Coming Up The Mountain: Cultivating Intimacy With God | Valuing His Presence (Part 1)

In this episode, Christopher Ball shares the first message from Sozo Kyle's new teaching series, Valuing His Presence.

Before the Church can effectively go, send, build, and influence, it must first learn to dwell. Drawing from the biblical imagery of the mountain, this message explores God's invitation throughout Scripture for His people to ascend into deeper intimacy and encounter with Him.

From Moses to Jesus and beyond, the mountain has represented the place where heaven and earth meet. The challenge for believers today is not merely to admire the mountain from afar, but to climb it—to pursue God's presence through prayer, worship, and relationship—and then carry what they receive back into everyday life.

Whether you're hungry for a deeper prayer life, seeking greater intimacy with the Lord, or longing to understand the role of God's presence in Kingdom ministry, this message will encourage and challenge you.

Topics covered:
• Intimacy with God
• The mountain motif throughout Scripture
• Valuing God's presence over activity
• Prayer and spiritual formation
• Apostolic ministry and Kingdom impact
• Building a culture of presence

For more content from Sozo Kyle, be sure to subscribe and follow along.

#ValuingHisPresence #IntimacyWithGod #PrayerLife #ChristianPodcast #SpiritualFormation #KingdomCulture #SozoKyle

Transcript

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You are listening to the Sozo Kyle Church Podcast. To learn more about Sozo Kyle Church, including our gathering times in the Kyle area, visit us online at sozoktx.com. Today's talk comes from Pastor Chris Ball.

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Wanna talk with us tonight about intimacy with the Lord. And there's a lot of places in Scripture where the metaphor for nearness and drawing near to God is a mountain, coming up the mountain. The big idea of why Sozokyle exists is to be an apostolic church, to be a group of people who help each other identify how God's made you, what he's called you to, and then equip you to send you to do this exact thing that we're talking about, being an influence in the world. That's really the purpose of the church. And if you do a bit of a history lesson, and we and we won't dive deep into it tonight because we want to lay some other foundation first, but eventually and ultimately, the idea is to model this Antioch-type church movement that was about equipping and sending. And we were just talking about this a few minutes ago, praying in that back room. It's easy to accidentally, I say accidentally, I think accidentally, at least in church in the West, get into this pattern of being teach heavy and pastor heavy, which are both great things. I mean, part of the five-fold ministry. You're not going to get anywhere if you can't teach, if you if you don't pastor people. Um, but if that's the end game and it stops right there and it limits, and the whole idea is just to pastor and teach, pastor and teach, pastor and teach, but there's really not any apostolic going and sending to carry out the great commission of discipling nations, then it's very limiting in what the church can do. It's kind of like the church has got its hands behind its back, and and that's really the picture of the Jerusalem church model that you see early, finally, like in Acts 10, you know, God gets a hold of Peter and and kind of broadens his view of what the church is meant to be. But the Jerusalem church largely was just like, let's just keep expanding the four walls of this particular church with the Jewish people. And you see 90 miles to the north, Antioch finally show up and say, This thing is bigger than just right here. When Jesus said to the ends of the earth, he really meant get outside of yourself and disciple the nations. And so ultimately, that's where we want to be headed is people that are knowing what we carry, activated, equipped in it to really go be bold and go have the adventure with Cod and go see what he's up to in your sphere. Um, nations doesn't have to mean across the Atlantic Ocean, nations as people groups. And there's a lot of them represented right here around us. Uh Brad sees all kinds of different nations inside a C Fan. You know, when he's there, he's like, that's a people group unto itself right there. Um many of us see that, know that. So we want to be an Antioch type church that is that is going. But you can't get there if you don't first lay down some family establishment. Otherwise, you're too fragile and you'll and you'll fracture if you try to start really sending and moving and sacrificing hello. And so that really, now I've we've explained a lot of this to you guys, but while we're kind of in our baby stages here, we're meeting in the evenings. That's really the goal is to lay down a nice slab foundation of family, of trust, of relational equity, um, the power of a potluck, I mean, that sort of thing, to really gel together to build trust and everything, so that we've got a nice family on mission foundation so that we can be an apostolic church that sends and is sent ourselves. And um, the sending may be just to H E B, but I mean you are sent, you are aware, you're on mission. So you probably knew a lot of that, but I just felt like as we jump into kind of a new series that I'm