How to get closer to God.
Honestly, this is one of my favorite topics to talk about.
It is my favorite question someone could ever ask me (coming in second is “do you want another coffee today?”).
It is however a question that a handful of years ago I would have came up with an answer but did not have the habits or heart to back it up.
Growing up I knew about God and believing in him, attended church with my family a few times each year.
To say I had a personal relationship with God wasn’t not even something I would have understood.
It wasn’t until these last few years that I began to start building a personal relationship with God and began to seek connection with him each day.
Putting action behind getting closer to God has changed everything.
Today you are going to learn how to do the same! After this article you will no longer have to ask yourself how to get cloesr to to God?
My goal with this article is to equip you with tools and and the right mindset so that you can start building a relationship with God and begin to experience intimacy with God in your own personal relationship with God.
How to Build a Relationship with God
Each one of us is starting from a different spot when it comes to our relationship with God so you’ll notice in the next section that it is seperated into 2 sections:
-how to get closer with God
-intimacy with God
Each one of us is starting from a different spot when it comes to our relationship with God and if you are trying to get to know God or simply just start having more communication with God, there are a few simple and effective steps to help you do that.
If you are already at a spot where you have been connecting with God more often and are beginning to open your mind to what a heart transformation can look like at the hands of God, we will dive a little deeper into what intimacy with God looks like.
However, I suggest reading both sections no matter where you feel your starting point is because maybe you are like I was, thinking she had a pretty good starting point off with God, only to realize that it was pretty darn superficial…
How to Get Closer with God
Have you ever been able to learn something new or get better at something without spending time?
Our relationship with God is the same way!
We can’t get to know him unless we spend time with him.
There isn’t a magical time limit and then all of a sudden poof! you have a strong relationship with God.
We all have a unique journey, different challenges each day that we need to navigate through and I’ve come to realize over the last few years that each one of us has a different level of openness.
All of these elements impact our personal journey.
And honestly my openness wasn’t so open a few years ago.
I liked to solve problems on my own, I saw myself as a strong person for others to lean on and crying was reserved for major injuries only.
Turns out that while these can be considered strengths, they were weakness when it came to building a relationship with God.
By implementing these 2 strategies below I was able to take God’s hand and let him begin to transform my heart.
Spend Quiet Time with God
Spending time with God in the beginning looked like starting a Prayer Journal. If you’ve never prayer journaled before, I cannot recommend it enough! You can get all the tips and tricks you need here at How To Start a Prayer Journal!
I began to prayer journal each day as my way of spending time with God and it helped my relationship with God started to change.
Making time for God doesn’t have to be difficult!It doesn’t matter if you have 5 minutes or 55 minutes to spend with God, just spend it.
Find time to sit with him.
Read Scripture
Reading scripture used to drive me bananas, it just did.
I way overcomplicated it.
I got so frustrated not being able to pronounce all the cities and names of kings.
I’d flip to an inspirational verse in the book of Matthew (you know the verses that are plastered all over cute Hobby Lobby signs?) and then I would sit there wondering why it didn’t make me instantly feel better.
In Ephesians 6:17 we are instructed to ‘take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.’ (emphasis is mine). The power of God’s word has grown with me as I’ve gotten more comfortable in my relationship with God over time.
Besides, who wants a weak sword?
Scripture is God’s truth, sitting right there for us to open up and read.
Let scripture become the foundation of your life.
Developing Intimacy with God
Getting to know God and growing with God are intertwined, speaking from my own experience.
As I established my foundation through spending time with God consistently, it wasn’t until next phase of my journey that I experienced a difference between knowing God and intimacy with God.
Each part of the journey with God involves spending time with him and becoming familiar with his word through spending time in scripture.
At this point, you’ve found time to spend with God each day.
You are picking up scripture more often and getting comfortable in his word.
check, check, check! Right?
Nope- now comes the fun part: heart transformation!
Your relationship with God is not a checklist.
It is a relationship.
And like any good relationship comes openness, trust and growth.
Steps to growing your personal relationship with God into intimacy with God:
I mentioned openness, trust and growth but for today’s purpose I am going to focus one of those because I think it is a great place many of us need to start looking at and renewing!
Openness with God
In the beginning of this article I shared with you my openness was pretty low.
I’m a 3 on the Enneagram so this focus of accomplishment is pretty heavy within me (its nichnamed ‘the achiever’).
Just to be clear, there is nothing wrong with having goals but where we put our value or need for approval is something all of us should take a closer look.
For me, the answer to that question was a major roadblock in letting my guard down with God.
Openness with God meant I had to let my guard down.
I wasn’t ready.
If I let my guard down and really started to hand over my life to God, where did that leave me? Well, long story short it meant the first few things God needed to help me with was to unpack and realign my identity.
No longer seeking approval and self-worth from others, from the things of this world.
Openness with God means you gotta go all in, my friend! Lean into the trust you have in God.
Think about Solomn’s story for a minute.
When he came to God he asked, “So give your servant a discerning heart to govern your people and to distinguish between right and wrong” (1 Kings 3:9).
He didn’t ask to be rich and famous, to have an army that never lost… nope. He saught God’s wisdom.
Now that’s the kind of intimacy with God I am seeking in my life, what about you?
We start to set the stage for answering questions like this one and others that help you start to grow outside of your comfort zone when it comes to letting your openness flow over in my free mini-series, Where You And God Connect!
Having Faith in God… Even When Things Aren’t What You Expected
As you seek connection with God and are getting closer to God, I can guarentee you that there will come a point where you question, or rather, you realize that maybe you’ve been more focused on having faith in God when things go well than faith during the hard times.
When you hit that fork in the road in your own personal relationship with God, here are 2 super important things to remember:
God isn’t a genie.
God isn’t santa.
Having faith in God means having faith in God’s will for your life; living a life that glorifies God.
Did you see the key word in that statement?
Having faith in God means having faith in God’s will for your life.
He is the ultimate creator.
He is author of your life.
He knows your hearts and loves you.
Because we are caught up in this world we know that at times our sinful human nature can allow our minds to get consumed with expecting God to show up in our life as a geniue or as santa and we wonder why our desires, our will, haven’t been met. (John 5:30 is a great reminder of this!)
We may not understand it all today.We may not know why we are going through the storm that we are going through today but one day we will.
And in the meantime, it’s the faith that carries us through.
One way to get closer to God when life isn’t going as you planned is to ask God how he can prune (John 15) your heart through this.
Trade in your why questions and instead start asking God what he can show you, how he can use this to renew you into the you he desires on your journey to how to get closer to God.
Relationship with God Verses
Because we all love to have a few key reference points, here are a few great reminders when it comes to a relationship with God verses!
A relationship with God can start with a simple knock: “Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me.”- Revelation 3:20.
I can’t think of one healthy, happy relationship that is passive; that doesn’t take active participation in some way.
‘Do not merely listen to the world, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror, and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like”.- James 1:23-24.
Don’t forget what you look like today, stay active in building your relationship with God!
Read John 17:20-26, when Jesus prays for all believers. Take note in verse 22-23 when Jesus said, “I have given them the glory that you have gave me, that they may be one as we are one: I in them and you in me”.
Now that right there is the kind of relationship with God to be working towards each day.
How to Get Closer to God in Summary
While there are lots of thoughts in this article to get you thinking about how you can begin to grow your personal relationship with God, don’t let it overwhlem you, just spend time with him as you seek to be in a relationship with God.
To be in a relationship with God, for me at least, has felt similar to other relationships. It starts with one step and then it just grows and grows!
Jump into the free Daily Prayer Journal Challenge and start connecting with God and scripture today!
