By God the Father delighting in His Son Jesus Christ He is actually delighting in Himself. The Trinity are 3 distinct persons but still just one Divine Being. By God taking pleasure in His Son He is taking pleasure in the same Being, Himself and vise versa with the Holy Spirit. This I believe illuminates light on the meaning in 1 John 4 when it says, “God is love.” The bible never says the Trinity is primarily based on some type of vague humanistic relationship. This is because the dynamic is a little different. The Trinity is one Being living in 3 distinct persons [Holy Father, Holy Son and Holy Spirit], sharing to one another their delight in each other as they see in the other the Beauties of the Divine Nature, Infinite Power, Love, Wisdom, all possible goodness, immutability, eternality and etc. Which is why the bible never says God is calling the saints in to the some type of vague or superficial “relationship” with God. God communicates in the bible, langue more specific when describing how He is going to love his children personally.  In revelation Christ Himself invites us to come to the “waters of life” and drink it in. The “waters of life”(revelation 22:1, 22:19) is none other than the Holy Spirit(John7 :38, John 15:26; Galations 4:6), which proceeds from the Father and Son. God in heaven does not transform us into the river. Which sheds much light on what it means when Christ prays for His saints to be one with Him, in John chapter 17. Revelation 19 tells us to drink in the Holy Spirit, or to drink in the joy and pleasure, which proceeds from the Living God. We are to drink in God and God will not only cover us with His joy and Glory but will overflow our very souls with Himself as we partake in knowing Him forever. Being made one with our God is not being transformed into a God, but it is God pouring into our souls His very own personal, knowledge, Holiness, Joy and delight which He has in Himself or within the Trinity. This is how we are going to be made one in God. By having God communicate or overflow our souls with His Joy and Glory. Just as Christ will light up the Heavenly Jerusalem, so we will have our Hearts and minds light up with the personal Glory of Christ as He shines His joy into the deepest recesses of our being. This is the Glorious future, which awaits those who have now Christ as their highest Joy and treasure.

So what does it mean to “have a relationship with Jesus?” Does it primarily mean Jesus my buddy and I sit on the porch together to share how our day went? No it does not. “Christ’s love is from His fullness and because He is so full that He overflows. Man’s love adds something to himself, but Christ’s love only seeks communication”, (Jonathan Edwards, “There Never was any Love that could be paralleled with the Dying Love of Christ”). 

John 17:3, "And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ… "Father, I desire that they also whom You gave Me may be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory.” Here in the prayer of Jesus Christ we read that “eternal life” is simply summed up by “knowing” God the Father and Jesus Christ. Now I am sure without a contest all will agree the call to “know” Jesus is the same today when we say have a relationship with Jesus Christ.  Later in this prayer Jesus tells His saints the unbelievable reality of our future, “that they also may be one in Us.” Jesus then gives us the insight of how this will primarily be accomplished, “that they may behold My glory.” Having a relationship with Jesus is mainly “knowing” Jesus Christ by “beholding” Him and His revealed Glory. Knowing or being brought into relationship with God is the reality that Jesus Christ, who has taken on our human nature with a human face, personally shines His Glory to us, for our enjoyment of Him for all eternity. That the Almighty God would do such a thing is still a mystery to the writer. How be it that it entered into the mind of God to loves us so personally and bring us to His very chambers of love and reveal His Glory to us in the most personal manner is a thing to marvel at all for all eternity! A special note to teachers and preachers of the word of God: Be sure when we use the word “relationship” in contention with knowing God that you take time, every time you use that word, that in some manner you explain what “knowing” God specifically means. For our American culture is doing all it can to distort this reality every day of your hearers lives. For example; worshiping God is relationship with God.

(RSV) Revelation 22:16-17 “(Christ) I am the Bright and Morning Star.” "Come." And let him who is thirsty come, let him who desires take the water of life without price.”

