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It's All About Relationship by Elizabeth Larson

By Elizabeth Larson

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Relationship is everything. Everything we do starts with relationship and the first and most important relationship you need to have is the relationship you have with the Lord. You can do nothing without this relationship. This relationship has to be deeply personal between you and the Lord. You cannot live off of someone else's relationship or anointing.


 


So many people cry out how they want to be blessed, but they have no relationship with the one who can bless them. The only way you can walk in the blessing of the Lord is to have a relationship with the Lord. The blessing comes from Him. The people who have been truly blessed are the people who have this deep personal relationship with the Lord.


 


Your Relationship with the Lord


 


If you want to be blessed, you have to have a relationship with the one who blesses.


 


The people who have had the worst time with sin and walking away from God are the ones who have not had this personal relationship with the Lord. An example of this is the way the people in 1 Sam said "The Lord your God." They never say the Lord our God or the Lord my God. They said "your God" because they had no personal relationship with God.


 


1 Sam 12:19 Then all the people said to Samuel, "Pray for your servants to the LORD your God, so that we may not die, for we have added to all our sins this evil by asking for ourselves a king."


 


Did you notice that they said "the Lord your God", not the Lord our God, as if He was only Samuel's God and not God over all the people.


 


Saul said the same thing continuously to Samuel, he said "the Lord your God", not the Lord my God.  David on the other hand said "the Lord my God."  His relationship with the Lord was deeply personal to him. He loved God with everything he had, and God blessed him in every way.


 


When we have no focus on God (the people, Saul) or when we lose our focus on God (David with Bathsheba), sin can come into our hearts and make us turn from God to go after our own pleasure, but we cannot know what we really need without God.


 


1 Sam 12:21 "You must not turn aside, for then you would go after futile things which cannot profit or deliver, because they are futile."


 


You don't even know what you need unless you have the Lord in your life. This must be a deep personal relationship like David's was. You cannot be successful and know what to do, or what you truly need without this personal relationship with the Lord. He has to be your everything, above your spouse, children, family, job, and above yourself. He must be first. He must be everything to you, and this relationship must be continuous. Without this kind of relationship you will be lost and you will be lead astray like Saul or David with Bathsheba. You cannot have relationship one day and ignore it the next. This relationship has to be a day by day continuous thing. The relationship you had last year is not going to help you today unless you also have that continuous relationship today.


 


Is God your Everything?


 


Now ask yourself this question: Right now, is God your "everything?" Would you walk away from everything if He asked you to? Most Americans like a Christianity that is comfortable, but God is actually calling us to follow Him in every area of our life, not just Sunday, and not just when you are at church. He wants us to give Him everything.


 


Do you love Him this much? Do you want Him above everything else? Do you have this kind of relationship with Him? Is He truly your King? I want you to really think about this because we are coming into a time where it is imperative that we hear the Lord's voice and direction. We can no longer live off someone else's anointing. We must have our own relationship with Him. Nothing else will do.


 


Have you made Him your "everything?"


 


1 Sam 13:11-12 But Samuel said, "What have you done?" And Saul said, "Because I saw that the people were scattering from me, and that you did not come within the appointed days, and that the Philistines were assembling at Michmash, therefore I said, 'Now the Philistines will come down against me at Gilgal, and I have not asked the favor of the LORD.' So I forced myself and offered the burnt offering."


 


Saul knew it was the wrong thing to do. If he would have had a deep personal relationship with God he would have known to wait no matter what he saw with his eyes because he would have had trust in his God. You cannot have trust without knowing Him and you cannot know Him without having a relationship with Him. Saul let what he saw with his eyes overrule what God had said and commanded. He knew he was doing the wrong thing by doing the sacrifice instead of waiting for Samuel. He did not trust God. You cannot have trust without relationship. Saul did things in his own power. 


 


1 Sam 13:13-14 Samuel said to Saul, "You have acted foolishly; you have not kept the commandment of the LORD your God, which He commanded you, for now the LORD would have established your kingdom over Israel forever.  "But now your kingdom shall not endure. The LORD has sought out for Himself a man after His own heart, and the LORD has appointed him as ruler over His people, because you have not kept what the LORD commanded you."


 


Relationship is Everything to God


 


God is looking for people after His own heart to do His will by the relationship they have with Him. Relationship is everything to God. He wants a relationship with you. That is why he sent His son. Now, are you going to have a relationship with Him or are you going to do things your way and go after futile things?


 


1 Sam 12:21 "You must not turn aside, for then you would go after futile things which cannot profit or deliver, because they are futile."


 


Are you ready to give Him everything and love Him with everything? He requires no less than everything, but He also loves you with everything.


 


God spoke to Saul and told him specifically what He wanted him to do.


 


1 Sam 15:2-3 "Thus says the LORD of hosts, 'I will punish Amalek for what he did to Israel, how he set himself against him on the way while he was coming up from Egypt.  'Now go and strike Amalek and utterly destroy all that he has, and do not spare him; but put to death both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey.'"


