Relationship

"And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity."
--Matthew 7:23

What does it really mean to know Jesus? Is he more to me than just a mental concept I acknowledge, or a list of lifestyle rules I attempt to follow? Do I value him as one values a true love or dear friend? Do I separate the salvation found through Christ from the relationship he calls me to have with him? His teachings make clear that his salvation is a relationship with him--not a contract between God and I, and not some heavenly insurance policy which guarantees coverage of my sins and a safe passage to heaven when I die. The core Greek word of 'believe' as found in our English Bible means to place faith in a person--to trust and commit to them. The 'belief' that Jesus spoke of as being central to salvation was and is not a mere mental assent to a statement or statements, rather it is a foundation for relationship, to truly knowing an individual. But how many years have I spent living as though the former were true! I claim to have a relationship with God, but do I truly? Is 'relationship' merely the title I give to the words I speak to an unseen, faraway spiritual being who I really have no concrete awareness of? The atheist's response would be simple: "God does not exist you ignorant nincompoop! You're attempting to conjure up an interaction with a mystical concept, so no wonder you're frustrated!" Well, that is the easy way out, but the truth is rather more complicated than a post-modern 'enlightened' intellectual would have one think. The tormenting part is that I have seen God, in the sense that I've been aware of his Spirit's presence and have observed him working in my life and in the lives of others, often in small ways, but sometimes in big ways. So, I know of Jesus, but do I know him? I find myself reaching a point of utter frustration, and feel as if my faith is going nowhere. I am still sinning in action and thought, clearly contradicting the righteousness that Jesus said results from salvation, aka, from a relationship with him. Such must indicate that I am either not in a relationship with him, or that it is not an intimate one. Is it a sterile, business-like relationship? In short, do I love Jesus? He spoke of love as being the essence of the believing life--"This is my commandment, that ye love one another, as I have loved you" (John 15:12). Do I not love him as I should because I feel he does not love me? Perhaps that is at the core of my failure to know him as he is. But why would I think even for a moment that God does not love me? Maybe because I grew up in Church with a knowledge of him and yet still remain in sin? Or is it the fact that I claim his name as a husband would his wife's, yet I often live and think as if I did not belong to him and he to me? Yes, how can God love such an unfaithful man as I? The world is full of men and women, even here in America, that have not heard the gospel of salvation, and who are entirely ignorant of Jesus' name. So what more would God do with me, since I have both heard and seen? What can he say to a man who lives the average hypocritical Christian life, though he might hate it with every inch of his soul? I am tired, I am weary, and I am sick to death of 'insurance policy' salvation. I desire to know Jesus Christ, to experience his love for me, and to then live out that love in my own life completely. But my flesh rebels against me, and my mind is my enemy. Can God reach me through such a fog? And I guess the overriding question for me is...does he even desire to?

I pray it is so.