On Intimacy

In response to a post by a beautifully hungry sister :)—and I know most of my entries are centered around intimacy with Jesus—but I’m compelled to share what my times with Him really look like. It’s such a struggle to that place of real enjoyment, but it’s something I wish more believers could experience on a daily basis. Like really good cheesecake. You can’t just experience it for yourself, ya gotta share fool! Not that I’m some expert on “how” to be intimate with God, it’s always a struggle with the flesh; but He’s done such a transformation of my prayer life that it’s a testimony how He changed me from someone who always felt so uncomfortable speaking into thin air, and faithless that He was actually listening, into someone who can now spend hours at His feet knowing He moves at the sound of her voice. It takes some getting used to, cause pleasure in the presence of God is of a different “texture” than wordly pleasure, as Dwayne Roberts says. Different, but so much better :).

I always need a quiet, private place to sit down and pray, just cause I need to talk out loud (I’m ADD like that). If I’m on campus, I’ll go to the Little Chapel of Silence (I think it’s open 24/5) or Fishbowl Chapel (weekdays 9am til it gets dark I guess) or if you have a walk-in closet in your apt, you can consider using it as your prayer room as well. Freshman year, I started off in the bathroom, haha. While I’m living at home, I retreat to my car and just drive to the park to pray. Wherever you choose, intimacy is being free from distractions so you can enjoy sweet mingling with God :).

I always start off worshipping. It’s the perfect way to break off the shackles of your cares, and dust off the imprints the day has already made. Plus it’s biblical :) “Enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise; give thanks to Him and praise His name” -Ps 100:4. On days where I just don’t feel like talking (God knows), I spend most of my prayer time in worship. I read a book on intercession, and someone asked the Sr. pastor of Bethel church what his prayer life looked like. He said if he had one hour to pray, he’d spend 45 minutes in worship and 15 to pray. It sounds disproportionate, but I guess what’s more important is connecting with God’s heart in worship (what intimacy’s all about), and allowing the Spirit to come and work in you. Then those 15 minutes will be purely Spirit-led, and it’s amazing how much we can pray for in 15 minutes.

A lot of times I’ll turn off my mp3 player and open with “God..” and then stop in wonderment at how much grace that moment just held. To be alone with the Creator of the Universe, speaking with Him in a way I would nobody else; whispering because I can—the Man’s closer to us than our own souls!—builds up so much gratitude in my heart that the overflow just comes out in words of praise and adoration. But what I’m getting at is this question of “What do you say?” As Mr. Wevodau said, intimacy is focusing on this issue of grace. It takes endless grace to be before God, to utter His name, to be requesting things of Him, to be right with Him—and coming before Him and thinking about all this before Him is intimacy. It’s being real..realizing how destitute you are, and yet allowed to enjoy the presence of—to be even loved by—an Almighty God. Worship from the lips, as uttered by the heart, is just the natural reaction to all this.

I’ve begun to realize that it's all about praying from the heart. It’s hard to explain, but sometimes I’ll feel words just mount up on my heart as an overflow of the grace I’m setting my thoughts upon, and it hardly involves the mind to pull in and grab ‘em out to speak forth and pierce things. My prayer life shifted when I stopped praying with my mind and started letting my heart speak for once. Even my blogging changed when my heart started having more to say than my mind, haha.

I remembered Jaeson Ma once wrote a letter about being intimate with God:

“Dear Close Friends,
Recently, God has been reminding me about the importance of taking time out each day to practice silence and solitude in prayer. Without silence, we cannot truly know God and grow in intimacy with Jesus. Without silence in our lives we can not find our center in God. Silence is necessary for us to daily hear God's voice and not the conflicting voices of this world. Many people ask me how do you spend time silent before God? How do you practice His presence?
I want to simply provide a few key tips and resources....
*1. Set a time daily to be quite with God -* this is not a time to read the Bible or even request our needs in prayer. We are to practice those daily. But I am suggesting we must find at least 20 minutes - 60 minutes to be completely silent with God in our body, soul and spirit. This requires great discipline, but the rewards are everlasting.
*2. When quite with God focus on Jesus - *it is easy to be distracted when trying to be quite with God. Every time your mind wanders, simply prayer quietly "Jesus I love You" or a simple sentence of love that focuses your mind back on Jesus the one you are worshipping in your heart and mind. Imagine Jesus being with, standing before you and relate to Him intimately in your imagination and with your spirit.
*3. Turn on Devotional Music to Help Experience His presence - *Every
morning before I spend my time in silence and solitude with God I turn on quite, peaceful and intimate devotional worship music that helps my soul rest in God's presence. Devotional music creates an environment for your body, soul and spirit to engage with the Holy Spirit in an experiential way. It's helpful to your senses to get in touch with the presence of God in and around you.
*Download a few devotional music albums I have in the link below...*
https://www.box.net/shared/35hxpe7ok9
*4. Be Expectant to Encounter God's Presence -* sit in a posture or position that is set to receive God's tangible presence (sitting, eyes close, hands open, etc). There is nothing better in this life than being in the presence of God. Persist in prayer and meditation upon the Lord until your distractions and thoughts subside and your spirit becomes alive and attentive to God's glory and presence in and around you. God is with us.
When we pray we should expect to encounter God and experience His tangible presence. In the recent days I have been experiencing God's glory in a unprecedented way. The word glory literally means "weight" or "heaviness" so when we experience the glory of God is an actually weight or heavy presence in which we can physically feel and emotionally engage in while our spirits are in unified worship with the Spirit of Jesus Christ. It is wonderful, it is amazing, it is what we were born for... to live in the presence of God. I hope this simple devotional helps you to go deeper into the heart and depths of God's love in Jesus Christ.
Blessings,
JMA”

Hope this helps Mon (and anyone else reading)! I really appreciate your comments, and it’s a tragedy yours are disabled, so thought I’d write a post for you on the only subject I can actually contribute to, haha. Press in, sistah! God loves your heart<3.

P.S. If you're really serious about this intimacy thing, the best thing I did to get close to God was to fast (He actually expects us to do so regularly). There are so many benefits to fasting, including intimacy with Jesus..here's a good pdf on it!

P.P.S. Everything you need to know at your disposal, my dear :).