In order to experience all that God has for us as His people, we need fresh glimpses of who He is in all His glory and greatness.  After all the biggest tragedy we can experience in our own lives is to forget about God and who He is.  We can be like Peter who when he was walking on the water to meet Jesus, and take our eyes off Him and become preoccupied with the swirl of the wind and waves and everything else around us. 

Since God is the only One who can reveal Himself to us, these glimpses of God always channeled through His Word and His Spirit.  How should we access God and His Word?  Certainly, there is a place for our own personal reading and study.  But we also need to take advantage of the insights of others who often have seen truths we haven’t discovered yet.  None of us have all the insights or understanding we need to live as God would have us.  Thus, we need to seek out God-centered and Spirit-anointed preaching and teaching, as well as books and other resources. 

At the same time, we need to take advantage of prayer and the ministry of the Holy Spirit in the lives of God’s people.  Prayer is a special resource God has given us.  Not only is He a great and sovereign Gd, but He also specifically invites us to make our requests known to Him.  The Apostle Paul describes this hope this way in Philippians 4:6-7, “do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.  And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”  What better request can we make than that God would help us learn more about Him and help us grow in our relationship with Him?

But the Holy Spirit normally works in connection with prayer in helping us grow and experience all that God has for us.  Paul reminds us in 1 Corinthians 2:12, “Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God” (italics added).  We need all the help we can get.  But God also tells us that He will give us the help we need.  The Apostle Peter explains this reality this way in 2 Peter 1:3-4, “His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire” (italics added).

But still we need to choose to take advantage of the resources God has made available to us through Christ and the Holy Spirit.  And we do this through faith—even as we try to seek learn from others in the faith who are further along in various ways than we are.  Spiritual growth needs to become one of the priorities of our own lives.  We need to study and learn as if our lives depended upon it—because it does.  After all, this is the only way we can be growing ourselves, the most effective way we can bless others around us, and the way we can most glorify God in our own lives.  To Him be the glory.