{"id":2051,"date":"2011-10-19T08:45:33","date_gmt":"2011-10-19T12:45:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/shieldsgroup.com\/?p=2051"},"modified":"2011-10-18T08:49:02","modified_gmt":"2011-10-18T12:49:02","slug":"how-to-have-a-relationship-with-god","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shieldsgroup.com\/blog\/2011\/10\/19\/how-to-have-a-relationship-with-god\/","title":{"rendered":"How to have a relationship with God"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>How close are you to people you love?\u00a0<\/strong>Laurel and I have been married for 29 years. That\u2019s a while. And she and I would both honestly say to you that we\u2019ve had our ups and downs. Some of the best years were when we lived in campus housing, went to school, and worked in the evenings.\u00a0We\u2026<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Sat in classes together.<\/li>\n<li>Ate lunch together.<\/li>\n<li>Worked on projects together.<\/li>\n<li>Rode motorcycle together.<\/li>\n<li>Shared notes together.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Those were good years.<\/p>\n<p><strong>When I entered ministry, everything changed.\u00a0<\/strong>Suddenly\u2026<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>I was writing sermons \u2014 by myself.<\/li>\n<li>She was preparing Sunday School lessons \u2014 by herself.<\/li>\n<li>I was doing counseling \u2014 by myself.<\/li>\n<li>She was preparing music \u2014 by herself.<\/li>\n<li>I was making hospital visits \u2014 by myself.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>And without even seeing it, we were slowly becoming strangers.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>When children came along, the distance between us fluctuated. Sometimes we were close. Sometimes we were not. In fact, both of us realized that unless we did something about it, we ran the risk of becoming strangers who lived together.<\/p>\n<p><strong>It was then that Laurel and I decided to make our relationship a priority.<\/strong> We began to set aside time for one another. Once a week we went somewhere where our ministries, our children, and our external demands could not interfere. For a while, that was a coffee shop in Clearfield. She was not allowed to take a book. I was not allowed to take a computer. She was not allowed to take her schedule. I was not allowed to take my PDA.<\/p>\n<p>We have found, in these 29 years, that if we don\u2019t take the initiative to be close, we will not be close.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Today, I want to suggest that the very same thing can happen with you and God.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>This podcast helps you see how to stay close to God.<\/p>\n<div class=\"powerpress_player\" id=\"powerpress_player_4108\"><audio class=\"wp-audio-shortcode\" id=\"audio-2051-1\" preload=\"none\" style=\"width: 100%;\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"audio\/mpeg\" src=\"http:\/\/shieldsgroup.com\/mp3s\/amq\/2011\/matthew\/20111016BehindTheCurtain.mp3?_=1\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/shieldsgroup.com\/mp3s\/amq\/2011\/matthew\/20111016BehindTheCurtain.mp3\">http:\/\/shieldsgroup.com\/mp3s\/amq\/2011\/matthew\/20111016BehindTheCurtain.mp3<\/a><\/audio><\/div><p class=\"powerpress_links powerpress_links_mp3\" style=\"margin-bottom: 1px !important;\">Podcast: <a href=\"http:\/\/shieldsgroup.com\/mp3s\/amq\/2011\/matthew\/20111016BehindTheCurtain.mp3\" class=\"powerpress_link_pinw\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Play in new window\" onclick=\"return powerpress_pinw('https:\/\/www.shieldsgroup.com\/blog\/?powerpress_pinw=2051-podcast');\" rel=\"nofollow\">Play in new window<\/a> | <a href=\"http:\/\/shieldsgroup.com\/mp3s\/amq\/2011\/matthew\/20111016BehindTheCurtain.mp3\" class=\"powerpress_link_d\" title=\"Download\" rel=\"nofollow\" download=\"20111016BehindTheCurtain.mp3\">Download<\/a><\/p><!--powerpress_player-->","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>How close are you to people you love?\u00a0Laurel and I have been married for 29 years. That\u2019s a while. And she and I would both honestly say to you that we\u2019ve had our ups and downs. Some of the best &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shieldsgroup.com\/blog\/2011\/10\/19\/how-to-have-a-relationship-with-god\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,9,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2051","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-godly-living","category-sermon-podcasts","category-spiritual-life"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9XvmV-x5","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shieldsgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2051","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shieldsgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shieldsgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shieldsgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shieldsgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2051"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.shieldsgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2051\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shieldsgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2051"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shieldsgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2051"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shieldsgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2051"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}