Intimacy is what we call the experience of really knowing and being known by another person. We must understand the importance of this kind of relationship because it is very precious when it comes along. An intimate friend is someone we feel EXTREMELY CLOSE TO; we know them and they know us on a very personal and VERY DEEP LEVEL. A person who doesn’t know us intimately only knows us at a superficial level.
Very much like this, “O LORD, you have examined my heart and know EVERYTHING ABOUT ME. You know when I sit down or stand up. YOU KNOW MY THOUGHTS even when I’m far away. You know everything I do. You know what I am going to say even before I say it, LORD. You place your hand of blessing on my head. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too great for me to understand!” (Psa. 139:1-6) If that’s not enough to convince of God’s intimacy for us, “You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother’s womb. Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it. You watched me as I was being formed in utter seclusion, as I was woven together in the dark of the womb. You saw me BEFORE I WAS BORN. Every day of my life was RECORDED IN YOUR BOOK. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed. HOW PRECIOUS are your thoughts about me, O God. They cannot be numbered!” (Psa. 139:13-17)
Does this sound like we are predestined? NO! We see in this Psalm that God has a PLAN FOR OUR LIVES but it’s UP TO US whether we obey it or not! We see how Eve then Adam disobeyed God’s will, Cain went against the will of God and killed Abel (Gen 4:8) In the days of Noah, people turned against God’s will, in a big way. (Gen 6:5) Later, along came David who, when He sinned, REPENTED and did not repeat that sin as a result God said “God removed Saul and replaced him with David, a man about whom God said, ‘I have found David son of Jesse, A MAN AFTER MY OWN HEART. He will do EVERYTHING I want him to do.’” (Acts 13:22)
OUR OBEDIENCE TO GOD IS OUR IMPORTANT PROOF OF OUR INTIMACY…
-Bill Stockham