Ways To Deepen Your Relationship With God Personally
As a leader of a large Christian men’s organization (Real Men Connect, Inc.), when it comes to being a Christian, other than, “What is my God-given purpose?” the second most popular question men ask me is, “How do I build a personal, intimate relationship with God?”
This may come as a surprise to many Christians but building a deep relationship with God isn’t as complicated as most men would believe. The simplest way to understand how to deepen your relationship with God is to simply look at and treat your relationship God like a REAL relationship. And in this article, I’m going to show you 5 ways to deepen your relationship with God that you can start working on today.
Forming A Relationship With God Takes More Than Church
First, building a deeper relationship with God is a journey that can transform every aspect of your life. Contrary to popular belief, it’s more than just attending church services or reading the Bible; it’s about cultivating a personal and intimate connection with the Savior. As you seek to grow closer to Him, you will find yourself being shaped and molded by His love, wisdom, and grace.
I’m going to share with you five (5) simple steps that can help you deepen and strengthen your bond with God, allowing His presence to permeate your daily life and guide you on a path of spiritual growth and fulfillment.
As I mentioned earlier, if you want to deepen your relationship with God, you must treat
your relationship with Him like a REAL relationship. What do I mean by that? That means in addition to the 5 tips below, you’re going to also need to add a little bit of discipline and a whole lot of desire to each; and believe it or not, you already have an ample supply of both.
How to Build a Personal Relationship With God - 5 Helpful Tips
Tip 1 – COMMIT to your relationship with God.
If you truly want to deepen your relationship with God, you must commit yourself to the building process. All that means is, you need to take the relationship-building process seriously. God doesn’t just want us to “date” Him, He wants us to “marry” Him.
If you read the Bible, you’ll notice that God often refers to us as “His bride” and He our “Groom.”
Revelation 21:2 - And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.
2 Corinthians 11:2 - For I feel a divine jealousy for you, since I betrothed you to one husband, to present you as a pure virgin to Christ.
Revelation 19:7 - Let us rejoice and exult and give him the glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and his Bride has made herself ready.
Depictions of us as a “Bride” is not by accident or just thrown in haphazardly. It’s not about gender, it’s about us recognizing God’s commitment to us and how He wants us to be committed to Him. And that means He doesn’t want us to be “married” (committed) to “other” gods, just Him.
Exodus 34:14 - for you shall worship no other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God…
Think about your own wife (if you’re married); before you got married, you “dated” each other. As time passed, you two grew closer and closer together, spending a considerable amount of time with each other. That time was spent with you getting to know each other better, becoming more intimate with one another, and you sharing some of the most personal moments in your life with each other.
And when you realized she was “the one” for you, you decided to COMMIT your entire life to loving her by asking her to marry you. And you pledged your faithfulness to her and only her. That’s why God describes His relationship with us as a marriage. He wants us to know how committed He is to his “relationship” with us; and He expects the same from us.
But the key here is, that relationship with your wife took TIME. Someone once said, the word “love” is spelled T-I-M-E. And time is the love language of God. He desires for us to spend time in His presence, so we get to know the desires of His heart as we share with Him the desires of ours.
King David wrote it about it in Psalm 27:4, “One thing have I asked of the Lord, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in his temple.”
So, if you want to deepen your relationship with God, COMMIT yourself to a designated time and place of when and where you will meet with Him, so you will get to know Him better through prayer (talking to Him), worship (praising Him), reading (about His character), listening (to Him), and journaling (capturing what He’s saying to you).
And just like any committed relationship, just showing up is not enough; make sure you show up ready, fully engaged, without distractions or selfish agendas. It’s about spending quality time with God, not just quantity.
Tip 2 – CONFESS and come clean with God.
Again, if you’re in a committed relationship with someone, the relationship is only as strong as the trust that is built between you and the other person. Likewise, with God, if you want to deepen your relationship with Him, then tell God the truth about everything. He already knows what you feel, what you’ve done, what you’ve been through, and what you’re going through, but He still wants you to tell Him.
