Growing Closer to God Through Intentional Relationships: Part 5 — A ‘Time With God’ Devotion

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Transcript

Good morning.

We’re finishing up a great week together, and each weekday morning we’ve been talking about this topic of growing closer to God through intentional relationships.

And let me just say, if you’re listening and you don’t yet have a meaningful relationship with God, you don’t yet know what it is to be born again, to know Jesus personally in your life. Then you can grow closer to God through intentional relationships as well, and I encourage you to just make it obvious to a Christian that you know that you want to know more. Ask them, how do you start a relationship with God? What does it mean to be born again? How can I have a relationship with Jesus? What is that all about?

Just ask some questions and you’ll find God revealing Himself to you through that Christian or through something they may give you to read or look at. But as we speak to the Christians here listening today, we’re talking about growing closer to God through intentional relationships, and I just want to finish this week with a challenge to you…

That in your life, you need to learn to be proactive rather than reactive. Proactive rather than reactive.

Well, it’s a simple concept. We probably all have heard of these terms before, and we know what that means. To be proactive means you take the initiative. To be reactive means you just wait for things to happen and you react to them. There’s a big difference, isn’t there?

And there’s a big difference in the way that you live your life. When you encounter a proactive person, you know, this person is not just floating through life, right? They are making things happen.

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You encounter them at your work and like, man, this person is moving through the ranks. Why? Because they are proactive. They’re actively engaged in thinking about how we can move forward, what we can do, they’re not just crisis solving, problem solving. No, they’re thinking actively, before there’s a crisis. What can we do to make things better?

And it’s the same in relationships. You can be proactive or reactive, and many of us in relationships just kind of sit back and wait to see what develops and who likes me, well then I’ll see if I like them too, and maybe we’ll become friends and stuff like that. Whereas a proactive person is reaching out, looking for those relationships, and strategically reaching out to people who are going to impact their lives in the way that they’re looking for.

Well, this is what you need to do in life. Be proactive in relationships, in conversations. Don’t just see where a conversation goes. Think about what kind of impact does God want me to have in this person’s life and start a conversation in that direction.

Think about how do I need to grow from my time with this person and come with a question to ask. Think about how can I find out where this person is and ask a question that invites them to express what’s going on in their heart and mind.

When Jesus left this world, He left us very clearly with the great commission. It’s, it’s what frames our life in this world.

As you go, he said, make disciples of all the nations as you go through life, make disciples. Help people encounter me. Help them grow in their relationship with me. Help them find a purpose in me so that they are intentional as well. This guides our lives as Christians. We aren’t just floating through life. We aren’t just hoping things turn out well. We’re not just concerned about our bottom line in the bank and our investments or whatever.

No, those things matter, sure. But the core of our life is this, whatever else I’m doing, whether I’m making money or losing money, or relating to someone on the street or my neighbours or my kids, my parents, whatever I’m doing, make disciples. That is, help people grow closer to God and build their lives on his agenda.

Well, that’s exactly what you want to do as well. Live an intentional life, be proactive, not reactive.

I’m John North.

To go deeper in your faith, visit AFCI.com.au.

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