Archive for February 2018

One is sitting in the cafeteria amongst friends and strangers. They are having such a wonderful time and talking about all types of subjects. In between the conversations, thoughts pop up and then dissipate randomly. Am I missing something? Another person is at work and very committed to his or her assignment. Striving to be the best at what they are doing. They have excellent communication with their colleagues. As they attack a project together, in between the dialogue, thoughts pop up and dissipate randomly. Are we missing something? Another is at home with family and friends, having a cookout. At the far table, another is playing charades and it has gotten good! It has become intense. Good, fun, and friendly times. In between the laughter, thoughts pop up and then dissipate randomly. Are we missing something? Another is sitting in a court room going before a judge who will determine the rest of his life. He is listening to the testimonies being presented for and against him. In between each witness, thoughts pop up and then dissipate randomly. Am I missing something?

As you can see, there are many different situations throughout life, throughout the world at the same time, affecting everyone. What do many of these situations have in common even though they are totally different? Can you find the common thread? Some may say the thread is a thought or a drifting away into clouds of thoughts. I wish it were that simple. But it isn’t that deep either. Do you see the disconnect?

Before I go any further, let me share a short but powerful scripture with you.

John 15:4 Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me.

You ask yourself, what are these thoughts that keep popping up? They are words coming from the Father through the Holy Spirit. The Father is asking where am I in everything. If you are like me, Morris Moore, you have these questions popping up in the back of your mind and you ignore them without realizing it. I go to church, I read my bible, I pray each day. So why would the Father ask such a question? I am doing the best that I know how and living the way I was taught to serve Him.

So, I go back to the scripture and ask if I am really abiding in Him. How can I immerse myself in this scripture and within Him? The concept and word that describes what needs to happen is “Intimacy”.

Intimacy is defined as:

A close, familiar, and usually affectionate or loving personal relationship with another person or group.
A close association with or detailed knowledge of or deep understanding of a place, subject, period of history, etc
I would like to say that I include God in everything I do, but I don’t. I do not intentionally leave Him out. The thought came to me one day that I was leaving Him at the altar, at the church. When I get to church, I am so fired up or when I am in my prayer room. But am I the same when I am anywhere else? I am not saying you should be crying out to Him every second, what I am saying is that we must involve Him in every second of what we do. What prompted this way of thinking in me was the idea that I separate my professional career from my spiritual walk. I do pray to Him while at work, but that is usually when things don’t go the way I would like for them to go. We don’t bring Him into the equation until He is needed to fix something in our life. According to the scripture, He wants you to abide in Him and for Him to abide in you. That means we are intertwined in everything including, work, family, fun times, conversations, sad times, challenging times, graduations, …. Etc. But how?!?!

We must become intimate with Him in everything. Get to know Him in everything, not just through prayer and reading the Word. Do not misunderstand me and think we should not do those vital things also, but do not limit Him. Do not exclude Him from the rest of your life. Ask yourself if you have left Him out of any area of your life and be honest with yourself and Him. Truth be told, there are so many areas that do not have God’s involvement. It is said that the first step to solving a problem is to acknowledge that you have one. We all have one, but the good news is that we know the solution. The Holy Spirit will lead us into this intimacy. The Holy Spirit is always with us; therefore, we can allow Him to guide us into that place of intimacy with the Father in all things.

Let’s think about how we share everything with our best friend or close family member. You know that person will be beside you no matter what. He or she will share the good moments and the difficult ones with you. Now transpose that way of think into the relationship you have with the Father in every area of your life; even the area that you keep from everyone else including the closets ones to you. Believe it or not, if we can get to that point with God, we would have a better understanding of what the Father would want us to do. He abides in us, remember? He will lead and guide us through our thoughts. In order for us to emulate Jesus in John 14: 7-11, we have to be intimate with the Father.

John 14:7-11  “If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; and from now on you know Him and have seen Him.” 8 Philip said to Him, “Lord, show us the Father, and it is sufficient for us.” 9 Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you so long, and yet you have not known Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; so how can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? 10 Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? The words that I speak to you I do not speak on My own authority; but the Father who dwells in Me does the works. 11 Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father in Me, or else believe Me for the sake of the works themselves.

No, we are not Jesus Christ but we are supposed to emulate Him. Jesus was intimate with His father. We must be intimate with our Father. As I grow, I will make this one of my primary focuses going forward. I will incorporate

Isaiah 26:3 in my daily life which says “You will keep him in perfect peace, Whose mind is stayed on You, Because he trusts in You.

Now that you’ve read this blog:

What are areas of your life where you feel that you don’t bring God into?

Are there relationships where you can incorporate God more?

What random thoughts pop up in social settings where you feel the Holy Spirit is trying to get your attention?