Our relationship with God isn’t just depicted as a bride/groom relationship, the Bible also describes God as our Father. You are His child, and He loves you; and although He already knows what’s on your mind, He wants to know do you trust Him enough to tell Him.
CONFESSION is simply coming into agreement with what God already knows about you. The Bible says, “God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth (John 4:24).
So, if you really want to deepen your relationship with God, whenever you enter into His presence, tell him the TRUTH about everything. That means telling Him and praising Him for the good things in your life; that means admitting the bad things in your life; that means asking Him for mercy and forgiveness for the ugly things you’ve done to Him, others, and yourself; that means confessing to Him all your fears, doubts, and frailties.
Initially, having to confess “the ugly” and admitting “the bad” will make it hard for you to spend time with God, because the enemy (Satan) will use guilt and shame to keep you from confessing anything to God. But 1 John 1:9 says, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
As the good Father, God wants you to come to Him and share what’s on your heart with Him, so He can help you heal and grow through the most difficult times of your life. Our confession to God reveals our level of trust in His love and His sovereignty.
Think about it, any husband who’s ever cheated on his wife, probably would have rather died before confessing what he did to his her. Why? Because he was afraid that if he told her, she would probably divorce him, stop loving him, and he could lose everything that he loved – including his wife and the children. And in a lot of cases, that’s true. But when it comes to our relationship with God, He is a God of grace and mercy, and He says, “absolutely NOTHING will ever separate us from His love” (Romans 8:38-39). Now that’s a real relationship.
Tip 3 – COMMUNICATE with God.
This seems simple enough, but what I’m referring to here is a different type of communication. I’m talking about having a “dialogue” with God, not a monologue. Allow me to explain.
When it comes to communicating with God, most Christians think of prayer. TELL God what you need; TELL God what you’ve done; TELL God thank you; TELL God you’re sorry; ASK God for forgiveness; ASK God for a blessing, a healing, financial provision, deliverance, etc. – you name it. And yes, God wants us to talk to Him about all those things.
However, God also wants us to do something that’s even more important than talking, and that’s listening. If you truly desire to have a deeper relationship with your wife, children, or friends, how deep would that relationship be if you only talked, but you never listened to them?
Most of us struggle listening to the people we love and see every day; so, imagine how much the average man would struggle listening to God who he can’t see and doesn’t talk to that often.
Now, imagine how you would feel if the only time your wife, children, and friends talked to you, was to tell you or ask you for something, and they never stopped to listen to you or ask you about anything – including your thoughts, your feelings, your desires, or your concerns? This would be very frustrating.
God created us so we could enjoy the joy of enjoying Him. He wanted to fellowship with us; He wanted us to commune with Him; He wants us to enjoy His love. But most of the time, we’re talking and reading about Him, but we’re not listening TO Him.
The truth is, God has a lot to say to us if we just take time to be intentional about listening to Him. And one of the best ways to listen to God is to deliberately ask Him questions about His character, about His word, about His promises, what He thinks, what He sees in us, what He desires from us, what grieves Him, what makes Him smile, etc.
In our men’s organization (Real Men Connect, Inc.) we teach and train men on how to do this through something we call a “Quiet Time.” A Quiet Time is a designated time that we commit to every day praying to God, reading His word, confessing to God, but more importantly, LISTENING to God by asking God specific questions about what we’ve read in His word.
For instance, imagine you just read David’s popular 23rd Psalm; if you want to hear what God has to say, then simply ask Him some of the following questions about it:
God, what does that psalm say about me and how you see me?
God, based on that psalm what sin do I need to confess to you (or need to avoid)?
God, what promises can I claim for myself after reading the 23rd Psalm?
God, search me, and tell me, based on this psalm, what attitude in my heart do I need to change?
God, after reading this psalm, what’s the next thing/step you want me to take in my relationship with you?
God, what area of my life do you want me to apply this psalm to?
God, what can I learn from David’s relationship with you in applying this psalm in my life more consistently?
