Now, we’re called to draw near, to live in this relationship with God, and I wonder how we’re doing? How is your relationship with God?

Are you frustrated? Do you feel like its messy or confused or just that it should be more? Wherever you’re at, let’s consider a couple things that may keep us from drawing near. There are of course several things to keep us from a rich relationship with God, but just to name two this morning:

Fear of Judgment

The fear of judgment keeps you from a relationship with God because you just can’t believe that God can forgive your sin. You know your heart and your sin and although you want a closer relationship with God, you wouldn’t dare pursue it because you just think that a person as messed up as you is not supposed to be close to a God like that.

This fear of judgment sees God in a certain way. If we were to think big picture — and I think we should do this often — imagine what kind of look God has on his face when he thinks about you. He sees you, everything in your heart, everything you do, when he looks at you, how do you picture his face?

Well, I think this fear of judgment imagines him frowning, crossing his arm, annoyed, angry, fed up with your mess-ups. He is not a Father running to meet you, he is waiting to judge you. And you can’t draw near to him like that.

Fear of Disappointment

Then there’s another fear. Maybe you’re not afraid of judgment, you’re afraid of disappointment. This fear of disappointment is a fear that says, “oh yeah, I get that relationship stuff, I’ve tried it before. But have you seen how crazy my life is?”

This is a fear that doesn’t tempt us to stop believing, but it tempts us to forfeit a life of intimacy with Jesus because we just don’t think that kind of life is for us. We’ve tried it, we can’t do it, and so we’re just going to sit back and try to survive the chaos. You’ve tried for it to be more and it doesn’t work.

This kind of fear reminds me of our oldest daughter Elizabeth. A couple months ago we were at a park with a big sand box. Well she has these rain boots that are really girly, they’re pink and yellow and have flowers on them. She likes them so much that she prefers to wear them any day, including this sunny afternoon in a giant sandbox. It was time for us to go so we’re packing everything up and I told her to empty the sand from her shoes before getting in the car. The sand was bugging her so she easily obeyed and took off her boots to empty them out. The problem was that she was still standing in the sandbox when she did this. So she emptied the boots out while standing on the sand in her sweaty socks, then putting the boots on again she scoops up a little more dirt. Now I just watched her for a while (and thought, here’s sermon illustration). She got frustrated. Not because it happened once, but it happened about three times until I intervened and suggested that she get out of the sandbox before trying again.

And there’s some of your relationships with God. You have wanted to get closer, but you’re boots just keeping filling with sand.

We’re called to draw near to God, that is, to live in a rich God-accomplished relationship with God. But we’re not there. And there are at least two fears that keep us from getting there: fear of judgment and a fear of disappointment.

Tomorrow we’ll look at how what Jesus has done and does answers these fears.