learning

I feel like Jesus is teaching me a lot lately about what being in a relationship with Him looks like.

As sad as it is, when I "talked" to Jesus in prayer in the past, I didn't realize how stuck I was in the image of me relaying a verbal letter to heaven. I don't know that I ever truly looked at the room around me and thought, "Jesus, you are right here, you are sitting beside me...I can just speak."

I know this sounds really simple and maybe a lot of other people have already got this figured out. But I think that I was a slight bit off from really understanding that Jesus is PRESENT right now with me. I don't need to orchestrate a long and eloquent prayer. He is my Father, sitting right beside me. Why would I send a letter in the mail to my roommate knowing she was right there all along? I guess its kind of the same concept for me.

It makes the times I listen to worship songs in the car so different.

"When I think about the Lord, how He saved me, how He raised me..."
When I sing those words, in my thoughts I can speak to Jesus beside me and say, When I think about You Jesus, about the day You saved me, how You raised me. The real deal Jesus is sitting next to me, smiling as I shower Him with that praise. I reflect on my salvation story with the one who saved me...it makes it so much more meaningful and my heart just flutters. Before when I would think of that, I would sing it thinking of Jesus, reflecting on how awesome He is, but not consciously thinking, "Jesus, your sitting here and I want to tell you that this is my heart song to you."

It's kind of like the difference between me singing a corny Michael Buble song to Reed and singing it by myself while thinking of Reed. Singing with him next to me makes it so much more intimate...as if you can hear the heartbeat of our love.

I'm working on this in my relationship with Christ. God is so good and so incredibly faithful to continue to teach me this, to broaden and increase my definition of a "relationship with Christ".

I'm not sure where the Lord is taking me with it from here and I'm honestly not sure how much of this makes much sense to anyone else reading. The difference between how things were and how I am looking at them now are so DRASTICALLY different, but explaining the difference feels like I'm splitting a fine hair...So I understand if its not especially easy to understand what the heck I'm rambling about.

Kind of off topic a bit, but I need prayer for transformation of my time in the Word. I am hungry for true meaning out of the Word, but sometimes I can get intimidated and feel as if I'm not getting the full meaning and depth out of it. I am learning this cool new way of reading the bible that has been really fruitful (it's called the inductive bible study method), but I'm not completely sure how to do it just yet, so I'm still yearning and grasping for the fullness of the Word. God will grant us the desires of our hearts and I know He will be faithful.