I’m not saying you have to ask ALL of these questions; but I guarantee you, if you ask at least 3-4 of them consistently, and be quiet and listen after you ask each one, you WILL hear from God through the power of the Holy Spirit. Just be ready to write down (journal) what God reveals to you after you ask. Don’t judge it, just capture it on paper. This is how devotionals are written; and now you can start writing your own.
Listening to and hearing God speak to your heart is one of the most wonderful and beautiful things in the world. It’s at that moment when God will become real to you, and your relationship with Him will start to change and grow dramatically.
Tip 4 – Recruit a COMPANION to share your journey with God.
If you want to have a deeper relationship with God, then recruit someone who desires a deeper relationship with Him too. I’m not saying it’s necessary to have your companion or a friend to have a deep relationship with God, but it can speed up the process and make the journey a lot more fun.
For example, I didn’t start building a deeper relationship with God until 7 years after I got saved and gave my life to Christ. Like most Christians, I got saved, then I started reading my Bible more, going to church consistently, volunteering at the church, and attending Bible study.
However, it wasn’t until my best friend, John, asked and challenged me to do “Quiet Time” with him for 40 consecutive days. And at that time, I didn’t know what a Quiet Time was, but John gave me a crash course on it in less than 30 minutes.
Although I was a little nervous, because it sounded super spiritual to me, I agreed to do 40-days of quiet time with John. That was 19 years ago, and I haven’t stopped having a quiet time since. Although John and I stopped having quiet times together after the 40 days, he helped me stay motivated long enough until it became a lifelong habit.
They say you can get to where you want to go faster going by yourself, but you can go a lot farther with help; that’s what I experienced with John.
Now, 19 years later, I’ve taught and trained over a thousand men on how to do a “Quiet Time” and I’ve done quiet times (like John did with me) with over a hundred men. So, if you want to have a deeper relationship with God, recruit a companion(s) who will hold you accountable and keep you motivated as you learn and grow together.
Tip 5 – CONSISTENTLY work on your relationship with God.
As I said in tip 4, John got me initially started in deepening my relationship with God, but it was my consistency over time that solidified my relationship with God.
As any married man knows, whatever you did to get your wife to marry and fall in love with you when you were dating, you’re going to have to continue to do it to keep her. If you don’t, your relationship with your wife will inevitably grow stale – and eventually you’ll start to lose that “loving feeling.”
Well, our relationship with God isn’t much different – except with a slight subtlety. If you don’t consistently work on deepening your relationship with God, God’s love for you won’t grow cold, but your love for Him will – whether you want it to happen or not.
I started this article by telling you that you have to treat your relationship with God as a REAL relationship. So, like a real relationship, it has to be cultivated over time, and you have to be consistent by doing the things that are necessary to strengthen it. That means committing the necessary time to nurture and tend to the relationship; consistently being honest and vulnerable in the relationship; consistently improving your listening skills when you communicate; and consistently evaluating the relationship to see what you can do to make it stronger.
However, let me warn you, consistency doesn’t mean perfection. John and I successfully completed 40 days of listening and journaling, and we didn’t miss a day. But, in the 19 years I’ve been doing Quiet Times with God, I haven’t done it successfully every day. Sometimes I’ve gone several days without listening to God; meaning, I haven’t been perfect in my pursuit. But the most important thing is, over the past 19 years, I’ve spent time with God more days than I haven’t spent time with Him.
So, don’t stress yourself out along this journey. Spending time and deepening your relationship with God shouldn’t feel like an obligation, it should be an honor and a privilege. It shouldn’t be something you feel you “have to” do, but rather something you “get to” do every day if you choose.
Think about it for a moment, God, the Maker and Creator of the universe wants to spend time with YOU; He wants to talk to YOU; and He wants to have a deeper relationship with YOU. Are you kidding me? If that doesn’t get you excited, what will?
So, remember, by committing time to be with Him; confessing the truth to Him; communicating and listening to Him; sharing your journey with God with a friend; and doing it consistently over time; you can experience a profound relationship with God that will literally transform your life forever.