Do you ever feel distant from God? Do you long to be close to Him? In today’s episode of the Christian Habits Podcast we’ll talk about 14 practical things you can do to get closer to God.

14 Practical Ways to Get Closer to God

The more intentional we are about our relationships, the better those relationships will be. Let’s look at some practical things we can do to get closer to God. I’ll give a short list here and then go into more depth in the podcast.

1. Find something you enjoy doing with Him. If you dread your quiet time, you won’t want to do them. In the past, I didn’t feel like doing quiet times because I thought they were boring. I found something I enjoyed doing, though, and all of a sudden I wanted to do my quiet times. Some of the ideas we talk about on the podcast are truth journaling, Scripture meditation, the Examen app, topical Bible studies, and any of these renewing of the mind activities. Don’t worry about beginning with something simple, as you can always progress later to more Bible reading, etc. The key in the beginning is to establish the habit.
2. Meet with God each day during the time of day that you’re most alert. The advice we usually hear on this topic is to have your quiet time as soon as you wake up. That works for me and for many others, but it doesn’t work for everyone. If you’re a person who has more energy or self-control later in the day, it may be better to schedule your devotional time for that time of day. If you struggle with discipline in quiet times like I did for twenty years, try journaling through these questions and Bible verses.
3. Do a “closeness check” at the beginning of your time together. In the past, I used to begin each quiet time with a closeness check. I’d ask, “Am I feeling close to God?” If the answer was no, I’d think back to the previous day to see if there was anything I needed to talk to God about. I’d confess any sin that I needed to confess (often heart sin such as bad attitudes) and work through anything I needed to work through with Him. We’ll talk more about the reasons for not feeling close (sin, idolatry, and not accepting what you need to accept) in the podcast and what you can do about it.
4. Believe that He loves you. Have you ever been in a relationship in which the person actually loved you, but for some reason you felt like they didn’t love you? When this happens to us, it makes us not trust that person or feel close to them. The same thing happens when we feel like God doesn’t love us. If you feel like He doesn’t love you right now, try praying through the following Bible verses and picture God doing the things He says He’ll do in those verses. The first couple of times I tried this, it was transformative: Insecurity Bible verses, 1 John 1:9.
5. Work on letting go of your idols and sin. When we feel like we have to have certain things to be happy, it interferes with our relationship with God. So does sin. It’s impossible to completely get rid of sin and idols, but the more progress we make in those areas, the closer we’ll feel to God. Here are a couple of posts/blog series that will help: How to Break Free from Idolatry and How to Break a Habit.
6. Carve out a weekly (Sabbath) and/or monthly “date time” with Him. I don’t know about you, but it’s easy for me to get so caught up in life that I forget that life is really about God, not the other things I’m caught up in! Having a weekly Sabbath where I don’t do any work and a monthly (or every two months) “date time” with God (which I explain more fully on the podcast) both help me keep Him first in my life and feel close to Him.
7. Be thankful. Do you remember when the Israelites were grumbling in the desert after Moses led them out of Egypt? All of their grumbling distanced them from God and it does for us as well. The more we dwell on the good of God Himself and the blessings He has already given us, the more thankful we’ll be–and the closer to God we’ll feel. This post has some verses to help with thankfulness!
8. Spent time listening to God. John Mark Comer talked about this in his new book, Practicing the Way, and I also visited with John Mark about this practice on the 1/16/24 episode of the Christian Habits Podcast.
9. Develop a prayer rhythm throughout the day. We see Daniel doing this in the Bible when he prayed three times a day. Meeting with God throughout the day will help us be aware of His presence and make us feel closer to Him.
10. Go to God for help with negative emotions each day. I talk about this more on the podcast and give some examples of what that looks like.
11. Don’t spend too much time on social media, news, Netflix, or phone surfing. When we’re constantly on our phones or watching television, we’re often filling our minds with both a cultural perspective and negative emotions as we feel anger, worry, envy, and all sorts of things when we see what’s happening in the world or what others are doing. The problem is that these emotions and messages enter at lightening speed and we don’t process them. It’s easy for them to draw us away from God if we’re not careful.
12. Join a home group or Bible study. This is another tip I discovered after beginning a lifestyle where we didn’t live in places long enough to have a home group or Bible study. (My husband is a travel physical therapist so we move every three months.) I didn’t realize how important our home groups were for building me up in my faith until we no longer had them.
13. Go to church each week. I talk more about this in the podcast but I discovered this tip after being thrown into a lifestyle where we didn’t go to church every week. If we miss out on church regularly, we can still be in the Word and listen to sermons online and even watch church online. But here’s what we can’t do: join other believers in person as we worship God together. There is power in worshipping God together through song and prayer. Not to mention being encouraged by others (Hebrews 10:25) and hearing some great teaching.
14. Go to God for help with major life changes. Because I’ve just been through my own major life change, it’s fresh in my mind how important it is to go to God for help with that. Why? Because when we enter into a new life stage we discover new weaknesses, new tendencies toward idolatry, and new reasons to be discontent – even if they’re GOOD life changes. If we don’t go to God for help with those changes, we may start feeling distant from Him.

Journal Questions for Getting Closer to God

The wonderful thing about God is that He loves us even when we don’t feel close to Him. So if we’re wanting to improve our relationship with Him, we know He wants that as well. That’s not always true in our relationships with people. Sometimes it helps to think about what changes we’d like to make to improve our relationships. Following are some journaling questions you can use to think about your relationship with God.

1. What would it look like to have a close walk with God?
2. Is a consistently close walk with God possible?
3. Why do you want a close walk with God?
4. What is one thing that keeps you from having a closer walk with God?
5. What is one step you could take to have a closer walk with God?

My prayer for all of us is that God will help us have the discipline and desire to do some of the things that will draw us closer to Him. He loves us and wants to be in a relationship with us. That’s such a huge blessing. Does one of the above steps stand out to you as something you’d like to try doing? If so, I hope you’ll give that a try.

Additional Resources Mentioned on the Podcast

• James Transformation Bible Study

How to Listen to the Podcast

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