Explore the profound depths of God’s love that transcends mere salvation and invites you into a personal, intimate relationship. Through understanding God’s desire for oneness with us, we learn how to build a spiritual intimacy that reflects the unity seen between Christ and His disciples. Dive into the teachings from the 17th chapter of John and discover the significance of this relationship to our eternal purpose.
Welcome to the In Touch Podcast with Charles Stanley for Tuesday, December 16th. The Bible says that God loves you deeper than you can imagine. The amazing truth is He longs for you to really know Him, to experience His love personally. Our series continues offering encouragement and hope through the God who cares enough to relate to us.
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God is not simply satisfied with saving us and delivering us from eternal separation and eternal punishment. He’s interested in something far more important than that though that is a part of it. He’s interested in building the kind of relationship with you and me that Jesus built with those 12 disciples. Can you think about something? What greater way could God have complimented you and me? What higher compliment could God the Father pay you and me than to want to build a personal relationship with us? I mean, it’s one thing to save us, but to want to build an intimate relationship with us so that we could relate to Him and on a daily ongoing basis the same way peter and james and john all those rest of those disciples related to christ you see most of us will miss the best of god’s blessings in life because god’s always out yonder somewhere up yonder in heaven and we’re down here that is not the way he intends for us to see him while he is the father And while the Lord Jesus Christ is seated at the Father’s right hand, the Bible says the Holy Spirit is living on the inside of us. And God intends to build a relationship with you and me. And I want to ask you again, how could God have paid you and me a higher compliment than to say to us and to all of mankind, I want a personal, intimate relationship with you. You are my friend. And you’ll never have one like him. Because you see, his friendship knows no limitations. It is absolutely and perfectly pure. A relationship of infinite love poured out upon you and me because he loves us. And as you go through these passages over and over and over again, he talks about loving us and our love for the Father. Look in the 17th chapter of John. The 17th chapter of John is his final prayer. for us here as he’s relating to his disciples and all through this passage he’s talking about them he’s praying for them and for us and uh it’s it’s a beautiful prayer but come on over if you will to um verse 21 well let’s look in verse 20 i do not ask in behalf of these alone look at this but for those also who believe in me through their word listen to that That includes me and it includes you. Look at that. I do not ask in behalf of these alone, but for those who also believe in me through their word. And so what happens? They told the story and those to whom they told it told it to someone else. 2,000 years later, what are we doing? We’re still telling it. And what he’s saying is, he says, Father, even before they’re born, I’m praying for them. Think about that. That Jesus prayed for you and me even before we came into being. Look in verse 21. That they may all be one, even as thou, Father, art in me and I in thee. That they also may be in us. That the world may believe that thou didst send me. And the glory which you have given me, I’ve given to them. Look at that. That they may be one just as we are one. I in them, thou in me. That they may be perfected in unity. that the world may know that thou didst send me, and that you loved them even as you loved me, and as you love me. If you go through this 14, 15, 16, 17 chapters of John, what you’re going to find is the most beautiful expressions of Jesus’ desire for intimacy, oneness of relationship with those men. He did several things to make this possible in your life and my life. He did three things. First of all, there’s the cross. What is it that caused God to drive Adam and Eve out of the garden? It was sin. You see, holy God, holy God cannot relate. to where there is the barrier of sin. You say, well, then how can he relate to me because I’m sure that I’ve sinned against him. Well, just follow me a minute. So what he did, he sent his only begotten son, Jesus Christ, to the cross. When Jesus died on the cross, God took the sin debt of the world Every single living human being, past, present, and future, placed it onto Christ and judged Christ, condemned him, and that’s why he said, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Because in those moments, he paid the penalty for the sin of all mankind. which made it possible then for every single person, not only to be made acceptable in the eyes of God, but to be able to relate to God, to build a relationship with Him. So the cross took care of the big barrier. Then came our conversion. And the Bible says that you and I were born again. That is, we had a new birth, which meant we had a new life. He says in, that’s in John chapter 3. In 2 Corinthians 5, He said… that you and I are new creations in Christ, created in Christ Jesus. That is, we’ve become a total new being. Then he said, you and I have a new spirit. That is, He’s given us a brand new spirit. So if you’ll think about all that God has done in this relationship, everything He’s done is new. We have a new birth, a new creation, a new spirit. But what I want you to see, and I want you to turn to Romans chapter 5, because I want you to read this verse. Romans chapter 5 and verse 17. In verse 17 of this chapter, here’s what He reminds us that He has given to us, which says, this is the reason that you and I can have a relationship with Him. In the 17th verse, he says, for if by one transgression, or if by the transgression of the one, that is when Adam fell, the whole human race fell, death reigned through the one, much more those who receive the abundance of what? Grace. And of what? The gift of righteousness will reign in life through the one Jesus Christ. So what he’s saying is