calling valuing his presence, I feel like that's a key piece. We've even talked about that's some in our values already. That's part of the foundation pouring to eventually get to where we want to get as an Antioch type apostolic church. So, first thing up, intimacy with the Lord coming up the mountain. Um you look at like guys, Noah, for instance, you know, the ark lands on a mountaintop as the waters recede. There's a there's a mountaintop moment right there. Um, you look at Abraham, and he actually goes up the mountain with Isaac on what looked like the sacrifice of all sacrifices, and he encounters God on the mountaintop. Um the temple built on the mountaintop. Uh Psalm 121 talks about how um the Israelites would journey for the the festival of ascends and in and the feast, um, looking up and heading up the mountain, and we lift our eyes up, like there's this ascension, uh, Jesus on the mountain and the transfiguration figure. Um, so you see mountains all over the place um to metaphorically symbolize the significance of God's presence. Uh Moses, Mount Sinai, um, everybody was actually originally invited up the mountain. And we had a bunch of base dwellers that wanted to stay safe at the base and say, you go on our behalf. I don't want to be, and you don't want to be, a person who's invited up the mountain of God into the intimate places of his presence and pass on it because it feels too scary or foreign. You want to be a person who's got adventure in your bones and willing to go up the mountain. I mentioned this this morning as I was thinking about this, and I was pulling a bit of a double duty, and so I I mentioned Long's Peak. I've probably mentioned it already to you guys, but this was a real mountain that I was in love with. If you can be in love with a mountain, not like really in love with it, but infatuated with it. Um, early on, like probably as early as like age seven or eight. So my family's going to Estes Park, Colorado. My parents live there now, but back then um it was just summer and winter trips. And Long's Peak is the 15th tallest mountain in Colorado. And I learned every fact about it. I was a walking almanac. I don't know why, I don't know who put it on my radar, but somehow I got a hold of it and thought I'm gonna learn and know everything about that mountain. And so, you know, could told you about um the explorer Longs in the uh mid part of the 1800s who first found it, and the Native Americans who called it Beaver Mountain because it looks like a beaver's climbing up on the South Ridge to get to the summit. Um, could tell you about how lightning strikes the number one killer on the mountain, and you gotta be off the summit by noon, otherwise they'll get you. Uh, you've got to climb it um like early in the morning with a headlamp because it's dark and you gotta be um summoning by like 10 30. I mean, I could just tell you every fact about it. Finally, 2005 comes. I'm 24 years old, and I get the chance to finally climb Long's Peak and uh took Natalie with me. We weren't married yet. She was hoping to get proposed to up there and didn't happen because I wasn't gonna take a ring up 14,000 feet. And uh yeah, yeah, you're not going again, too. You've said that. I think that's probably the next adventure with some of my boys actually kind of like stepping into manhood moments. We're probably going back up Long's Peak, but anyway, that's not that's not set yet, but uh, she is not coming, she's let me know. So I get on the mountain, and man, I'm like, I'm the expert. Guys, follow me. I know what to do, I know where to step, I know where to walk. Come on, it's gonna be great. I got on that mountain and like might have been just a blubbering fool. It was like I was having a spiritual experience of just, I can't believe I'm doing this. Like, I'm good for nothing right now. I can't even get words out. It was I learned something about God, is what I learned. That you can know about a thing, and then you can actually know the thing. And those are not the same things. And it's that way with God. You can know about Him and grow up around Him and hear all about His His truth and all this, but if you haven't actually decided personally to immerse, step in, go up personally, then you really haven't experienced the Lord. And I love the mountain because it's this imagery of, okay, we going up there, how do we get there? Or we get we you don't you don't end up up there, you intentionally go up there. So if you've ever done something where you're like, okay, I've wanted to do this, finally did it. It wasn't that you accidentally wandered into it back then, but there was planning, there was, there was intentionality, there was perseverance, there was uh a real pursuit. And that's what I sense. The invitation for the Lord of the Lord is for us to be people who intimately know him. You go after it, you decide to. And the most important thing about you is that you were created to have a relationship with Jesus. As the most important thing about a person is that they were created to know God. And we've talked about the word know. It's just not know of, it's to know intimately. And Jesus gives the biggest insider's tip of all in Matthew 6.33 when he says to seek God first and everything else will be added. And so if you're looking for meaning and purpose uh and destiny in life, then Jesus would say, go after