You meet. 
You can’t have a relationship without meeting them in some way. You can’t decide to have a relationship without knowing they exist. You have to have some sort of defining and noticeable encounter that makes you want to know them and not stop knowing them!

My prayer for you: May you have and continue to have an encounter with God!

You Decide. 
You decide what you want to be to that person and they decide what they want to be to you. God wants to be everything to you. Do you want the same?

Casual
This mutual decision is sometimes unspoken. It just happens. But the more important the relationship, the more definition it needs. There are people you see occasionally. You laugh, catch up and there is no desire for continued conversation until you run into each other again or have a need to talk to them. There’s no obligation to call or text. But if you do it’s great. You can go days or years and it’s ok. But with God… is that where you are or what you have with Him?

Close Friends
You know that you are close because typically you share more of yourself, experiences and you’re more open with this person. More people know that you’re friends. It’s not natural to hide a close friend unless your profession or life is very public and you need to keep things more private. Close friends can range in intensity and boundaries are determined by personality and where you both are in life. It’s natural to have a close friend and life causes your closeness to be and change. Sometimes temporarily and sometimes permanently. But while you’re close, you’re close. You may be so close that you help them sometimes financially, with emotional crisis. They may feel like family and you watch each other’s kids. I have a friend and neighbor who is also on the board of our Nonprofit. She gets “offended” when I call her my BFF or best friend. She says… “we are sister”. I’ve accepted that view and love her dearly. Yeah… she’s going to tear up when she reads this!
Close friends can vary in levels of friendship. I’ve had a dear friend who has become like a daughter to me… because the word mentee is just too impersonal. I want to take her everywhere and help her however I can as though she were my own daughter. We grew to that place over the years.
What is my point and how does that relate to God? Have you or do you desire a relationship with Him where He’s not just provider… or the One who come to when you need things? Is He more of a friend that’s like… family? Your best friend or also a Brother to you, or a Father. He can be all of that.

Groom
This is the part that makes some people either happy or very uncomfortable. Sometimes even men have a hard time grasping the parallels around the Bible verses that talk about Christ being the bridegroom and others that say we are the bride or like a bride. They are not written to strip anyone of their masculinity or to confuse your relationship with Christ. On the contrary, it is to define the love, responsibility and commitment that God has to us. This responsibility is called a covenant. Meaning He intends this to be “for life” with you. For the sake of simplicity, we can say that.

My Testimony with Him
I had a night… long after my salvation where I felt that I wrestled with God and myself. Where I was up all night weeping… just searching out where I was. Confessing that I didn’t like things about myself and how HARD I’ve tried to change or to do better. But I couldn’t. And I realized… I was trying to fix myself, but I’m not the Creator. I needed the One who Created me, who KNOWS me and KNEW me when I had no clue who God even was. I needed Him to fix me. And so, He put me on a journey and showed me. And guess what… I often STILL ask Him to do that just to maintain… me. So that I don’t get tempted to be my own mechanic. After all, we didn’t write the manual to “us”.
He’s that stock person behind the scenes placing everything carefully so you can obtain it, making sure what you need is in order and within reach. The one we care not to meet. He’s like the cashier person that we do see, but when we get what we need we quickly forget all they’ve done and their name as we walk away. Sometimes we will forget the Names of God and all that He is to us.
He’s so in love with you and desires to be closer to you. He doesn’t want you to run from Him. Christ died so you would run TO Him.

Have you encountered God? What are some noteworthy encounters with God? If you have trouble identifying an encounter where you feel that you met Him or He revealed Himself to you in some way, do you desire an encounter?

We’re All Connected in the Kingdom

God’s treasure and His heart is in people. We should settle our hearts and have peace among others. If you experience adversity with others, know that their daggers mean nothing in the presence of God. He fights for you. But living without peace can stop the flow of God through us to others. Lack of peace can also effect our relationship with God.

Defining Your Relationship With God
God are we friends? Casual, close, BFFs?
Do I see You as Provider, Father, My First Love, My Everything?
What part of me have I not… or stopped giving to You?
Do I truly treasure You above all things?
There are many other questions you could ask… but I want to tell you one thing I KNOW He may ask us all.
He may ask you… “Have YOU committed to Me fully? Have you committed to the things I’ve been leading you to do?

Revelation 3:15-16 says 15 “I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I could wish you were cold or hot. 16 So then, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will vomit you out of My mouth.

Sounds cold? Well let me ask. If YOU were in love with someone, and they went back and forth with you and never established where they stood with you. What would you say? Wouldn’t you want to know what you were dealing with? If they said they loved you and pledged their life to you, wouldn’t you want a real relationship with them… knowing where they stand? God feels no different.

Read Rev 3:14-21 and you’ll see better what I mean.