“All who are thirsty

All who are weak

Just come to the fountain

Dip your heart in the stream of life

Let the pain and the sorrow be washed away

in the waves of His mercy

As deep cries out to deep

In Ephesians 1: 10 we are instructed that God’s goal for “redeeming” us by Christ’s “blood” is this.  “That in the …fullness of time He might gather together in one all things in Christ.” God saved us by the blood of Jesus Christ so that one day He might gather all the saints from all over the world in Christ. Now from here it is not until chapter 2 verse 7 we get the answer of why God wanted to gather us together to Himself in Christ Jesus. “That in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.” The Father is gathering us to Himself in Jesus Christ so that He might SHOW the riches of HIS grace and goodness to us for eternity. What we have here is an image of the glorious Son sitting the Saints on a giant couch in Heaven while He stands in front of them and says “enjoy the show because I am about to show Myself to you.” On more a personal level you have this image of Christ who is bringing His saints so close and intimate to Himself, although God does not relate to us sexually but for the sake of the point allow me this, that it is almost like a newly married lover reveling them-self to the other. The Holy Spirit will cover us and overflow our souls with the enjoyment and delight, which the Father has in the Son and the Son in the Father. The greatest gift of the blood of Christ is this partaking in the delight which the Trinity shares toward one anther as they see the beauty of the Infinite worth and perfections in the other. Which is why Jesus Christ says the following in Matthew 25:23 when He address the state of the “good servant” or saint who will be admitted in heaven, “Enter into the joy of your lord.'” The joy by which we will be entertained or rewarded with is the Joy which God has in Himself or in His Son, which He will pour into our souls so that our very being is immersed by the Holy Spirit for the Spirit is the Joy of God and Christ itself. 

So what does this mean now today for us? NAU Psalm 37:4, “Delight yourself in the LORD.” It is easy to see the Glory of our great God by knowing what He commands. He is asking us, His enemies, to come through the Blood of Christ and delight ourselves in Him. What an awesome God we serve and obey. How then do we delight ourselves in Christ? God has revealed Himself in the scriptures and so it is to this true image of God, by faith, we delight ourselves in. I invite my readers to carefully study the Supreme risen Christ and know who He is and what about Himself He has communicated to us. Therefore the question is what Has Christ communicated about Himself? For having a relationship with Christ is none other than loving, delighting or enjoying Christ our Lord, then flowing into worshiping, adoring and thanking Him. Delight yourself in Christ’s mercy as He cleanness you from all guilt and shame and harm of condemnation. Delight yourself in Christ’s strength, as His strength becomes your strength. Delight yourself in Christ’s happiness as His happiness in Himself is poured into you, through the Holy Spirit, for you to enjoy. Delight yourself in Christ’s unfailing love toward you, which is yours to hold and cherish forever. Delight in Christ’s wisdom, which perfectly directs your steps so that all things are for your good. Delight yourself in Christ’s comfort, as His comfort becomes your comfort. Delight in Christ’s pleasure as you share His gospel to others so they might delight in Christ with you. Delight yourself in Christ’s humanity hoping one day you will see your Beloved God “face to face.” Delight yourself in Christ’s Supremacy, which commands your destiny, ensures your enemies defeat and your victory.  Delight yourself in all that God is for you and all His promise for you in His Son Jesus Christ. Delight our self in God’s decree of election and predestination, which insures infallibly His Love to you for all eternity. Delight yourself in Christ’s fulfillment of the Covenant of Grace, which purchased for us all possible good including the gift of the Holy Spirit. Use every possible moment and opportunity to do this and you will fulfill the greatest commandment, “Love your God.”

Friendship

Therefore friendship from God is His personal communication of Himself and His perfections to us in an up close and friendship manner, even through the “face of Christ” His Son. The 2-way fellowship, as we have seen in scripture, is mainly God shining or showing Himself and we beholding, delighting in and finally communicated back to God in worship and praise. When we are transformed more into the image of Christ and grow more in worship we are merely reflecting God’s Glory back to God. As the moon reflects back to the source its light. In this way God’s Glory is the still the center of all His affections and the saints are brought into ever-increasing fellowship and enjoyment of God Himself.

