The Bible study that made me re-evaluate my relationship with God

I’ve been doing a video devotion the last couple of weeks – it was really good and I highly recommend it (it was working through the book of James on the YouVersion Bible app). On the final day of the 12-day devotion, it explored James 5:13-20 with a dive into 5:13:

Is anyone among you in trouble? Let them pray. Is anyone happy? Let them sing songs of praise.

Francis Chan, who was leading the devotional, pointed out the multiplicity of circumstances in which we should be reaching out to God. When we’re in trouble, when times are good, when we’re sick, when we’re well….God should be the last person we want to speak to at night and the first person we want to speak to in the morning.

This stopped me. Want to? He wasn’t saying that we should speak to him in the evening and in the morning, he was saying we should want to. And to my shame, the first question that popped into me head was – what if I don’t want to?

I don’t think I am the only one who might think that. We might intellectually know it’s good to talk to God at all time. But how many of us truly want to talk to God all the time? How many of us look forward to prayer time? How many of us can’t wait to talk to God, like when we were kids and we couldn’t wait to talk to one of our parents when we were away from home? Or like a first love, when we couldn’t wait to talk to the object of our affection?

Prayer time, let’s be honest, is something we do at the end of our quiet time, at church or when we’re looking for a good car spot. And don’t get me wrong, all those times are fantastic and all good and valuable. But do they fall into the category of ‘want to’?

And if we don’t want to, it makes it very difficult to do it at all.

I feel very challenged by this. It’s really made me look hard at my relationship with God and how I treat him – as in, am I treating him as a longed for parent or an object of affection. If I’m not, what does that say about my relationship and the level of effort that I am bringing to it?

This devotional drove me to other readings in scripture and there is something beautiful in God’s intimate knowledge of us as his creation and as his beloved children. In Philippians 2:12-13, Paul says:

Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.

Verse 13 is stunning. Sometimes it can help to see it in another translation. The passage above in the NIV. Below is verse 13 in the NLT:

For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him.

The desire to speak to God and walk in his ways, and the effort to speak to God and walk in his ways actually comes from God.

The desire to do this – the wanting to speak to God – does not come from me, it comes from him. So does the effort. It certainly doesn’t come from me who would rather stay in bed a bit longer or scroll on my phone at the same time as watching Netflix. My broken, sinful, puny human brain is wired to do what will make it most comfortable and convenient. We need God to produce the desire and the effort in us.

So if you pray for one thing today, pray that God will give you the desire and the effort to speak to him, and walk in his ways.

Don’t be fooled – this isn’t a ‘set and forget’ activity. We have to keep asking, because my brain and what it sees directly in front it will always triumph over God who is everywhere but yet unseen. As Jen WIlkin said in her book Women of the Word, “We will not wake up ten years from now and find we have passively taken on the character of God.” We need to ask and keep asking. But the wonderful thing is that God loves to give. He will keep giving us the desire and the effort, the wisdom and the hunger.

Pray for the desire and the effort and keep asking. Seek him earnestly. God will do the rest.