Let’s Go Deeper

Introduction

Over the last few weeks we’ve been discussing topics along the lines of “going deeper” with the Lord

This is something that’s been on both mine and Ciara’s hearts for the last several weeks and something that we genuinely believe God wants for our church

We saw last Sunday and how amazing the worship was, and how present the Spirit of God was in a very tangible way (MENTION THIS SUNDAY AS WELL)

We believe God wants to take us deeper, beyond surface level Christianity & to genuinely participate in God’s plan on the Earth as the people of God

What does that mean? What does it even look like to “go deeper”? How do we do it? Why do we need to do it? Why can’t we just be content with being Christians who go to church and believe in Jesus and not allow Him to do MORE with us? We are going to discuss all of this tonight from a biblical perspective

1.) Deepening Our Faith is and INTENTIONAL Pursuit (SEEKING)

Scripture presents this theme of deepening faith as an intentional pursuit marked by wholehearted devotion and intimate knowledge of God

Seeking God with “all your heart” forms the foundation for finding him

Jeremiah 29:13 ESV

You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart.

God tells us in His word that we WILL find him, when we seek Him with “all your heart”

This isn’t a passive thing. This isn’t waiting for God to reveal Himself to you while you just sit in silence. This is ACTIVE seeking.

To “seek” in this passage means:

To actively pursue or search for — with intention

To inquire or consult with

To desire DEEPLY — involving the heart, not just the mind

To completely devote ones self to — suggesting commitment and PERSISTENCE

When we truly seek God with all our heart, this is something we do intentionally and with purpose

Another passage we see this theme of intentional pursuit involving your whole self is Matthew 22:37–38 “And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment.”

Jesus is referencing Deuteronomy 6:5 (the Shema) in this passage, anchoring this principle of whole devotion to God all the way back to Moses

In the jewish culture, each of these components making up the person had deep significance:

The Heart was not just emotions; it was the center of the person. The deepest inner portion of the individual which represents your will and your desires

The Soul referred to your whole living being — your life, your breath, your very existence

The Mind represents your reasoning and understanding; your conscious thoughts and comprehension

We are to FULLY love and pursue the Lord with our whole self! This is not a passive, “one-time decision” to follow Christ and have a relationship with Him.

No relationship—spiritual or otherwise—can flourish without ongoing, deliberate investment

Faith deepening is not a single moment, but a continuous process of drawing closer to Christ (what Scripture calls “Sanctification”)

Sometimes I think we as Christians have a tendency to compartmentalize our faith from the rest of our life

(Personal Story) For a very long time, my life was compartmentalized into three categories: God (and anything to do with Him) - Relationships (family, friends, ect.) - & Work

None of these compartments would cross into each other - even my friend groups were kept separate at all costs. But my point is, God, (and my relationship with Him) never bled into my relationships and my work life

When I finally began to understand these parts of my life NEED to have God in them in order for me to be able to truly live life as a Christian, that’s when my relationship with God began to shape the other “compartments” in my life.

Deepening faith requires letting your relationship with God permeate your entire life, rather than confining it to Sunday Worship—faith must infuse all you do to remain vibrant!

We’ve established that deepening faith won’t happen by accident—it requires us to actively pursue God. But what does that pursuit actually look like in practice? It looks like showing up. It looks like cultivating a consistent, daily connection with Christ that becomes the backbone of your spiritual life. Without this consistency, even our best intentions eventually fade.

2.) Cultivate Consistent PERSONAL Connection

Deepening our faith (going deeper, if you will) also requires sustained spiritual practices

Meditating on scripture day and night, rather than merely reading it casually, embeds God’s Word into one’s being

Joshua 1:8 “This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success.”

Drawing near to God involves both initiative and purification—cleansing hands and hearts from divided loyalties

James 4:8 “Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.”

Being rooted and grounded in love, comprehending the breadth and depth of Christ’s love, and being filled with God’s fullness represents the expansive nature of spiritual maturity

Ephesians 3:16–19 “that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.”

Remaining in Christ and staying in close personal fellowship with Him is an active CHOICE, not a passive state of being. The vine and the branches metaphor that Josh taught on a few weeks ago reveals that connection demands ongoing attachment—branches don’t accidentally remain in the vine.

