There is More | Intimacy with God

Intimacy with God is removing the veil.
 
If you’re like me, you may have heard pastors or evangelists frequently refer to “removing the veil” and never actually understood what it meant. Many will pray for God to encounter people by “removing the veil” or ask Jesus to “tear the veil” for non-believers.

We as God’s children are wired for intimacy with Him, meaning we are designed to be in a loving, committed relationship with God our Father. In Ephesians 5, Paul draws a comparison between Jesus’s relationship with the church and the relationship of a husband and wife, arguably the most intimate earthly relationship. If we are the church, then we are the bride, and Jesus is the bridegroom. When we understand that Jesus looks on us as His bride, employing the image of a veil starts to make sense.

A veil hides a bride’s face from her groom. It keeps her from seeing him fully as he is. Likewise, the groom is hidden from the bride. When it comes to our relationship with The Lord, we want to pursue deep intimacy with Him, which can’t include us staying hidden and Him on the other side. What immediately precedes us giving ourselves to Jesus is Him lifting the veil from our eyes so that we can see Him clearly, in full glory.
 
I’m sure you had that moment, or maybe you are longing for that moment. The moment where Jesus reveals Himself to you clearly enough that you’re willing to say yes to Him. This is the beginning of intimacy, an unveiled pursuit of knowing and loving God while being fully known and fully loved by Him.

As humans, our end of that pursuit isn’t always perfect. We are a self-preserving people, meaning we like to protect ourselves, especially the deepest parts of ourselves, from getting into the wrong hands. Therefore, we will sometimes pull the veil back down over our own eyes, hiding away the deepest parts of ourselves instead of letting God in. But when the veil is down, we can’t fully see God either. We can’t know His character; we can’t receive His love. If we would only allow Jesus access to our hearts, we would see that He is actually the most worthy of our trust, and everything we would want to hide from Him would be met by perfect love.
 
James 4:8 tells us that if we draw near to God, He will draw near to us. It is His natural response to be close to His people when we seek Him. We never have to worry about being abandoned by God; He will always meet us in our pursuit of Him. Psalm 73:28 says that it is good to be near God. He is our refuge, our safe place.

When we intimately know God, we are able to receive His heart for the world and see it as He does. As we feel what it feels like to be close to God and see that how we talk, think, and act starts to reflect God’s heart, we can see where the world is veiled to the Gospel. 2 Corinthians 4 says that the world is blind to the light of the glory of Christ. But you, who are able to look upon God with unveiled eyes, will know His goodness and love for you, and therefore His love for the world.

Our natural response to intimacy with Jesus should be to invite others into the same. And so we pray for the removing of the veil so that others may know Jesus for who He is, because when they do, they too will bear witness to the heart of the Father. What if pursuing our individual, intimate relationship with Jesus is actually the first step to the awakening of nations?

Prayer:

Jesus, I invite you to know every part of me. I pray that you would continually lift the veil from my eyes so that I may see you for exactly who you are. When I am afraid, show me your heart. When I feel ashamed, show me your pride in me. Lord, give me a heart to know you and a desire for the world to know you. Amen.

Author | Kalli Drake