this. When you and I were born again, that is when we received the Lord Jesus Christ as our personal Savior, here’s what happened. For us personally at that moment, what God did 2,000 years ago at the cross became a reality. The barrier of sin was lifted from us the moment we received Christ. And he says, you and I were given the gift of grace and listen, the gift of righteousness. which means from that moment on, you and I had a standing, a relationship with God, which made it possible for us to speak with Him, Him to speak with us, and for us to relate to each other from that point on for the rest of all of eternity future in which there is no time. So he says, we were given the gift of grace and the gift of righteousness. You and I have been made righteous in the eyes of God. Oh, we sin against him. But you see, that does not remove the gift of righteousness. We sin against him, but that doesn’t remove the gift of grace. It is the gift of grace that makes it possible that even though I choose to sin against him, I have been forgiven by the blood of Jesus Christ. Sin does not alter my standing with God once I become a believer. Sin clouds the relationship, fogs up the fellowship, but it does not remove that relationship. And so what did he do? In preparation to build a relationship with us, First of all, he sent Christ to the cross. That dealt with the sin barrier. Secondly, he brought about a conversion experience in your life and my life that gave us the standing of, listen, this grace wherein we stand, Paul says in this fifth chapter. Then he talks about the gift of God’s grace and the gift of righteousness, the gift of a right standing. It has nothing to do with my conduct. It is the gift of God that makes it possible for you and me to relate to this God in a warm, personal, intimate fashion. And then he did one more thing which he knew was important. That is, the coming of the Holy Spirit. He sent the Holy Spirit to live on the inside of us, to live in our spirit, and to give birth to our spirit. That’s what happens at conversion. The Spirit of God comes and seals us forever as a child of God. We’re then born into the family. Listen, if he didn’t want intimacy, why didn’t he say, this troop, and that troop, and this segment, and this company. He said family. Father. Son. Daughter. The Savior. Jesus said, friends. And the Father has made every single one of us who is a believer a child of God. And we’re His children. He’s our Heavenly Father. And we come to Him and He relates to us and He says, I’ll provide all of your needs. You can talk to me in prayer and I’ll answer your prayer. He says, you can do all things through me because I’m going to be with you, in you and upon you. I’ll always be there and never leave you. Intimacy, intimacy, intimacy, intimacy. Relationship, relationship, relationship. Not a distant God somewhere. but a warm, intimate, personal father. And most people are going through life and never feel his love, never sense his love, never have a relationship with God. Seeking relationships with other people, but never with God. You and I have a responsibility in this relationship. Now, what is it? First of all, our responsibility is to enter into that relationship. We have a personal relationship that happens, that comes about when we say, I do trust the Lord Jesus Christ as my personal Savior. I do believe that He paid my sin debt in full. I receive Him as my personal Savior. First step. Most important. That is, you and I have to choose to enter into this relationship. The second thing that we’re responsible for is the pursuit of this relationship. Now, let’s say that you’re a young lady and this fellow says, well, I’d like to date you. He dates you a few times. Then he says, I want to marry you. You say, well, now I tell you, I got to do some thinking about this and got to talk to my parents. And he says, well, OK, forget it. Just let me know when you get ready and I’ll be back. That’s not pursuing a relationship. It’s like the fellow who says, I love you with all of my heart and I’ll be over tomorrow night if it’s not raining. That has nothing to do with love. But you see, pursuing a relationship means that I take the initiative. Now think about this. God has already taken the initiative. How much initiative? Created us in His image. Secondly, He wasn’t satisfied, if we can put that in human terms, quote, wasn’t satisfied with everything He had done. Finally, and you and I know that He planned all this before the foundation of the world, which we’ve explained in the two previous messages. Finally, He said, I’m coming down there. I’m coming down and I’m going to take upon myself human flesh so you’ll know that you can relate to me. So you’ll know that we can talk and listen and be open with each other. And so pursuing this relationship, we have to take this initiative. You see, the reason we don’t have an intimate relationship with Him is not because God hasn’t done His divine best to make it a reality. It’s because… We really don’t think it’s all that important. And I want to say again, if you go through life and you don’t build an intimate relationship with him, you’ve missed your whole purpose for living. How do you think God feels when he keeps pouring his love into your life and you keep saying, when I need you, I’ll call you. Friend, you and I ought to grieve deep in our heart because that is exactly what so many of God’s people do. When I need you, I’ll call you. Here’s a God who says, I love you so much. Here’s what I want to tell you. And you see, he says so many wonderful things in this passage about himself. And so many wonderful things about His love for us and His desire for us and His willingness. I love this verse. Don’t even turn to it. I want you to listen. If anyone loves me, he’ll keep my word. And my Father will love him. And we, Father and Son, we will come to him and live with him or with her. That’s God saying, I want to have an intimate relationship with you. But I have a responsibility of pursuing that. And you see, oftentimes pastors get in the same mess that everybody else does. They get so busy doing the work of God. You know what happens? That God gets on the periphery of the work. And in our busyness of doing the