God. That's how you find those things. Anybody in your world who's like, I just feel so unfulfilled, the answer every time is to pursue the Lord. And indirectly, you find the fulfillment you're looking for because fulfillment's really not found anywhere ultimately outside of Jesus, anyway. So John 17, verse 3, the first scripture we'll jump into. It says, Now this is eternal life. And s it might feel like what he's about to say is heaven one day. That's eternal life. Or um, you know, something in the future, tense is eternal life. But that's not what he says. He says uh that they know you, the only true God. It's a prayer. And would know Jesus Christ. He's talking about himself, of course, whom you have sent. That's the prayer, that's what eternal life is. It's intimacy with Jesus, and it's to be had now. Um you have the capacity through creation and the possibility through recreation to have a personal relationship with God. Every person created to know him, and through recreation, new creation, new covenant living, you actually have the possibility for what you were created for to be a reality in your life. And that is the most important thing about a person. You have a spirit within you, so you are created with capacity and an ability to know God, but you also have to deal with this reality that God is holy, which is a roadblock to anyone who doesn't realize, oh, it's it's a new covenant life in Jesus that allows me access. And so, again, it to the point, you don't just wander up backwards up the mountain. You realize, oh, the mountaintop is holy, and the invitation is to be holy as I am holy, and to come after me, to give up your life, and to and to take up the cross of Jesus. And so that's the baseline point. Um if you look back earlier in the story of humanity's journey with God, you see Moses out in the wilderness trying to lead the people of God in Exodus 33. In verse 7, Moses would meet with God in the same way God wants you to meet with him. It says that. And so, verse 7, now Moses used to take a tent and pitch it outside the camp, some distance away, calling it the tent of meeting. So everybody kind of knew what that was. There's the tent, it's going up again. There's the tent of meeting, an opportunity for a meeting with God to happen. Anyone inquiring of the Lord would go to the tent of meeting outside the camp. And whenever Moses went out to the tent, all the people rose and stood at the entrances to their tents, watching Moses until he entered the tent. You kind of hear the anticipation in that, the expectancy. As Moses went into the entrances of uh excuse me, as Moses went into the tent, the pillar of cloud would descend, it would come down and stay at the entrance, while the Lord spoke with Moses, and whenever the people saw the pillar of clouds standing at the entrance to the tent, they all stood and worshipped, each at the entrance of their own tent. The Lord would speak to Moses face to face as one speaks to a friend. Then Moses would return to the camp, but his young aide Joshua, son of none, did not leave the tent. So who's this guy that's gonna take the people eventually into the promised land, Joshua, who's not gonna be intimidated by the giants in the land when everybody else was, who's gonna have the word of certainty that what God says can happen can actually happen, who's gonna deliver on the promise to give these people a hope and a future. Who is this guy? It's gonna be Joshua. Why is it gonna be Joshua? Because he was locked on to the greatness of God in the fact that he wanted to draw near and linger. He wanted to go up the mountain, so to speak. It was his heart's cry. And it opened the door of his life for his calling of leadership and influence to lead the people into the promise. Moses verse 12 said to the Lord, You have been telling me, lead these people, but you have not let me know whom you will send with me. You have said, I know you by name, and you have found favor with me. If you are pleased with me, teach me your ways, so I may, and there it is, know you and continue to find favor with you. Remember that this nation is your people. So you're in on the dialogue here going on between Almighty God and Moses in their meeting together inside the tent. Verse 14, the Lord replied, My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest. So he Moses asked, Who's going to go with me? God's answering, I am. I'm who you need. I'm going. I'm going with you. Then Moses said to him, If your presence does not go with us, don't send us up from here. How will anyone know that you are pleased with me and with your people unless you go with us? What else would distinguish me and your people from all the other people on the face of the earth? I just love that, by the way. That the response, of course, would be, we're not going if you're not going. So we're not talking about, oh God, would you just show me the way? Like, could you just point in the direction I'm supposed to go? I mean, how often is that our prayer of Lord? I just need to know what the right thing to do is here. Just show me, is it this job or is it this job? Is it this person? Is it this person? Is it this city? Is it this city? And I think the right prayer, the answer is, it's whatever city, so long as you're going. So long as you're going, Lord, I don't want you to point in the direction I should go. I want