek to stay in conversation with Him
throughout our days; being intentional to set aside our thoughts and to
spend time actually talking to the invisible God all day long.
“Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this
is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus (1Th. 5:16-18).”
C. The Promise For Those Who Do:
He wants for us to call out to Him and He says that when we do He will
hear us and respond. He exhorts us to call on Him, to wait on Him
constantly and to listen for Him to speak. The more we cry out the more
He will respond to us.
“Listen to my instruction and be wise…Blessed are those who listen to me,
watching daily at my doors, waiting at my doorway. For those who find me
find life and receive favor from the Lord (Pr. 8:33-35)”
“Yet the Lord longs to be gracious to you; therefore he will rise up to show
you compassion…Blessed are all who wait for him!...How gracious he will be
when you cry for help! As soon as he hears, he will answer you...Whether
you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you,
saying, “This is the way; walk in it (Is. 30:18-21).”
II.
He Knows Us As Individuals:
God knows us and He interacts with each us just as we are. He created each
of our personalities and He loves us, so He reaches low to love us in ways
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specific to us as individuals so that we can feel that love. His kindness in
relating to us as individuals extends also into how He speaks to us tailoring
His language to our unique personality.
A. Examples of His Tenderness:
It is sometimes astonishing to me how He speaks so “us” to each of us.
His voice is tailored to each of our personalities and those personalities
are so different that most of the time we wouldn’t understand what EH
was saying if He spoke to us like He spoke to our friends.
1. Cherish likes animal stuff but Luke likes gun stuff.
2. The Lord shows my friend Pancake pictures.
3. I like food (Taco Bueno exit story).
B. What This Means About Him:
His willingness to come to our level and speak to us in a personalized way
and His willingness to come down to our level are abundant proofs that
God so desires conversation with us. As we understand this it should
provoke us into greater communion with Him.
C. Choosing Communion Instead of Carelessness:
Even with the huge hearted God in pursuit of us we still have to choose
that communion. The less that we talk to God the less our hearts will
engage Him. It is far too easy to become careless in our pursuit of the
Lord, to take Him for granted even in the midst of all His blessings and
mercy. We need to be careful each day not to allow our minds to be led
astray from our devotion to Him.
“I am afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent’s cunning, your
minds may somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to
Christ (2Co. 11:3).”
III.
The Spirit Within:
All believers are called to fellowship with the Holy Spirit; our friendship with
Him deepens as we talk often to Him and give Him our heart. We should
regularly ask the indwelling Spirit to let us see what He sees and to feel what
He feels. We want to engage Him in questions about many different things
and topics so we can hear from Him as much as possible.
A. Our Spirit is Now Found in His:
We want to begin to see God as the indwelling Spirit who lives inside us
and who is now intertwined with our spirit (2Co. 3:3). His Spirit lives in
us and so it is from within that He speaks to us and leads us. We need to
believe that reality if we want to learn to discern His voice.
“And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you
and be with you forever— the Spirit of truth...you know him, for he lives
with you and will be in you (Jn. 14:16-17).”
“I speak the truth in Christ—I am not lying, my conscience confirms it in the
Holy Spirit (Ro. 9:1).”
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B. Flowing From Our Inner Man:
The Spirit lives in us and flows forth from within our heart; sometimes
the scripture refers to this as flowing forth from our inner man. We want
to turn the attention of our minds to the Spirit that dwells in our spirit.
“Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me,
as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.” By
this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to
receive (Jn. 7:37-39).”
“I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power
through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your
hearts through faith (Eph. 3:16-17).”
C. Fellowship with the Holy Spirit:
Friendship with God is about developing a deep fellowship with the Holy
Spirit. Paul spoke of this sweet reality as being made readily available for
those that would seek Him.
“May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the
fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all (2Co. 13:14).”