God in His personal dealings with Abraham and with the disciples calls them friends (James 2:23, John 15:15). Now what does this mean to be a friend to God? First notice God is a friend to us in a friend like manner. Example Jesus walked with, ate with and treated His disciples in ways you and I do. Then also notice how Jesus explains in John 15 that He is making us His friends in that He is telling us what He is doing, what His plans are. The picture is that Christ puts His arms around our necks while telling us who He is and what His plans are for us and the world. God did not have to do it this way. He could have given us heavens manual on “who is God” and that’s it. Now I ask, is our friendship to Christ mainly given back as we tell Christ what we are up to? Our friendship is loving Christ by joyfully obeying Him, John 15:14 "You are My friends if you do whatever I command you.” Also from John’s last words in His book we see that friendship is admiring and delighting ourselves in Christ, John 21:25, “And there are also many other things that Jesus did, which if they were written one by one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that would be written. Amen.”(See also John’s own words in Revelation 1:4-8) Also notice God’s interaction with Abraham. Christ was relating to Abraham as a friend. But also notice the relationship was based primarily on God teaching about Himself to Abraham and telling Abraham His plans. They related to each other in a friend like way. I say, in a way, because no friend of mine would ever bow down and call me Lord, but Abraham did toward God, although God was relating to Him in friendship like manner.   

Notice how God befriended Moses. First what does God say about Moses? The scriptures record that Moses was the most Humble man on the face of the planet (Numbers 12:3). We must therefore understand the biblical specifics to what friendship with God means. We are to approach Jesus Christ as our friend but also no less than the Almighty God, terrifying in His Glory and infiniteness. Which is why I believe God was such a friend to Moses. Moses knew God be to the LORD of Host, the Almighty God and therefore Moses knew His place. Which was to approach the LORD who is a God of Mercy and compassion(Exodus 33:19, 34:6), but also approach Him with utter Humility and debasing of all self-recourses (Deuteronomy 32:39, Isaiah 6:1-4). Psalm 2:11, “Serve the LORD with fear, And rejoice with trembling.” Humility rejoicing in the mercy of Jesus Christ is what true friendship with God is. Isaiah 57:15, “For thus says the High and Lofty One Who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: "I dwell in the high and holy place, With him who has a contrite and humble spirit, To revive the spirit of the humble, And to revive the heart of the contrite ones.” God will dwell with the Humble. For it is only to the humble and contrite persons God will communicate His Love, Mercy, Comfort and Endless Joy. Only a humble heart is able to receive such things from God. Thus it is only the Humble who are the only ones who can in true authenticity and sincerity worship the Eternal God who is overflowing in Grace and all Supremacy. Herein lies true friendship with God.

            James chapter 4 also teaches us this same doctrine; that friendship with God is humility before God and not living for this world and its fleeting pleasures but living for God and seeking to be satisfied by knowing Jesus Christ. James 4:1-6, “Where do wars and fights come from among you? Do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members? You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask.  You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures.

Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God … "God resists the proud, But gives grace to the humble."  Here we learn what is the opposite of being a friend of God. Being a friend of world and its ways is so far from being a friend of God that the scriptures record that you are an enemy of Jesus Christ. That is astonishing! The apostle James gives us some good insight to avoid this horrific fate of becoming an enemy of God. We learn that some people of the church were murders of the heart, coveters, and lusting continuously. Then James gives us the base issue of where all this was coming from. “[They] come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members? Then James tells us what was making these pleasures so evil. In verse 3 we learn these people were asking God for things selfishly so they could use these things solely for themselves so they could be satisfied by them. This is evil because God, not the world, is to satisfy the true Christian. In Jeremiah 2:13 the scripture tells us that God is the “fountain of living waters.”  Therefore you are an enemy of God if you go about satisfying yourself apart form Jesus Christ, who is “life” itself. If you go about trying to satisfy yourself apart form submitting to God, you are proclaiming that God is inferior to the World. At the point your live becomes a public advertisement that God is infamous and inferior to world.  This is to make you God’s enemy. I dare say most people have not truly thought what it is to have an enemy who has infinite, and I say what word as strongly as possible, Power.

