Start Here: Beginning a Relationship with Jesus

by David Dwight

So if a tree is to live and grow, it will do so deeply rooted into the ground. If a fish is to live and grow, it will do so immersed in the water. And now we’ve learned that if we want to live and grow, this happens when we are rooted and immersed in our relationship with God. Yes, Jesus said it: “Remain in me and I [will remain] in you” (John 15:5).

So as we go through this last chapter of Start Here, we want to offer some guidance for how we stay “in relationship” with Jesus Christ. Here are five ways: • In relationships with other Christians • In God’s guidance by reading and...

In taking action through serving • In expressing love for God through worship

At the top you want faithfulness to the Bible, leadership with integrity, and an environment of authenticity. Faithfulness to the Bible means that the teaching you hear comes from the Bible. It isn’t just feel-good analogies or stories; it’s actually truth being told from what the Bible says. Leadership with integrity is sometimes harder to discern immediately, but you are looking for men and women who lead the church with humility, honesty, and transparency. This kind of leadership usually cultivates a spirit of authenticity in the community. One of our favorite church “taglines” is this: “A place where everyone is welcome, no one is perfect, and anything is possible!”6 That kind of environment says, “Hey, come on in no matter where you are with God; no one here is perfect, and we trust God can do great things in us, even though we’re far from doing it just right.” That’s a great place to start with a church. After those factors, you’ll be looking for a place where worship is central to life together, where there is intentional focus on growing in Christ, and where there is always a sense of reaching others so they can come into God’s family.

“Matthew. Mark. Luke. John.”

remember that it’s about loving God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.

It’s easy over time for some people to begin to “know the Bible by head,” but the Bible is intended to be known also by heart. It speaks to head and heart, to our souls and our wills.

Prayer involves sharing ideas, listening, asking questions, asking for help, expressing so you can be understood, confessing and saying you are sorry, saying thank you, or just being together.

Prayer may also be specifically set apart in uninterrupted space because you want to have quality time with God. This is akin to any great relationship where there will be much talking throughout the day as well as those special times where you can go deeper and share in more meaningful ways. As your relationship with God grows, you’ll find that you develop your own patterns and rhythms of prayer. You may pray out loud; you may pray silently; you might write or journal your prayers. You may do all of these.

To be meaningful, prayer should be intentional and authentic. There are two ways prayer can go in the wrong direction: disconnected prayers, where there is no intentionality behind what

you are saying, and inauthentic prayers, where you pray for show (for yourself or others), but not with honesty of heart.

Disconnected prayers are words coming out of your mouth with no express intent or heart behind them. The words become rote recitation. You

He cares about our hearts.

That’s spiritual manipulation.

“Prayer must be vertical to be honest. Directing an activity that is supposed to be directed to God into an activity that can also make a good impression on others—Jesus calls phony.”10

The best praying is praying like a child—honest, earnest, unpretentious. Pray

IN TAKING ACTION: SERVING Authentic Christianity will show forth in a love and care for God and people. Jesus described the sum of all the law and commandments as, “‘And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself’” (Mark 12:30–31 ESV). The beauty of this statement is that love for both God and people is present if a person’s relationship with God is real. To serve people but have no love for God is not God-centered love and service. To love God but do and care nothing for those around you suggests that the love for God either is not real or is significantly lacking. You see, God loves people—so if you love God and are truly growing in your relationship with God, you will also be growing in a love for people. Taking action by serving, by caring, by stepping outward toward people is expressing the heart of God’s love to people, and it is also a significant way that you will grow in your own relationship with Jesus. Why? Because this is what Jesus did. He gave Himself for others. As you do this, He will be with you and you will grow in Him. This can be as simple as offering a listening ear to a person who is going through a hard time, or it may be more extensive than that. It is offering yourself one way or another. It could be your time, your help, your money, your love, your presence. But what’s clear is that you take action and ...

God to give you eyes to see the needs around you. This made all the difference for our friend Craig, who said, “It takes thought and energy to put yourself in a position to really make a difference. Now that God is in my life, I’m able to see and have the energy to move on opportunities much more than I used to. He’s given me eyes to see that. I look at life through a different window now. The perspective is much different. It was like the shades were drawn, and now they are up.”

To praise is to express appreciation for or to someone.

The heart of the matter is not “How did you like the worship?” but “How did God like your worship?”

True love is creative.

• In Relationships: the Church • In God’s Guidance: the Bible • In Conversation with God: Prayer • In Taking Action: Serving • In the Act of Praise: Worship

reminders. Remember that this life with Jesus is not something you accomplish or master; it’s a growing relationship from this day forward.

And our desire and prayer is that you would continue to seek after God—to press through the objections, to lean closer into Him in hard times, to ask your questions of God, and to seek to answer His questions for you. And we pray for you the same way the apostle Paul prayed for the early church: