Friendship with God

You are my friends...I chose you. John 15:15-16

How do we cultivate any friendship? By spending time together with those to whom we are attracted. There are stages of building any relationship, beginning with getting acquainted, which is a bit awkward, through friendliness, which is more pleasant; to friendship, which is a commitment; to various levels of union and unity that restore the state of intimacy that we lost symbolically in the Garden of Eden. Here we are under the influence of unconscious drives of various intensity that in turn influence our decisions and relationships with other people and foul them up...Contemplative prayer is a deepening of faith that moves beyond thoughts and concepts. One just listens to God, open and receptive to the divine presence in one's inmost being as its source. One listens not with a view to hearing something, but with a view to becoming aware of the obstacles to one's friendship with God.

Remove every obstacle out of the way of My people. Isaiah 57:14