Get passionate.

In the last few weeks we have been looking at growing in our intimacy with God. It sounds easy enough in principle but in reality it is a fight to draw closer to God.

I once heard that the devil is not scared of us being saved. What scares him is when we begin to walk with God and get to know who we are in Him. Intimacy with God, walking closely with God, is where we begin to really see who God is and who we are in Him. Which means, naturally, the devil does not want us growing in our relationship with God. The enemy does not want us spending time with Jesus sitting in His Presence like Mary. So he has a few tricks up his sleeve that he uses to dissuade us from doing what we set out to do.

Did you know that there is a spirit of tiredness? This is how it works; we can scroll on our phones on Instagram or TikTok until 2:00 in the morning. But, if we are to read the Bible, pray or listen to a sermon, it will take conscious effort to stay up past 10:00pm for most. Has that ever happened to you? You start praying and next thing you know your alarm is going off and it is morning? Like how did that happen?

Or, especially now in times where our Bibles and our books are on our phones, it is easy to start off in the Bible app or reading that awesome book about hosting the Presence of God and randomly find yourself scrolling through the internet. We find ourselves distracted. Or the moment you decide to spend time with God, the phone rings and it is that person you have not spoken to in a while that you would love to catch up with.

Same with how you can go a whole day without eating and have dinner at 7:00pm at night but the one time you want to fast, you wake up starving and can’t think about anything else except food all day. Or how when you decide to be still in the Presence of God, your mind is bombarded by all kinds of thoughts that make you want to pull away from God’s Presence. All of a sudden you are reminded of your past, your mistakes, your failures and instead of drawing closer to God you want to run and hide.

Those are the devil’s tactics to stop us from pressing into God. Half the battle is knowing that you are in a battle. So if you have been trying to spend time with God in the last few weeks and have been finding it to be a struggle, it’s ok. It is quite normal. What I have learnt is not to set unrealistic goals for myself. I remember years ago I realised that I was so busy that I did not have time to sit and be still in God’s presence and I’d keep putting it off. So what I did is I scheduled date night. One night a week where after work I’d come home, I would not be on Netflix or scrolling or doing assignments etc. I would just sit and pray and listen to God. See if there was anything He wanted to say. Anything I had missed.

From there it grew to me listening to sermons during the day and listening to see if God was saying something to me. Then I got too busy at work, so I’d listen to sermons on my way to work and worship music on my way home and pray in that time. Then slowly I would add to it until it became routine and I would add a little more. But even then, sometimes it is still a fight for me to do it. But once I do it, I feel so good!

We can’t be passive about our walk with God. We have to purposefully pursue God and godly things. Matthew 11:12 says, “And from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and the violent take it by force.” The Kingdom of God is not for the passive. We don’t just wake up one day BFF’s with Jesus without having gone the journey with Him. It does not work like that in the natural and it does not work that way in the spirit either. Faith without works is dead.

You want to inherit the promises of God, you have to take them by force. You want to get intimacy with God? You have to push past the devil’s distractions and antics by force. You have to have a made up mind. That this is what I want. I want Jesus and nothing else. I am going to chase after Jesus with everything within me and I will find Him because His word says so, Jeremiah 29:13.

Matthew 11:12 in the Passion Translation says, “From the moment John stepped onto the scene until now, the realm of heaven’s kingdom is bursting forth, and passionate people have taken hold of its power.” I love that, passionate people take hold of its power! How do we lay hold of the power of heaven’s kingdom? By walking with God. By drawing closer to God. By getting to know who our God is and who we are in Him.

Psalm 1:1-2 says, “What delight comes to the one who follows God’s ways! He won’t walk in step with the wicked, nor share the sinner’s way, nor be found sitting in the scorner’s seat. His passion is to remain true to the Word of “I AM,” meditating day and night on the true revelation of light.”

Stir up your passion for God and His word and His Presence.

Love and blessings,

Melissa Tsingano.