The other evening I got a message from one of my former Conversational English students at Tokyo Biblical Seminary. I told Donn, “I have to admit, she was one of my favorites.” Then I hurried to add, “It’s not that I picked her out and pursued a closer relationship with her. It’s that she pursued a closer relationship with me and became one of my favorites.”

I couldn’t help smiling as I thought of how much that parallels how I believe people become “God’s favorites.” I don’t believe God picks out certain people to be His favorites, but that those who pursue a closer relationship with Him, become, in a sense, His favorites, in that they have a more intimate relationship with Him.

For example, the book of Psalms is full of David’s pursuit of God. In the first chapter of Psalm 63, he says, You, God, are my God, earnestly I seek you; I thirst for you, MY WHOLE BEING LONGS FOR YOU…

 Then in Psalm 27: 4 AMPC, One thing have I asked of the Lord, that will I seek, inquire for, and [insistently] require: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord [in His presence] all the days of my life, to behold and gaze upon the beauty [the sweet attractiveness and the delightful loveliness] of the Lord and to meditate, consider, and inquire in His temple, and Psalm 27:8, When You said, “Seek My face,” My heart said to You, “Your face, Lord, I will seek.” 

It’s not hard to recognize that David pursued God with his whole heart.

I love the book of Exodus because of the intimacy of the relationship Moses developed with God. Chapter 33 tells us Moses pitched a tent some distance away from the camp where he went and met with God. Verse eleven says, The Lord would speak to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend. In verse 15, Moses told God, If your Presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here. 

You have to understand, Moses is talking about the Promised Land, the place the Children of Israel have yearned for so long, a land flowing with milk and honey. And yet Moses is saying it’s not worth it to go to the Promised Land if God isn’t going to be there. God’s presence was more important to Moses than anything else.

This is also the reason I love the third chapter of Philippians, especially in the Amplified Classic version, because of the intimacy of the Apostle Paul’s relationship with Christ. He says, But whatever former things I had that might have been gains to me, I have come to consider as [one combined] loss for Christ’s sake. Yes, furthermore, I count everything as loss compared to the possession of the priceless privilege (the overwhelming preciousness, the surpassing worth, and supreme advantage) of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord and of progressively becoming more deeply and intimately acquainted with Him [of perceiving and recognizing and understanding Him more fully and clearly]. For His sake I have lost everything and consider it all to be mere rubbish (refuse, dregs), in order that I may win (gain) Christ (the Anointed One)…     

  [For my determined purpose is] that I may know Him [that I may progressively become more deeply and intimately acquainted with Him, perceiving and recognizing and understanding the wonders of His Person more strongly and more clearly… (verses 7,8 and 10)

It is so clear that Paul’s first priority, what he wants more than anything, is to have a close, intimate relationship with Jesus Christ. Compared to that, everything else is mere rubbish.

How about you? How intimate is your relationship with our Savior? Does your whole being long for a closer relationship with Him? I heard someone say once that each of us can have as close a relationship with the Lord as we want, but we need to be willing to pursue Him with our whole heart.

Father, forgive us when we allow the things of earth to become more important to us than pursuing a deep, intimate relationship with you. I pray that we would fix our eyes on you so that “the things of earth will grow strangely dim, in the light of your glory and grace.” Amen.