you to go and I will follow. I'm not going if you don't go. I'm not going into that relationship unless you don't go into that relationship with me. I'm not going to that place of opportunity unless you go. And that's the heart sentiment that's happening here. It's the heart cry that I want to define my life. I don't want to move. I don't want to go unless you're going. Verse 17, and the Lord said to Moses, I will do the very thing you have asked, because I am pleased with you, and I know you by name. God didn't say, Hey, random follower of mine. He says, Moses, I know you by name. That's probably making Moses feel pretty good. And so Moses, with some courage, now that God's just said, I know your name, says, Okay, I'm going all for broke. I'm going all in, all the cards on the table, here it is, here we go. And Moses says, Then now show me your glory. And the Lord said, I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the Lord, in your presence. I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. But he said, You cannot see my face, for no one may see me and live. This is old covenant time. We've now seen the face of God in Jesus. And you say, Well, I thought Moses said that he was talking to God face to face, like a man talks to another. Well, they were talking face to face in voice, but they weren't talking face to face in vision. There is a veiling there still, and God's highlighting it here. And verse 21, the Lord said, There is a place near me where you may stand on a rock. I just love this story. When my glory passes by, I will put you in a cleft in the rock and cover you with my hand until I have passed by. Then I will remove my hand and you will see my back, but my face must not be seen. It's like so front loaded with the promise of Jesus that it's not like God's gonna leave us in a place where we can't ever see his face. But it's like this anticipation of there's gonna be a way where you do get to see the face of God. You do get to come up the mountain, you do get to know him intimately as you want. He is to be known as known as you want to know him. And then the story actually continues in 34, almost done reading here. The Lord said to Moses, now, uh, chisel out two stone tablets like the first ones, and I will write on them the words that were on the first tablets, tablets which you broke, by the way. Thank you very much, God, for pointing out that Moses broke your commandments. So be ready in the morning. Not a day you want to sleep in on. And then come up on Mount Sinai. Present yourself to me there on top of the mountain. And God is extending that invitation to you today. Be ready in the morning and come up on top of the mountain and meet with me. And nobody in this room backed into a meaningful relationship in your life. You might have met somebody accidentally, but you didn't actually have a relationship with them accidentally. That was intentional. My mom and dad's love story is that my mom worked at budget rent a car in the Denver airport in the 1970s. My dad worked for a company where he flew into Denver and had to rent a car when he'd come in, and so he always looked for what he said was the cute budget rent a car girl. And it was my mom. And so that happened for a few months, and there was flirting and I think a few dates and that sort of thing. And then my dad gets a transfer and he's not gonna be flying into Denver anymore. He's gonna be calling on Houston. And so his whole region was shifting, and so he tells her, um, hey, this is it. It's been fun, but I'm heading south to Houston now. And my mom was like, That's not okay with me. And so she intentionally uprooted her life, made a move so that she could be around Houston, Texas, and continue to see and date my dad. They met accidentally, they had a relationship intentionally. There's not a relationship in your life that you backed into. It's all been intentional, and that's how it is with God. When you actually form and pursue in the deep places a relationship with God, it's because you responded to his invitation to be intentional to go and meet with him to do it. And you don't get to be a friend of God where he says, Hey, we call each other by name accidentally. He knows your name, but there is a level of relationship, of pleasure bringing to the king that you can have with intentional mountain ascension, if you will, to know him. And it's something you have to plan, you gotta prioritize, you gotta protect, you gotta pursue, you gotta persevere. All of your good relationships, those things are needed. And so I don't want to just assume, because we're all in church, that we automatically know how to come up the mountain of intimacy with the Lord. And so I want to encourage us today to say what the psalmist said when he said, One thing I'd ask and that I would seek, like Casey quoted a minute ago, one day is better in your courts than a thousand elsewhere, that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in his temple. And so I've got a couple of practical, intimate practices. Kind of a stair stepper, one thing leads to the next. Here's the first one. You gotta have information. Now I realize we tend to downplay information because, as we mentioned earlier, knowing God is more than information, knowing God is an intimate thing. But the truth is, most relationships start with information. It's very possible that