work of the Lord, serving God, fulfilling our ministry and our call, God is in heaven saying, I’m so grieved. I’m not interested in your sermons. I’m not interested in how many people you are. I’m not interested in any of that. I’m interested in you relating yourself to me and understanding that I’m your father. And I want to give you myself. Think about this. I want to ask you a question. Nobody can answer this for you but you. In your relationship to God, does He feel loved by you? Or does He feel used by you? Do you want Him when everything is going good? And when you’ve got free time on your hands, do you spend it with Him? Do you make time reading His Word and talking to Him? Are you absolutely honest and transparent with him and saying, Lord, I blew it. God, I made a mess of it. Lord, I’m ashamed of myself. I don’t even understand why I act this way. God, but I want to thank you. You’re still my friend. You still love me. And you’re not going to reject me. And you’re going to keep me as your own anyway. And I thank you for understanding. I really blew it bad, God. Or you try to hype God up and say, Oh God, our Heavenly Father, in Jesus’ name, I come to you. You know what? Suppose you walked up to a friend and said, How, thou old friend of mine? Somebody would say, Get off of that. But that’s so the way we treat God. Open, transparent, honest, free with Him. You see… Somewhere we have the idea, well, that’s very prideful to think that God wants to relate to me. Friend, it’s not prideful. It’s His whole purpose for creating you. And you see, my responsibility is to pursue that. And how do I pursue that? I want to know Him. And I want to love Him. And I want to find out what He’s like. And I want to find out what He’ll do in my life. And I want to find out how does He operate? How does He work? What will He do? What does it mean to be loved by God? Listen to this. How much of His love… I love this. How much of His love could I stand? How much of His love could I stand? I’d love to find out. But if I’m so busy doing my thing, I’ll never find out. How much does God really want to bless you? You’ll never be able to know as long as you’re pursuing your interest rather than developing a relationship with Him. But there’s a third responsibility I have, and that is to protect this relationship. Not only to enter into it, not only to pursue it, but to protect it. How do I do that? I do that by obeying God. I do that by making it my priority. You see, in pursuing that relationship, I’m building it up. Giving Him time, listening, openness, quietness, giving, making a commitment. How do I protect it by obeying him? What happens when I disobey God? It clouds up my relationship. It doesn’t destroy my relationship, but it clouds it up. It fogs up the fellowship. And so if I’m going to keep that relationship right, then I must be obedient to him. And the last thing I must do in my responsibility is I must pass it on. He said, what do you mean by passing it on? Well, let me go back to tell you that when I was 12 years of age, I was saved. My understanding of God was very, very, very minuscule. That is, God was somebody up yonder, somewhere out yonder. I didn’t understand who God was. As a 12-year-old kid, I’d been reading the Bible for years, but I didn’t understand who he was, what he was like. And it was four years later, at the age of 16, when I spent about five or six days with my granddad, that all of a sudden I began to realize, hey… God is real. God relates. He’s personal. He’s involved in my granddad’s life on a daily basis. And if he’ll do that for him, what will he do for me? It was then I began to realize I could have a personal relationship with God. It was Oswald Chambers in his book, My Most for His Highest, who riveted that into my soul and into my spirit growing up. The most important thing in your life is your relationship to Jesus Christ. More important than ministry, more important than any form of service, just building a relationship to Him. You see, the first thing you need to do is just say, God, I’ve worked hard at my relationships to other people. I’ve had good relationships and bad relationships. But Lord, I do believe that you are worth knowing. And God, I believe that somehow if I develop my relationship with you, not only will I know you, but I get to know who I am. And more important than anything else in my life, I want to make the priority of my life building my relationship with you, which is why you created me. Because one of these days I’m going to spend all eternity with you. And I want to know you real good even before I get there. Nothing in life more important than what we’ve talked about this morning. Nothing ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, nothing more important than this. And you’re saying, but I’m not even a Christian anymore. My friend, if you only confess your sins to the Lord Jesus Christ and ask Him to forgive you, in that moment your sin will be forgiven, the sin barrier removed, the gift of grace and righteousness becomes yours. You’ll have a standing with God in which from that moment on you can begin to relate to Him personally. And it is yours simply for the asking and the confessing of your sins. And remember, think about this. This isn’t something that lasts for an hour. It is something that is going to last for all eternity. There is nothing more valuable in the eyes of God than your relationship to Him and His relationship to you.
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Thank you for listening to The God Who Cares Enough to Relate to Us. For more inspirational messages like this one, visit our online 24-7 station. And if you’d like to know more about Charles Stanley or InTouch Ministries, stop by InTouch.org. This podcast is a presentation of InTouch Ministries, Atlanta, Georgia.
Explore the profound depths of God’s love that transcends mere salvation and invites you into a personal, intimate relationship. Through understanding God’s desire for oneness with us, we learn how to build a spiritual intimacy that reflects the unity seen between Christ and His disciples. Dive into the teachings from the 17th chapter of John and discover the significance of this relationship to our eternal purpose.
