How to Reconnect with God, when you feel like you’ve left Him.
There is always a way back until there isn’t. (Which is when you’re dead….so as long as you’re breathing, you can come back to God!) God is never going to not want you! He is always going to be waiting for you to return to Him, and to grow to love Him.
Many times when we backslide, we feel like God is not going to forgive us this time. Or we feel like, “I have already said sorry a million times! Why would he forgive me now?” This is but guilt speaking, and forcing us to remain in unrighteousness.
In this devotional, I want to share with all of us (myself included), how to come back to God, especially when it feels like He doesn’t truly forgive us.
First, we must ‘confess’
1 John 1:9; If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
We hear it all the time, but what does it truly mean to confess? The common conception of confession is simply ‘telling God you’re sorry and asking Him to forgive us’. Confession is not only verbal repentance, but it must come from the heart, soul, and mind.
When one confesses, they have to truly mean it. And I believe that many people confess because of the fear of Hell. Our desire to confess must not be driven by fear of damnation, but rather by the need to connect with God, who is the person who has sustained us throughout our entire lives.
Stated simply, confession is repenting with your lips, and meaning it in your heart that you are sorry, and then trusting God to forgive us.
Confession ain’t the full apology
Of course, God has already forgiven you. But for your confession to have great meaning to God, and to yourself, it needs to be grounded in prayer.
Prayer is one of, if not the most important habits, at the center of Christianity. In order for you to really grow in your faith, your life needs to be a prayerful one.
The bible says to pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. This is how we really bond with God.
The basic forms of prayer are praise, petition (asking God for something for yourself), intercession(asking God for something for someone else), and thanksgiving.
The Bible is the number one way to truly discover God.
In order to reconnect with God, one has to truly know who God is and understand His nature.
Think of God as your closest friend. When you hurt them, you first say sorry, and then you try to spend more time with them.
As I said in the previous point, confession and reconnection to God, are grounded in prayer. Now, I would like to add that reconnecting to God requires that you not only speak to Him through prayer but that you listen to Him also, through His word. Reading and meditating on God’s word is how Christians spend time with and in God.
Extra Tip:*How to prevent yourself from backsliding again
“Backsliding, generally first begins with neglect of private prayer.” J. C. Ryle
The key to developing a relationship with anyone, is consistency. If you’ve followed my advice up until now, then you would have already re-entered into God’s bane of purity. But the key question is how do you stay there? We must consistently and actively talk to God, and listen to Him, in order to strengthen our relationship with Him. And when one grows closer to God, it becomes more difficult to sin against Him.