your relationship with your spouse, if you have one, started with you stalking them online. You thought, hey, I'm gonna get to know that person a little more. Hey, the internet was around in the nineties, like ninety-nine. However you stalked him. Alison, I know, I know. You and you probably predate stalking Chuck online, but there was there was a way that you were like, hey, who is this hunk? Somebody tell me about this guy. I mean I'm trying to help you Chuck. Somewhere there was an investigation. And um if you're in business, you went and looked him up on LinkedIn to know, hey, is this is this an opportunity? Is this is this thing going to be a match? There's a bit of hunting on the periphery first that that takes place um in a relationship. So information isn't to be discounted. It's the starting place for most relationships. And God is saying I want to know I want you to know about me. So come up the mountain so you can be in a relationship with me for the rest of your life. And that's why he's given us his word. His word is the story of the journey of covenant relationship with God and man. And it's him revealing himself to us. It's not just some ancient archaic cobbled together gobbledygook thing that happened to be preserved somehow. It's God's intentionality for you to have a starting place with him. I love hearing the stories of new believers saying I got a copy of the Bible and I just started reading John or I just started reading somewhere or somebody said hey you should just start reading this and I just started reading it. And I mean it started coming alive to me. There was a starting point. At first it was just information on a page it was it was it informing me that I'm loved that that there's a God who's real who actually has intention over my life and purpose and wow never known that before it's information gathering. John 1 in the beginning was the word and that word is the word logos it means the spoken word of God it's capitalized because it's a person. And we see it unfolding in the rest of the text in the word the logos the speaking was with God and it was God. And he, so there's a pronoun there, so we know that this word is an actual person, was with God in the beginning through him who? The word, the the spoken word of God, all things were made. Without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life and that life was the light of all mankind. You drop down to verse fourteen the word became flesh and made his dwelling among us so now we're talking about Jesus being the word of God the speaking of God. So if you want to know what God is saying you look at Jesus because Jesus is the word of God not just saying the words of God but he is the words of God. He actually embodies it. He is the very word. So it says we have seen his glory the glory of the one and only Son who came from the Father full of grace and truth. Remember how Moses could not see God's glory on the mountain because it would kill him we have seen God's glory in Jesus. In 2 Corinthians Paul describes the same glory of God as being in the face of Christ. The glory is in the face of Jesus. We all know that in any relationship that's that's worth anything at all there has to be a point when things move from informing you that this is an opportunity to revelation. And you've got to have revelation. Ephesians Paul's praying for the believers there verse 17 chapter one I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ the glorious Father may give you the spirit of wisdom and revelation because Jesus knows that's a key piece for your intimacy with the Lord is it being having a a revelation past information to happen. So he's praying that for you so that you may be what smarter have more information? No, to know him better. So when you stay you start up the mountain you go with the word of God. And if you don't want to where to start get a devotional of some sort and dive in and then as you read it ask the Holy Spirit to give you revelation about what you're reading and watch it begin to take shape and bring application about the information because back to Jesus the information that is the word is actually alive and therefore can be known past head knowledge and become actual heart understanding. And so here's a simple promise if you ask God to give you a revelation about what you're interacting with in his word he absolutely will reveal what that means to your life right now. And that's when everything changes. That's when information shifts God wants to do that for you. And that's why I promise that you will experience over the long haul of going up the mountain that you'll come to places in the word where you're like oh my I don't think I've ever read that before but you know you've read it before it's this real interaction of revelation happening. And the word can't be exhausted because Jesus can't be exhausted because he's infinite and you can't find out all there is. He's got layers upon layers. And so then you've got revelation in your intimacy journey going up the mountain with the Lord that leads to conversation and you've got to have conversation. He wants to have conversation with you. It is not just a robotic hey got my pen in hand with my journal so go ahead give it to me God download it all to me I'm ready to write one way street. God's like yeah and what are you dreaming about? And what's on