Friendship with God

I am blessed that my wife is also my best friend. Communication may be the fire of any relationship but a relationship is great when words are often not necessary. Merely being in the presence of the friend is enough and communication takes place without words. 

If we are to be true friends of God our relationship with Him should develop to the “mere presence” level. When we start with God we delight in our time with Him but that time is infrequent and it takes effort. We have to go to our “special” place. We need solitude and silence. At the very early stages we do most of the talking. But as with any friendship, as it develops we begin to listen and listening becomes a greater delight than talking.

My strongest memory of my first date with Rosemary was that we talked. I came away from that experience feeling that I had never spoken that much or that openly with anyone. It was just the beginning of our great relationship. That’s what we seek with God. 

With a friend you never need to ask what they want. You just know it. But even after years of such friendship there are occasional misreadings. They are corrected by a gentle check. 

When our friendship with God reaches that level “you have a life of freedom, liberty, and delight; you are God’s will. And all of your commonsense decisions are actually His will for you, unless you sense a feeling of restraint brought on by a check in your spirit. You are free to make decisions in the light of a perfect and delightful friendship with God, knowing that if your decisions are wrong He will lovingly produce that sense of restraint.”

It is no great relationship that consists only of one continually asking favors from the other. So it is with our relationship with God. It begins with our great need and His great power to meet our need. But we move beyond that. As with any great relationship we move from needing what the friend can provide, to needing the frined. In the providing of need by a friend and to a friend, we get to really know the friend.  “The reason for asking is so you may get to know God better. “Delight yourself also in the Lord, and He shall give you the desires of your heart” ( Psalm 37:4 ). We should keep praying to get a perfect understanding of God Himself.