Towards a mature relationship with God


TOWARDS A MATURE RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD

Mario D’Couto

            We are called towards a relationship with God but what does it mean to have a mature relationship? We have just finished the season of Lent, the Holy Week and Easter and sometimes I think to myself, we do so much of fast and penance and after Easter, the fervour just seems to vanish. It kind of reminds me of the passage in the Gospel where in Our Lord says, “When the unclean spirit has gone out of a man, he passes through waterless places seeking rest, but he finds none. Then he says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ And when he comes he finds it empty, swept and put in order. Then he goes and brings with him seven other spirits more evil than himself, and they enter and dwell there and the last state of that man becomes worse than the first” (Matthew 12:43-45). Mature relationship with God is based on trust rather than feelings.

            Retreats and missions have their place because it is meant to bring us closer to God. But to get caught up with just the ‘feeling’ of being on a spiritual high is not going to help. In fact, it could do more damage. Of course, this does not mean that we should be “Mr. or Mrs. Right” for as long as we are human, we shall fall down. Thus, with this being said, there are a lot of things to be looked into.

            Imagine yourself that you are back form a retreat and you wake up one morning and all your spiritual ‘feelings’ are gone. You pray but nothing happens. You rebuke the devil, but it does not change anything. You go through spiritual exercises … you have your friends pray for you …. You confess every sin you can imagine, then go around asking forgiveness from everyone you know. You fast …. still nothing. You begin to wonder how long this spiritual gloom might last. Days? Weeks? Months? Will it ever end? At times, it feels as if your prayers simply bounce off the ceiling. In utter desperation, you cry out, “What’s the matter with me?”

            The truth is there’s nothing wrong with you! This is a normal part of testing and maturing of your friendship with God. Every Christian goes through it at least once or over several times. It is painful and discomforting, but it is vital for the development of our faith. Knowing this gave Job hope when he could not feel God’s presence in his life. He said, “I go east but He is not there. I go west but I cannot find Him. I do not see him in the North for He is hidden. I turn to the South, but I cannot find Him. But He knows where I am going. And when He has tested me, like gold in fire, He will pronounce me innocent.” (Job 23:8-10)

            All the great saints and other holy men and women have gone through this stage. St. John of the Cross, referred to those days of spiritual dryness, doubt and estrangement from God as ‘The Dark Night of the Soul’; Henry Nouwen calls it, ‘The Ministry of Absence’; A.W. Tazer called it, ‘The Ministry of the Night’ while others refer to it as ‘The Winter of the Heart’.

            King David, a man who was known as a man after God’s own heart (1 Samuel 13:14), felt God’s absence. He frequently complained of God’s apparent absence, “Lord, why are you standing aloof and far away? Why do you hide when I need You the most?” (Psalm 10:1) “Why have You forsaken me? Why do You remain so distant? Why do you ignore my cries for help?” (Psalm 22:1) “Why have You abandoned me?” (Psalm 43:2) Of course, God had not really left David and neither does He leave you. He has promised repeatedly, “I will never leave you nor forsake you” (Deuteronomy 31:8). But God has not promised that we will always feel His presence.

            When God seems distant, you may feel that He is angry with you or is disciplining you for some sin. In fact, sin does disconnect us from an intimate fellowship with God. We grieve God’s Spirit with our disobedience, conflict with others, manipulative business, friendship with the world and other sins. Yet, often this feeling of abandonment or estrangement from God has nothing to do with sin. It is a test of faith that we must all face. It seems as though God is asking us, “Will you continue to love, trust, obey and worship Me even when you have no sense of My presence or visible evidence of My work in your life?”

            The most common mistake Christians make in worship today is seeking an ‘experience’ rather than seeking ‘God’. They look for a ‘feeling’ and if it happens, they conclude that they have worshipped. Just because we feel a spiritual high, does not mean we have become saints (although God does grant that experience too sometimes) nor is the feeling of closeness to Christ the same as worship.

            When we are ‘baby’ Christians, God gives us a lot of confirming emotions and often answers the most immature, self – centred prayers, so you’ll know He exists. But as you grow in faith, He will wean you of these dependencies. In fact, as we progress in our spiritual journey with the Lord, He often removes our feelings, so we won’t depend on them, for as noted before, feelings or a religious experience is not the same as worship.

            God’s omnipresence and the manifestation of His presence are 2 different things. One is a fact; the other is often a feeling. God is always present even when you are unaware of Him and His presence is too profound to be measured by mere emotions. Yes, He does want you to sense His presence, but He is more concerned that you ‘TRUST’ Him than that you ‘FEEL’ Him, for “Faith, not feelings, pleases God.” We shall examine more about this in the second part.


Popular posts from this blog

In the world yet not of the world

Image
  IN THE WORLD YET NOT OF THE WORLD MARIO D’COUTO           Being in the world and yet not of it is something that can be a struggle, at least for me and what I mean by that is in as much as we desire to be good and to do good, God is not going to put a glass jar over us and say that just because we choose to love Him and follow Him more closely, that He is going to shield us from the temptations of this world. To make things clear though, this is not to say that the world in itself is bad or evil nor are the things found in the world either but how we deal with it is what will make us or break us. We all have responsibilities and important things that need our attention. If we are not careful though, our hearts and minds can be consumed with the task of keeping them afloat. Rather than centering ourselves in Christ and letting the other elements of our lives take their rightful place around that center, we can end up shifting our attention fr...
Read more

The Gift of Life

  THE GIFT OF LIFE  Mario D’Couto  The above video may seem to put human existence in a rather pessimistic way as if to say that our lives did not really matter and while no doubt there is some element of truth in it, I still feel that if lived well, there is meaning and purpose to our lives and that none of our lives is some sort of haphazard creation.  As I celebrate my gift of life tomorrow, I suddenly began to think that if we compare ourselves to the vastness of the universe and everything else that exists in it, we may perhaps be nothing more than a tiny dot floating on the surface of the earth and yet in as much as such a thing may appear insignificant, the One who created everything chooses to have a personal relationship with that tiny dot, that is, ourselves. This is something truly uplifting, which gives meaning and purpose to our lives and our existence. At the same time, it is also a reminder for us to stay grounded especially in those moments when w...
Read more

Are you creative?

Image
  ARE YOU CREATIVE? Mario D’Couto                         Can you imagine a world without creativity? What would the world look like if there was no creativity? Well, for all we can expect, it would be pretty boring and dull. There would be no speech, no songs, no tools, no ideas such as love, freedom or democracy. It would be an existence so mechanical and impoverished that none of us would want to be a part of.             To achieve the kind of world we consider human, some people had to dare to break the thrall of tradition. Next, they had to find ways of recording those new ideas or procedures that improved on what went on before. Finally, they had to find ways of transmitting the new knowledge to the generation to come. Those who were involved in this process we call creative. What we call culture or those parts of our selves that we internalized from the social...
Read more