your heart because I got my pen too you realize oh this is a dialogue this is a conversation intimacy with God is and we don't go up the mountain just for a little nugget of information. I went all the way up there just to get the little nugget just to get the little the little you know picky up devotional self-help drop in the bucket thing. We go up the mountain to get a glimpse of God. Nothing wrong with nuggets that can be hosted in your online stock um but that's not what God created you for. He created you for a a thirst that can only be satisfied by himself. And so he's inviting you into a relationship of of intimacy um where we're not just looking for information and honestly we're not just looking for revelation we're engaging in conversation back and forth with God and um I can have a conversation with the word about the word and it's it's wonderful and it's not to be forgotten about and it's not to be skipped over it's not to be oh I've done that already but the daily rhythm of asking the word about the word is um a tool like unlike any other so you've got to have conversation but then that all leads to transformation. You've got to be transformed this is knowing that as I come up the mountain and I'm in the presence things are going to actually change. Things aren't going to stay the same. And that's what Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 3 when he jumps from the old covenant Moses moment to the new covenant Jesus moment and ties these two things together he says in verse 12 Therefore since we have such a hope we are very bold. That's what hope does hope makes you bold. When you really believe that you have what it takes you're going to step out in boldness and go for it. When you are not sure that you have what it takes or what the word is then you're not so bold. So Paul is leading with Since we have such a hope we're very bold we're not like Moses who would put a veil over his face in the cleft of the rock to prevent the Israelites so to speak from seeing the end of what was passing away but their minds were made dull for to this day the same veil remains when the old covenant is read. This is why so much of the New Testament was even written, right? We've talked about this before was to help the church understand it's in a new c it's a new covenant age. Things are not the same as they were there is no more veil with Jesus. But he's saying for so many of you put the veil back on and you look at it through the lens of the old covenant it has not been removed because only in Christ is it taken away. Even to this day when Moses is read a veil covers your hearts but whenever anyone turns to the Lord the veil is taken away now the Lord is the Spirit and where the Spirit of the Lord is there is freedom. We've quoted that verse a hundred times and it's a powerful verse. A lot of times it gets taken kind of in a standalone context which is still powerful and matters but in this context it's written and it's talking about no matter what your pastor looks like or how you've fallen short or where you haven't made it before there's still a freedom in Jesus to come up the mountain of God. Where he is there's freedom to be where he is because of the new covenant because of the unveiled nature of the creation in the creator now it doesn't matter your resume you have the freedom to access the mountaintop with God it's going to lead to a transformed heart. Verse 18 and we all who with now unveiled faces contemplate the Lord's glory are being transformed into his image with ever increasing glory. We talked about that this Shane talked about that this morning in uh in Sam Marcus which comes from the Lord who is the Spirit some translations say we are transformed into his likeness from glory to glory. Every trip up the mountain something changes. Every encounter with Jesus something's transformed there is never a moment of you encountering Jesus where something's wasted and missed there's that much to him there's that much opportunity. He's never altered but we are we are always changed into his likeness because what the world needs more than anything is a me that looks more like God. That's what the world needs. That's going to be the transforming card this is the conversation I'm having with four boys in my house that this is not some, hey, can I just put the the charge on you to go out and try to transform your friends. But what the friends need is to see a you that looks more and more every single day like Jesus and they may not even have language for that. They may see something so different and peculiar I don't have words for it. I can't put my finger on it but that's unique. That's not the same in fact that's not even the same you that was there last year when I saw this same kind of situation be unfolding here. What gives that's where the transforming power comes the glory was in Jesus' face and he's saying now unveiled faces you have my face you have my glory glory to glory it's a it's an exchange it's a pass on it's circular it's back and forth. We keep meeting with God we keep being transformed the world keeps noticing and more transformation keeps happening. So we thank you God for the information we treasure it we hold it dear but we're also asking for revelation today and I want to be in a relationship with you God because we're not in this for a Bible project. We're in this