                Now lets see what the opposite of this is so that we can see what real friendship to God is. Friendship with God is not looking to you or to this world and its ways to be satisfied. But instead in humility coming God, by throwing aside all confidence in yourself and this world to satisfy, and come to Jesus Christ in total confidence. that He alone can satisfy. Friendship with God is helping others to turn away from this world and then humbly come to God for everything, to live life not for yourself but for Jesus Christ. The apostle Paul put it best when he said, “To live is Christ and to die is gain…to be with Christ is far better (Philippians 1:21).” I believe we are now about to see the clearest picture for what it means to be a friend of Jesus Christ. Philippians 4:11 “I have learned in whatever state I am, to be content.” Because Paul’s sole satisfaction came from Christ, “To live is Christ”, he therefore was “content” with Christ. Paul didn’t need to covet or lust after the world to be its friend because He was getting all His satisfaction from God. To be content in Christ is to show or display Christ as supremely satisfying and beautiful to the whole world. This is true friendship with Christ: to be so satisfied with Christ that you are therefore content with Christ so that this world and its ways are totally unattractive.  We know this to be true for St. James’ wisdom for us to follow is the same, in light of discovering how lustful and murdering our hearts are as we lust for worldly self pleasures. He instructs us to “Draw near to God and He will draw near to you.” His instruction to people struggling in trying to find true pleasure by seeking it in fleeting selfish pleasures is to be humble by admitting our sin before God and “Draw near to God.” Then after we are instructed to “Draw near to God” James tells us to then “Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded.” Draw near to Christ and find the satisfaction for you whole soul by resting in His mercy, which heals the deepest hurts, cleans the vilest of sins, makes strong the weak, and makes wise the simple. Find total enjoyment for Christ gives liberally to all. This includes all of His great and magnificent promise of life, forgiveness, and even best of all the promises which to know Him in the most intimate manner possible, who is the LORD of Heaven and Earth. Fill your soul with greatest of delights by filling your soul with knowing and drawling near to your Great God and Savoir Jesus Christ. To come to Christ in this way is true friendship with Christ, by coming to him with empty hands ready to be filled up with the pleasure of knowing the King of the Universe. The best biblical example if know if is of the following giving by Christ Himself. Matthew 13:44, " Again, the kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and hid; and for joy over it he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.”

            Another way to see this more clearly is in Luke 7:47, where it says, "Therefore I say to you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven, for she loved much. But to whom little is forgiven, the same loves little." Humility is true friendship with God because of what we learn from Jesus as he teaches us what is true “love” to God. I am sure most will agree that the bible’s demand for us to “love” God is about the same today when we urge people to forsake their relationship with this world and come to have a relationship with God. Christ tells us that people love Him much because He forgives them much. This forgiveness is the foundation of our “love” or relationship with God. This is where humility is born and sustained in the true Christian. By loving our God very much every day, because we have been forgiven “much.” Now from the other side of the coin it becomes apparent what this special type of dynamic on which our relationship with God is based. 1 John 4:9, “In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him.” This sending of the Son into the world is none other than the crucifying of Jesus Christ for all the sins of elect church. It is this, by which the apostle John tells us that God loves us, because He has Mercy on us! God’s love is “manifested” or made known by showing us mercy through Christ Jesus. Therefore we “love much” because we are forgiven much. There is no other relationship, which we are in that is based on this type of a drastic dynamic. Therefore I encourage all to view the blood trail of Christ’s love to the Cross every day, by the eyes of faith. See His love for you demonstrated by His boundless and enduring Mercy, which is able to cover the sins of the vilest sinner. His mercy cleanses all the stains which sin left on our minds and hearts. Christ’s mercy clears us of all shame and guilt and then ushers us as legitimate sons and daughters to the Most High God and King to eat at His table.