“If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any
comfort from his love, if any fellowship with the Spirit (Php. 2:1)”
D. Growing in that Fellowship:
Without a growing fellowship with the Holy Spirit we should not expect
to hear much from Heaven as we were created to have intimate
fellowship with God. This relationship with God has always been about
abiding, and God communicating to those who were in that abiding
friendship with Him. Paul compares our lives with the Spirit to a constant
dance that we are to intentionally engage in.
“Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit (Ga. 5:25).”
E. Two Way Dialogue:
True fellowship is a two-way dialogue. The Holy Spirit honors our part in
this relationship; He does not force us into dialogue with Him. He does
not force conversation or friendship on anyone. If we do not want to talk
to Him them we won’t have much dialogue, He doesn’t push Himself on
those who aren’t desperate for Him. Love requires a voluntary response,
a hungering for nearness to him as He beckons us into a deeper
friendship with more continual conversation.
IV.
The Work of the Spirit:
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If we will respond to that beckoning however then we will increase our
dialogue with Him. The Scripture speaks about the work and ministry of the
Holy Spirit in many ways frequently using picturesque terms that describe
Him as being a light to us, a fire and a river. When the living Spirit of God is
active doing His mysterious work it impacts us in mighty ways that is His
reciprocation in that two-way dialogue. These are more than terms, they are
metaphors of how the interaction will feel.
A. He is Called a Bright Light:
The Spirit ministers in us as a bright light that overpowers confusion,
accusation and rejection (Ps. 18:28; Is. 9:2; Mt. 4:16; Lk. 11:34; Jn. 3:19,
5:35). As we engage Him we should expect to encounter the Holy Spirit
as a bright light.
“The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it (Jn.
1:5).”
B. He is a Consuming Fire:
He is a consuming fire (Dt. 4:24; Is. 33:14; He. 12:29) that imparts love as
it tenderizes us and devours all that gets in the way of love, like bitterness
and addictions. There are many examples in the Psalms and elsewhere
that tell us that we can feel His presence like a fire within us.
“They asked each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he
talked with us on the road and opened the Scriptures to us (Lk. 24:32)?”
C. He is Like a Flowing River:
Remember that passage about the Holy Spirit flowing from within us like
a river of living water from John 7? This passage and others describes
Him as a flowing river who connects our heart with the free flowing
spontaneous activity of God. We should anticipate having encounters
with the Holy Spirit that feels like a mighty river flowing from within us.
“Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as
Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.” By
this he meant the Spirit (Jn. 7:37-39).”
V.
Responding in the Moment:
Many times the Lord wants to speak to us and even through us but in order
to do so we have to be willing to respond to His leading in the moment. The
conversation is always ongoing and He may at any moment ask us to do
things for Him or say things on His behalf to those around us.
A. He Confides in Those He Trusts:
The Lord loves us immensely, but we must not mistake His love for His
trust. To gain His trust we must first prove trustworthy by responding to
Him rightly when He gives us instruction and direction. The fear of the
Lord is to hear and obey, to keep in mind what God wants and to do it, the
Word of God says that the Lord responds to those who fear Him by
confiding in them.
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“Who, then, are those who fear the Lord? He will instruct them in the ways
they should choose…The Lord confides in those who fear him; he makes his
covenant known to them. My eyes are ever on the Lord (Ps. 25:12-15)”
B. When We are Faithful with Little:
Gaining that trust is a process; the great principle of God in His dealings
with mankind is that He promises to be faithful back to us when we are
faithful with even very little. He sees every deed and He takes note and
rewards us according to our faithfulness. With this in mind we can trust
that as we are faithful to engage the Lord with more intentionality He will
respond to us and make available to our spirit greater grace to press in
even further.
“Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few
things; I will put you in charge of many things (Mt. 25:21).”
C. Willingness to Act:
We must be willing to act on the instruction and impressions that the
Lord leads. The sweet fellowship that Jesus had with His Father was
unbroken because He only said what He heard His Father saying and did
what He saw His Father doing. This was complete submission and
willingness to do whatever He sensed that His Father wanted.
“Jesus gave them this answer: “Very truly I tell you, the Son can do nothing
by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever
the Father does the Son also does (Jn. 5:19).”
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