The Whole Point of Fasting, Prayer and Bible Reading/Study
Once we seek out answers to these types of questions, we may go to the Word of God to get more insight. We may sense that we have a lot of distractions and we have trouble really hearing from Him, so we may go on a fast. We may want to feel closer to Him or just empty out or hearts, or ask Him to protect and bless someone we know or care about… so we begin to pray. These things are an extension of your heart disposition. So periodically break open your heart and explore where you are with God.

After you’ve done a bit of self discovery this week, next we will pick up Part 3 that explains:
Types of Relationships and more…

My Guarantee

One thing I can guarantee is that everyone reading this will have a different intensity of relationship with God. No two are alike. I can also say that chances are even with spouses, children, family and friends… while you are the same person, no two of any of YOUR relationships are exactly the same. However there are commonalities that you find in every relationship. So no matter your walk, I think this will be insightful because we are all growing.

I struggled a bit in writing this because there are so many ways to look at intimacy with God. I certainly didn’t want to tell you read, fast, and pray. Though it’s TOTALLY TRUE AND VITAL. If it were that easy, many people wouldn’t be walking around trying to figure out how to crave or get much out of doing those disciplines. Then it hit me. All relationships have uniqueness yet some common threads. If we look at where we are in our pursuit, we can build on it and grow from there. We’re all growing so…  my excitement piqued and I sat down to write this to you from the heart.

I see people struggle in their pursuit of closeness to God. The beautiful truth is, He’s closer than your very breath and completely in love with you. He accepts you and meets you where you are and draws you in deeper but only as much as you want Him to. The disciplines I mentioned get you there, but it’s a by product of a deeper truth… it stems from something more than you can just turn on and “DO”. Relationships don’t just start in what you DO. That’s a small part, because people do things for us all the time seen and unseen but yet there’s no relationship. The stock person at the grocery store that placed your merchandise on the shelf did that so it would be there for you… basically. But you rarely ever see them nor do you usually desire or think about meeting them. The person at the cash register serves you by taking care of your transactions. Allowing you to be released from the store for things that are vital to your existence. You see them and hopefully there is a mutual kindness. But once you’re gone, neither of you usually know or remember the other one’s name. Nor will you think of them. Sure they aren’t God… but you get what I’m saying, right? This was us before we really met Him. (You may want to reread this paragraph again with that revelation).

No…something more… something deliberate in your mind and heart has to happen for a relationship to form with anyone. God included. I’m no relationship guru or expert… well sometimes I attempt to be … but here’s what the Holy Spirit wants you to know.

God REALLY IS head over heals IN LOVE with you… yes… you! It’s not a cliche. Not empty words. It’s truth. Some of us know that but sometimes we forget how true it is. Let me give you a few passion filled reminders. Don’t read this like it’s just print on a page… or a screen. Read it like you’re reading about someone who’s TRULY in love. And make sure you see yourself in it. Not mankind… see yourself.

Zephaniah 3:17 The LORD your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing.

Romans 8:37-39 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

1 John 3:1 See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him.

So our pursuit is always to know more about Him. That pursuit will go beyond our lifetime and could never be quenched… even in eternity. Beautiful… and powerful.

Clearing the air

Here are some questions you can ask yourself. You could be new to this or a well seasoned and well known for your walk. You can even be doing a lot for the Kingdom and begin to slip in intimacy, needing to find your way back.  We who believe are all His and He’s more brilliant, more wise, more full of love than any of us could begin to understand. So our  spiritual levels IN THIS CASE don’t mean a thing. We’ll never BE Him in that sense, but stay with me…

Really ask yourself this week… and ask or explore for the answers:

– Where are we God… in our relationship?

– Where would you like to see me progress in my closeness to you? (Really think on and visualize what the next level of your relationship would look like)

– I know I can never do enough, but what do I need to be doing in this season?

– Am I distracted from the core of what I’m really supposed to do right now?

Yes I know I said “doing” doesn’t necessarily bring relationship. But sometimes we need to UNDO things that are keeping us from getting closer to Him

Ok… I’ll proceed…

– Am I ignoring negative feelings that I have toward others and not processing it through You? Or even negative feelings about myself or situations in my life? Or even negative feelings about You, God?

– Who and what do I need to forgive? What should I repent for?

– What do you want to remove from my mind or my heart?

– What are some of my ways that hinder me from experiencing You and what You have for me more fully?

– Do I have passion and conviction for the things of God?

– Are there people in my life that, though You love them, they aren’t good for me and I need to move on from them?

After you’ve done a bit of self discovery this week, next we will will pick up Part 2 that explains:

How to begin defining your relationship with God, the real skinny on Rev 3:15-16 and more…