            Christ demands specially our “love”, not just our choices. He demands the deepest desires and longings of our hearts, He demands them for Himself.  This is the best biblical langue for what we mean by the word “relationship.” Matthew 10:37, "He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me.” Those who truly understand in their mind and feel deeply in their heart that they have been forgiven much, they are the ones who will “love” Christ more than all other things. The bible does not say our relationship, which we give to God, is the greatest virtue human beings have to give God. But it does say plainly that “love” (1 Corinthians 13:13) is the greatest virtue we give to the LORD God Almighty. The Greek word for “love”, which Christ used for describing what is the greatest commandment, “love your God”(Matthew 22:37), means this; “your strongest longings, first of all your desires and affections.” Christ teaches us that our relationship to Him is primarily for us to long for Him with the greatest and deepest of our affections, desires and therefore with all our life itself. Which is why I now direct my readers to what I said earlier. It is clear to see why Christ in heaven simply invites all to come and drink in the waters of His life and pleasures. And then why His # 1 commandment is simply for us to “love”, enjoy, desire, long for Him above all things with all our life. Our life, which includes all of our passions, dreams, aspirations, our thoughts, strength, our jobs, hobbies, families, our entertainment habits, our emotions and every thing about us.

In revelation Christ invites us to come to the “waters of life” and drink it in. We are to drink in God and God will not only cover us with His joy and Glory but will overflow our very souls with Himself as we partake in knowing Him forever. Just as Christ will light up the Heavenly Jerusalem, so we will have our Hearts and minds light up with the personal Glory of Christ as He shines His joy into the deepest recesses of our being. This is the Glorious future, which awaits those who have now Christ as their highest Joy and treasure. Is Christ your greatest desire? Is He the cream of all your affections? If so then your actions will prove it or otherwise expose your confession as a lie. Is Christ your deepest longing? Do you desire more than anything to see your Savoir Face to Face and drink in His love and pleasure. If so, then let your light so shine among men so they may see it and give God Glory. If not then I invite you to fall upon the mercy and forgiveness found only in the Son of the Living God, Jesus Christ. Come to Him and find out what it means and feels like to be “forgiven much” so that you might in return love Christ much.  May God’s grace fall on His elect and may His Spirit blow to dead hearts to awaken then to real life.

Lastly I would like to bring in A. W. Pink as he speaks on the friendship of Christ. The specific reason I am quoting him is because of how well he touches on the aspect that Christ’s friendship is best understood to us light of Him also being our God and Lord is the idea the He brings us unspeakably “close” to Himself. This closeness is what Christ wants to most basically communicate when He tells us He is our friend.

“Many and varied are the relationships in which Christ stands to a believer, and he is the loser if He is ignored in any of them. Christ is God, Lord, Head, Savior of the Church. Officially He is our Prophet, Priest, and King; personally He is our Kinsman-Redeemer, our Intercessor, our Friend. That title expresses the near union between the Lord Jesus and believers. They are as if but one soul actuated them; indeed, one and the same spirit does, for "he that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit" (1 Cor. 6:17). "Christ stands in a nearer relation than a brother to the Church: He is her Husband, her Bosom-friend" (John Gill). "We are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones" (Eph. 5:30). But even those relationships fall short of fully expressing the nearness, spiritual oneness, and indissoluableness of the union between Christ and His people. There should be the freest approaches to Him and the most intimate fellowship with Him. To deny Christ that is to ignore the tact He is our best Friend.

Death will have separated us from those on earth, but "absent from the body" we shall be "present with the Lord" (2 Cor. 5:8). And in the future Christ will manifest Himself as our Friend, saying "Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord."

John 17:3, "And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.”

Therefore:

Yours in Christ striving together for the faith, obedince, and friendship in Christ our Lord

:Oshea