for you because you're worthy and you're wonderful and you're so wonderful that we want to search you and know you. So we're going to have a conversation in that searching and in that knowing and in that regular rhythm of mountaintop meeting with you. And as all that's happening we know that there's going to be transformation of our lives that's going to actually impact the world and the region around us. And as that happens you've got to have application. And this is true in any relationship. If you're in a meaningful relationship with someone and find somewhere along the line that you disagree on something and the other person decides to go a different direction, what happens after a while in the relationship there's a strain there's tension it's introduced. If there isn't congruency on what we agree on as two people then the relationship begins to have breakdown moments and that's true in our relationship with God. And it's not a quid pro quo where God asks us to keep putting quarters in the machine that if you do that then he'll love you more or anything like that. He's already decided to love you as much as you can possibly be loved which is more than you'll even fathom because it's maxed out to the nth degree but there is the nature of relationship something called congruency where if you don't apply what God is showing you on the mountain then he's not going to keep showing you more of himself isn't that true about relationships? It's like I want to trust you with the keys to the car son but if you can't come home on time then there isn't going to be more given to you. Let's see if you can do this first. And it's not that God's playing hard to get with us it's the nature of relationship. He says hey I've got opportunities and plans that are going to prosper you past what you could ever imagine but if we're like oh I couldn't do that oh that must not be really him asking me to do that then it's a limiting force in the relationship. And so as we're talking about being intimate with the Lord then there has to be an arrival in our heart to say I'm going to apply and obey what Jesus is inviting me to. And that may be for some of us the biggest break in the chain of our intimacy is that God is like hey this is where I'm leading you this is where I'm at this you say you want you don't want to go unless I go with you unless my presence goes with you this is where I'm going. And you're like oh I don't know if I can go there. It's like well there's the limit of the intimacy and I love that God empowers us and that what he asks us to do, what he invites us into scary maybe as it might seem in him is not a fearful thing. It's an opportunistic thing. It's a wonderful thing. His goodness is there his glory is his goodness and he goes with us and so I just bless this house to be a house of application and obedience as we pursue intimacy with the Lord. John 1421 He who has my commandments and keeps them is the one who loves me and he who loves me will be loved by my Father and I will love him and will disclose myself to him. Catch that a disclosure of God to the to the one who loves God I mean you could just spend some imagination energy on thinking what would God want to disclose to me what's in his heart tonight that he would love to open to me to see into and he's saying the key is to just love him to draw near to him and it's a promise I will love him and disclose myself to him it's not meant to put tension on your life so much as it is to offer invitation into the depths of intimacy with God that's possible for you. And you don't want to look up at the end of your life and realize you left some intimacy on the table that you could have walked in. But you can sing all the worship songs you want you can tell him how much you love him all day long but if you don't align your life with the treasure he's showing you then your love feels empty. And that's how life works that's how relationships work. That's how your friendships work. He doesn't love you based on you obeying him but your relationship with him up the mountain is intricately determined by your willingness to obey and apply what he's showing you in your life. And I believe that. And if you feel like you've stalled out on your relationship with God then ask him to show you is there some place where I'm ignoring what you're showing me? Or maybe uh you don't have to ask him maybe you already know of it. Maybe it's been on your radar a whole while and you're like I'm stuck at obeying and up and applying him when it comes to intimacy. It's like yeah I I got the information he's shown me some revelation I get either some confirmation I've even been changed. I've been transformed but when it comes to actually applying what he's showing me that can be a different ballgame. And then here's the final little tip I'll give you for intimacy is that you've got to have duration. See there these are how we do relationships. The journey um up the mountain isn't always easy. In fact it isn't always the highs of life sometimes it is a mountaintop experience it's where we get the view a mountaintop experience and it's amazing the view from the summit. But sometimes it's a slog. Sometimes it's uh a couple weeks and you don't feel it and you're like man we had such momentum. Where's the intimacy of God gone? You know all relationships have to be contended for uh and there's