Faith & Doubt
Other people describe a personal relationship with God and I have never had anything like that. Why not, and can it ever change?
“Now Samuel did not yet know the LORD, neither was the word of the LORD yet revealed unto him.”
Samuel is a boy living and serving in the tabernacle, about as close to the center of Israel's religious life as a person could physically get, and the text says plainly that he did not yet know the Lord. He was in the right building doing the right things without the personal part having happened yet. Scripture treats that as a stage rather than a scandal.
“Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.”
This is addressed to a comfortable, lukewarm church in Laodicea, and the striking detail is where Jesus is standing: outside, knocking. The picture is an invitation waiting on a response, and it is offered to people who assumed they were already fine. Closeness here begins with someone opening a door, not with a personality type or a particular kind of experience.
A path forward
Ask two people who describe closeness what it actually looks like on a normal Tuesday. The answers are usually far more ordinary than the language suggests.
Give it real time for eight weeks: the same twenty minutes daily with scripture and unhurried prayer. Relationships never given hours do not become close.
Consider that you may relate to God differently than the most expressive person you know. Some people meet him in study, service or silence rather than in strong feeling.
Closing verse
“And ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart.”
- Jeremiah 29:13
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