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Firsthand Spirituality Is Best
“Come near to God, and He will come near to you.”
James 4:8
Secondhand spirituality as opposed to firsthand spirituality...what’s the difference? The
difference lies in if we are experiencing God firsthand or letting others spend quality time
with Him and then we try to benefit from their experience.
We all live very busy, fast paced lives. Finding time to be alone with God is a challenge for
all of us. We become discouraged with our lack of consistency and often just give up. God
desires to fellowship with us. That means that He wants us to talk to Him as well as He
wants to talk to us. Here lies the bigger problem—listening. How much time do we spend
really listening to God?
Talking to God usually isn’t too difficult, especially when we are in trouble. During those
times, we can spend hours pouring out our problems to Him. Appreciating God’s beautiful
creation is easy and may be a part of our daily talking to God. However, our stumbling block
is usually in the listening. Getting the physical body to sit quietly for 20-30 minutes is a
challenge in itself. But trying to get the mind to “be still” (“Be still and know that I am God.
Ps. 46:10) for even five minutes becomes the greater challenge.
Each of us can probably think of a least one great prayer warrior we know and admire. We are
eager to go to them with our special prayer request. Somehow, we feel they are closer to God
and He would listen and respond to them quicker than He would to us. Since they are “prayer
warriors,” we assume they hear God’s voice clearer than we do. Therefore, it’s just more
convenient for us to let them pray on our behalf and then they can tell us what God has to say.
We are looking for secondhand spirituality.
If this is our approach, then we have missed something very important. In John 4:8, the
invitation is a personal one. God wants our spirituality to be firsthand. God is patiently waiting
for the opportunity to tell us the wonderful plans He has in store for us. Are you listening?
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