 


1 Sam 15:7-9 So Saul defeated the Amalekites, from Havilah as you go to Shur, which is east of Egypt.  He captured Agag the king of the Amalekites alive, and utterly destroyed all the people with the edge of the sword. But Saul and the people spared Agag and the best of the sheep, the oxen, the fatlings, the lambs, and all that was good, and were not willing to destroy them utterly; but everything despised and worthless, that they utterly destroyed.


 


Saul didn't do what the Lord told him to do.


 


First he blamed the people,  


 


1 Sam 15:20-21 Then Saul said to Samuel, "I did obey the voice of the LORD, and went on the mission on which the LORD sent me, and have brought back Agag the king of Amalek, and have utterly destroyed the Amalekites. But the people took some of the spoil, sheep and oxen, the choicest of the things devoted to destruction, to sacrifice to the LORD your God at Gilgal."


 


Then he made excuses,


 


1 Sam 15:24 Then Saul said to Samuel, "I have sinned; I have indeed transgressed the command of the LORD and your words, because I feared the people and listened to their voice.


 


But the truth is he had no relationship with God. He did not fear Him, nor did he love Him. The only way you get more concerned about what man thinks (fear of man) and start putting that above God is if you are more focused on what man thinks and not what God thinks. The only way that happens is if your relationship with the Lord is less than other things in your life. That is a dangerous place to be as we see in Saul's case which is why God must be first in everything in your life.


 


1 Sam 15:25 "Now therefore, please pardon my sin and return with me, that I may worship the LORD."


 


It amazes me how flippant he is about his sin and that he thought that he should just be pardoned and everything will be fine. He had no relationship with the Lord. Because of this lack of relationship he really didn't know who the Lord was. He was more worried about himself than what he did against the Lord.


 


1 Sam 15:30 Then he said, "I have sinned; but please honor me now before the elders of my people and before Israel, and go back with me, that I may worship the LORD your God."


 


He was still more concerned about himself and the way he looked to the people than about what he had done against God.


 


The Lord had to take the kingdom away from him. He had no choice.


 


1 Sam 13:14 "But now your kingdom shall not endure. The LORD has sought out for Himself a man after His own heart, and the LORD has appointed him as ruler over His people, because you have not kept what the LORD commanded you."


 


Becoming a Man (or Woman) after God's Own Heart


 


How do you become a man (or woman) after His own heart? You do this by having a relationship with Him. Saul had no relationship with Him. You can't do much with someone who won't have a relationship with you. You can give them things, but if there is no relationship then you cannot have teamwork. You can't co-labor together. You can't work together. God works through us. He changes things through us, but if we don't listen and don't have relationship with Him, He can't use us because we will make it about us instead of about Him, and He can't do anything with that.


 


What happens if you haven't been in relationship with the Lord? What if you have let that relationship fall by the wayside, and got busy doing other things, building your own kingdom, or your own life? What if that relationship has been lost, or what if you haven't ever had that deep personal relationship with the Lord? Is it too late? Are you out? No. It's not too late. You can start over today, or if you have never had that relationship you can start working on that today, but don't wait, for the Lord is saying that a time is coming where everyone will have to hear His voice for there will no longer be the grace that He has given in this time. Start now.


 


How do you build relationship?


 


Communing with the Father


 


Relationship comes from communing with one another. This requires us to spend daily time in front of the Lord, not once a week, or once in a while when something goes wrong, but every day. We do this by setting aside time every day to spend time with Him. You can do this by prayer, reading the word, worshiping, or journaling to Him. The important thing is that the time is spent with Him. It won't be the same every day, but that is what will make that time exciting and fresh. You wouldn't want to eat the same thing every day for the rest of your life, nor should you want your time with the Lord to be the same every day. This needs to be a discipline like eating healthy or exercising, and just like eating healthy or exercising, a once in a while practice won't do much. The discipline must be a continuous effort.


 


As you spend time with Him you will begin to develop the ability to take that time into the rest of your day. You will begin to hear His voice and you will be able to stop at times during your day and feel Him and commune with Him. You will find yourself being able to ask Him about what to do instead of having to figure out everything yourself. You can go from making 150 steps in your own power to making 75 steps by the direction of the Lord and getting much better results with what you are doing.


 


David was not a successful king because of his own brilliance. He was successful because he asked the Lord about every step he made, and he could ask because he had a relationship with Him. You can do nothing in your own power. If you want to get things right, you need the Lord to guide you and that comes by relationship. Once you have that relationship you can start to build other relationships as He leads you. These relationships will be more fruitful because the Lord will be guiding them. It all starts with relationship.


 


The blessing comes from relationship with Him.


 


Elizabeth Larson


Ministering Spirits Ministries


www.ministeringspirits.org


 


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