“But whoever loves God is known by God.” (1 Corinthians 8:3 NIV)
Sometimes my husband and I have strange discussions. Yesterday it was about being ‘known’ in the biblical sense and how some of us have the distinct privilege of only ever ‘knowing’ one person. ‘Known’ in the KJV/PG term for marital relations, but if we really grasp God’s design for ‘knowing’ we’d understand that it’s much more than skin deep. It’s meant to be soul deep, not at all casual and certainly not promiscuous. ‘Knowing’ is about revealing the most private parts of your life (body, soul and heart) with a singular spouse.
Then this morning John Eldredge puts a bow on it for me. He explains how God wats to ‘know’ us. “He wants intimacy with you… God wants to live this life together with you, to share in your days and your decisions, your desires and your disappointments. He wants intimacy with you in the midst of the madness and mundane, the meetings and the memos, the laundry and lists, the projects and pain… He wants Your deepest heart, that center part within that is the truest you.”
So often we look to our marriage to provide this level of intimacy. Or far less reliably, our boyfriend or girlfriend or best friend. What I’m realizing is that any earthly relationship is going to fall short of the true intimacy we’re after, the kind of intimacy we’ve all be been craving since Adam and Eve left the Garden: being known.
Deep down we all crave it and we’ll turn over every rock and look under every log in search of it. But the truth is we’ll only find what our hearts require when we look to our Creator, when we open up our life to His probing and perfecting love. Once we learn to walk in growing intimacy with our God, that’s when we start to know how to offer our truest selves to others.
“Abide in Me and I in You.” (John 15:4 NKJV)
Lord, help us come close and stay close to You. We realize that intimacy is always awkward at first. I is only through the repeated effort of a bared soul that it becomes agreeable and eventually satisfying. Give us the courage to bare our souls; our thoughts, desires, concerns and requests. Please meet us in this place of spiritual intimacy. Share Your meek and mighty heart with us. Teach us to tend to souls as You do and show us how to walk through this life conveying that kind of love. Amen.