THIS daily practice, of CHOOSING to remain in Christ, is what distinguishes believers who experience God’s POWER — and those who drift into spiritual disconnection. Without this consistent choice, even believers with strong past experiences gradually lose their footing

(Story) How many of you have heard someone say: “I wish God would move like He used to again” - or - “I wish God would take over our services and we’d be in church until midnight again” - or - “I’m just waiting to have a power-encounter again” (or something similar?

It’s a beautiful thing to remember what God did for us in the past, and how He moved for us in the past—but that WILL NOT sustain a believers faith in Christ without daily devotion, and consistent personal connection with Christ

We don’t have to be in a wild church service with people swinging from the chandeliers for you to encounter the creator of the universe!

We don’t have to be in an altar until midnight to approach the throne room of Grace!

We don’t have to have someone else intercede on our behalf to get our need before the Lord

ALL OF THOSE THINGS ARE GREAT AND THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NOTHING WRONG WITH THEM - but the point I’m trying to make is we can’t outsource our relationship with God to our pastors on Sunday morning!

Consistency alone, however, can become mechanical—a spiritual discipline performed out of obligation rather than desire. But what transforms routine connection into something alive and vibrant? It’s passion. When you move from simply maintaining your relationship with God to genuinely craving His presence, everything changes. Consistency becomes effortless because you’re no longer forcing yourself to show up—you’re desperate to be there.

3.) Crave God Passionately

What does it mean to “crave” something? And I’m not talking about craving a milkshake from UDF at midnight like what happens to me on a daily basis

Crave — to feel a deep, intensive desire for something

to long for something deeply

to feel an URGENT pull towards something

to have something be the SOLE FOCUS of your attention until it’s satisfied

The Psalmist in Psalm 63:1-8 sheds some interesting light on this as it relates to God:

Psalm 63:1–8 ESV

O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water. So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary, beholding your power and glory. Because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you. So I will bless you as long as I live; in your name I will lift up my hands. My soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food, and my mouth will praise you with joyful lips, when I remember you upon my bed, and meditate on you in the watches of the night; for you have been my help, and in the shadow of your wings I will sing for joy. My soul clings to you; your right hand upholds me.

The psalmist’s thirst for God mirrors physical desperation in a parched landscape, moving beyond just casual acknowledgement, to passionate longing; craving

Again, we see the Psalmist using this analogy of thirsting after more of God (or craving) in Psalm 42:1–2 “As a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God?”

There’s something interesting about this analogy of THIRSTING after more of God:

Thirst is involuntary and non-negotiable

It operates differently from other desires—it cannot be reasoned with, forgotten, despised, or overcome through willpower alone. It DEMANDS to be heard and cannot be ignored; the entire being of a person must yield to it

Thirst is not a desire you can push aside for very long without literally dying if you don’t satisfy it

When we develop a genuine craving for God, it becomes the driving force that shapes our entire spiritual existence, not merely a casual preference

Outro

Here’s the uncomfortable truth: that distance you feel like is sitting between you and God isn’t His fault. He hasn’t moved. He hasn’t hidden Himself. He hasn’t made Himself harder to find. The gap exists because we’ve created it through our choices, our compromises, and our unwillingness to pay the price for intimacy with Him. And until we’re honest about that, nothing changes.

We want more of God - but we’re not willing to skip out on our favorite show this week for an hour of prayer time in the evening

We want more of God - but we’re not willing to admit to ourselves we have a sin struggle we need to be on our face before the Lord about - so we just avoid God’s presence all together

We want more of God - but we’re not willing to draw firm lines on what we’ll allow ourselves to consume, and the people we’ll allow ourselves to be influenced by

We want more of God - but we want someone else to talk to Him FOR us; to get a Word from God FOR us; to intercede FOR us

You really want more of God? Then go get MORE! You are as close to God as you want to be…

How do you get more?

1.) Seek Him with your entire being

2.) Talk with Him constantly and consistently

3.) CRAVE God and His presence passionately

The question before us isn’t whether deepening faith is possible—Scripture makes that abundantly clear. The question is whether we’re willing to pay the price: the intentionality it demands, the consistency it requires, and the passionate surrender it calls for.

Let’s Pray