sometimes dry seasons and that doesn't mean you're defective it doesn't mean that you're doing it wrong. All relationships have to be contended for um you know and it's it's the vows you made on your wedding day if you had a wedding day and you made vows of till death do us part, you know, I will love you in the good times and the bad times. It's a it's a promise of duration and it is a key in intimacy. And God is promising you that he's in it for the long haul. And it's interesting to me how in my life God is just always so kind. He's always so gentle. He never comes back and scalds me or snubs me. Maybe there was a time in your past where you disappeared on him and you didn't show up for five years. Where'd you go? Well God didn't give up on you and say well I guess he's just not in it. I guess I'll go find the next guy who is but he stuck around because God's in it for the long haul with you the duration. And so that's the opportunity for us is to have duration. So I get to make a decision today that I'm gonna stick out my valleys somebody said you know the valley may be the mountaintop I mean you know maybe um there is such an experience with God in the valley that it actually could qualify as a mountaintop experience if you'll give it a shot. What is it Graham Cook always says about people saying God if you could just get me out of this valley if you just get me out of this mess and Graham will say God's saying you kidding me it took me six months to get you here. I'm not about to get you out of this thing I'm gonna I'm gonna meet you in the valley duration and he's inviting you tomorrow morning to come up on the mountain. Be ready in the morning the word was because we're going up the mountain and present yourself and meet me on the mountain and do you want to say yes to that? I mean don't you want to be a person who regularly climbs the mountain let me say this you don't stay on the mountain. Do you realize that when you go up the mountain when I climbed Long's peak in 2005 I'm not still there. There's a life to be lived down the mountain I hope to go back up the mountain. I love the mountain the mountain's an incredible place the idea is that what I gather and gain from intimate encounters with God on the mountaintop are actually to be taken with me back down the mountain and shared at the base of the mountain so that others can taste and see the intimacy of God and say I can go up there I can experience that how do I go let me let me hold your hand I'll shirpa you here we go and we go up the mountain and they become a mountain goer to where they experience the presence of God and and then they got to come back down and on and on it goes. And so we don't just practice intimacy for intimacy's sake though it's wonderful to be in the presence intimately with Jesus but we're exporters of that intimacy in our lives and that's what he is commissioning whatever word you want to use calling inviting empowering you to be as a carrier of his presence to an influential world around you that's probably more influ influenced by you than you realize everybody's looking for a role model in this life everybody's looking for a way to do whatever it is they need to do raise a kid have a relationship with a spouse that works be humble on the job site be successful in their career like show me somebody who's doing it right my head is on a swivel who can I model after who can I grab and link up with and learn from and there's just no in and in supply of that is just everywhere. And so we want to be a people who practice going up the mountain being intimate with the Lord and exporting that to the world around us. So here's what I would like to do in classic sozokyle fashion is to turn your chairs and pray for the other two people in your little triad circle and bless them with a refreshment of intimacy and any of these things that are potential hangups, maybe a little vulnerability in your life that you'd say man, sometimes I get hung here. Sometimes this is the issue that you know traps me or it's it's toxic self-talk, um, it's self-reliance uh it's uh low self-worth not seeing myself like Jesus sees me or something and just pray and release to the person that uh that you have the makings to be intimate with the Lord and to be a carrier of that kind of thing. So turn your chairs Lord we thank you for this group and for this family and for the revelation of valuing your presence for we want to be people who value your presence at every turn in the highs and the lows in the mountaintops and at the base wherever we find ourselves on the mountain maybe we're on the rock wall face clinging to it saying this is scary. But we value your presence enough to keep going Lord so thank you for the power of duration thank you for transformation in our lives and coming through us give us fresh vision of what it would look like to come through us for anybody who is still unsure of what they carry their calling your power on their life to be any good at this anyway, Lord, that you would come with a resounding you are good enough. You are mine, I'm in you there's no reason to fear we could go on and on Lord. And so thank you for your revelation of your empowerment on our lives to be carriers of your presence in Jesus' name. Amen. Pray for each other go for it.

SPEAKER_00 45:21

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