When Good Friends Come To Visit – Pt. 2 — A ‘Time With God’ Audio Devotion

Subscribe to the ‘Time With God’ Podcast

Transcript

Good morning. We’re going to take some time with God now, just listening to what He has to say to us in His word, the Bible. God loves to speak into our lives. It’s so practical. If you don’t spend time reading the Bible much, your thoughts about it might be, oh, it’s all just weird stuff. It’s hard to understand. You need a priest or a pastor to tell you what it means, and, I’ll just wait till I go to church.

But when you start reading the Bible every day, and you’re listening to God and saying to Him, what can I apply to my life from what I read today, you start to find that God just ends up taking you to passages in the Bible that tell you exactly what you need for your life. It’s so practical. It’s about real-life issues. Don’t leave God out of your every day. Don’t leave Him to the weekends or to your hour or so at church each week. Keep God in your everyday life, and this is why each weekday morning at this time, we open the Bible and take some time with God.

What does God have to say to us today? Well, all this week we’re talking about the practical topic of spending time with good friends who come to visit you. Yesterday we looked at the simple answer celebrate with them. Celebrate their visit. Do something special.

Even if all you’re drinking is water at your meal, raise it and have a toast to God bringing you back together with your good friends.

Today, here’s the lesson. When you’re spending time with good friends who come to visit, who you haven’t seen for a while, share with one another the spiritual lessons that you’ve been learning. Share with one another the spiritual lessons you’ve been learning.

Let me share with you a few verses from Romans chapter 1 as Paul writes to them about his coming visit. He says, starting in verse 8, First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is proclaimed in all the world, for God is my witness whom I serve with my Spirit in the Gospel of His Son. That without ceasing I mention you always in my prayers asking that somehow by God’s will I may now at last succeed in coming to you. For I long to see you, that I may impart to you some spiritual gift to strengthen you, that is. That we may be mutually encouraged by each other’s faith, both yours and mine.

Well, what does Paul hope for in his time with them – that they’ll be sharing things with each other that build each other up. Now I have to admit Paul hasn’t met these people yet. He knows all about them though, and they certainly know all about him.

And he’s going to visit them, and he says, here’s what’s going to be the best part about our visit. We’re each going to be sharing with each other the things of God, the things God’s been doing in our lives. We’re going to be encouraging each other spiritually, and both of us are going to love our time together.

Hope 103.2 is proudly supported by

Well, when your good friends who are Jesus followers that you haven’t seen for a long time come to visit, this is what you want to do. You want to encourage one another, and as you spend time together, be sure you don’t just stay on the surface level, but share with one another the spiritual lessons you’ve been learning. Ask your friends who’ve come to visit – what has God been teaching you? And as they share about the things going on in their lives, what do you feel like God has been saying to you in that, you see, those simple little questions take you far deeper than the surface and make your time together so much more meaningful.

And they’re gonna ask you the same kinds of questions. You’re gonna learn from each other. You’re gonna grow from each other. You’re going to get to know what’s been going on in your friend’s heart and life, and that’s gonna reconnect you so much more deeply than just talking on the surface. When you see your good friends who come to visit, share with one another the spiritual lessons you’ve been learning.

I’m John North.

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