Intimacy With Christ

So the past few months I've been trying to explain something to Ross in our conversations about spiritual intimacy. I haven't done a very good job of articulating what I mean, but fortunatly someone much more talented has. Eugene Peterson in Christianity Today. I've been thinking about what it means to "know" Jesus and how following him is much different than having a fuzzy, mystical feeling about God. Here are some highlights...

"I've been a pastor most of my life, for some 45 years. I love doing this. But to tell you the truth, the people who give me the most distress are those who come asking, "Pastor, how can I be spiritual?" Forget about being spiritual. How about loving your husband? Now that's a good place to start. But that's not what they're interested in. How about learning to love your kids, accept them the way they are? "

(CT)"Many people assume that spirituality is about becoming emotionally intimate with God."
(EP)That's a naïve view of spirituality. What we're talking about is the Christian life. It's following Jesus. Spirituality is no different from what we've been doing for two thousand years just by going to church and receiving the sacraments, being baptized, learning to pray, and reading Scriptures rightly. It's just ordinary stuff.

This promise of intimacy is both right and wrong. There is an intimacy with God, but it's like any other intimacy; it's part of the fabric of your life. In marriage you don't feel intimate most of the time. Nor with a friend. Intimacy isn't primarily a mystical emotion. It's a way of life, a life of openness, honesty, a certain transparency. "