Eric's thoughts

Have you ever felt distant from God? I'm about to confess something...I have. I know some of you are completely shocked, I mean I'm supposed to be in the God business, I should never feel distant from God, after all it is my job to point others to him, right? For others, I know it didn't come as a shock because some of you were already questioning my salvation. I can confess this because I know I am not the only one.

When you tell someone else about how you feel they typically give you the same answer, to get close to God you must, read your Bible, pray more, go to church, commit more, love God more. And so you do all this, but you still feel nothing. Then others say, well you can't base everything on your feelings, which is true, but sometimes it doesn't... well...feel true. These are all great things that God uses to bring us to him, and I agree that we should be doing a lot more of, but what happens when we do these things and still feel distant? I confess again...I have.

Some say, if that doesn't work then it's because of the way you've been living. Then we give some list of things they need to be doing or not doing like, don't have sex outside of marriage, don’t drink, don’t cuss, don't get angry, and don't do bad things. In other words behave yourself. Is that what it's about? Jesus came to this earth and died and came back again so I can behave myself?

So what have we done? We've just painted a picture of what a relationship with God looks like...pray, read the Bible, don't do this and that, and behave yourself. There you have it. But here's the problem, if I do this does that mean I have a close relationship with God? If I do this, does that mean I even have a relationship with him? You see, all of these things are based a large part on me...and can have nothing to do with God at all.

But what if what if I started with Him instead of me. What He has done for me? The grace, the mercy, the blessings, the pain, the trials, the love,...the death,...the resurrection.

In my life, it is when I have caught a little glimpse of what he has done for me, I want to know him more, so then I pray, then I read the Bible, then I pay attention to the way he tells me to live and get the most out of life.

I find the more I take myself out of the equation the closer I am to Him.