Friendship With God by Pastor Dolapo Lawal: MP3 Download & Sermon Notes

The Tabernacle of Meeting

Exodus 33:7–11

Moses took his tent and pitched it outside the camp, far from the camp, and called it the tabernacle of meeting. When people say they go to the mountain to pray, they are not saying God lives on a mountain — they are saying God is found in the secret place. Separation is the principle.

When a minister takes twenty-four hours, sometimes two days, separating himself before a significant meeting — praying in the Spirit, staying in the word — the content taught may be identical to what he always teaches. But there is an extra dimension of confirmation and power when he returns. That is the power of separation.

The phone is a powerful tool for information, but it can rob the secret place. Recording yourself praying. Filming worship moments. That device can displace the altar if care is not taken.

Determine where God will meet you. Set a place. Name it.

Moses determined where God would meet him, and God was faithful to that place. A consecrated space — even a chair in a room — becomes a portal over time. It is easier to rebuild an altar than to build a new one. If a person steps away for a season and returns to that place of consecration, spiritual activity picks up as though it never stopped.

Genesis records that in Genesis 12:8 and Genesis 13:3, Abraham was building altars near Bethel — before Jacob ever arrived there. When Jacob rested his head on that stone and God met him in Genesis 28:19, he named it Bethel — house of God — but the place had been a portal long before. His father's altar had crumbled. The stones were scattered. Jacob gathered them to rest his head. But God was still faithful to that portal, because men had built there before.

Face to Face — Understanding the Idiom

Exodus 33:11 — The Lord spoke to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend.

That phrase is an idiom, not a description of literal sight. Exodus 33:20 itself confirms this — God says no man can see his face and live. So face to face is describing relational closeness, not optical vision.

An idiom is a phrase whose meaning cannot be derived from its literal words. Deuteronomy 10:16 speaks of circumcising the foreskin of the heart. Psalm 17:8 speaks of the apple of God's eye. Ephesians 1:18 speaks of the eyes of understanding. None of these are literal.

The phrase "face to face" in Exodus 33:11 describes the unique intimacy and clarity of communication Moses had with God — not that he saw the invisible essence of the Father. John 1:18 confirms: no one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son has declared him — meaning revealed him, made him known — as Father.

God is not God's name. God is an office. The God referred to in John 1:18 is the Father. It takes a son to give a revelation of a father. The only way it can be known that someone is a father is when he has a son.

What Moses Had and What He Lacked

Moses had friendship with God but lacked nature. He had relationship — remarkable, intimate relationship — but the nature of God, the Spirit of God, was not on the inside of him. That is what he was asking for when he said, "Show me your face." 2 Corinthians 4:6 reveals it:

God who commanded light to shine out of darkness has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

God's face is the face of grace. The grace of God is the outpouring of the Spirit.

Moses saw God's back — not his face. He had relations but lacked nature. What God ultimately died for was to restore fellowship. The reason sin had to be atoned for was so that humanity could return to fellowship. What Adam lost in the garden was not only life — he lost access. He was sent out. The perfect fellowship was severed.

The Foundation of Friendship — What We Have in Common with God

Friendship, as C.S. Lewis describes it, is not two people facing each other. That is romantic love — eros. Friendship — philia, the root of Philadelphia, brotherly love — is two people standing side by side, not looking at each other, but looking together at the same thing. The connection is not the people themselves. The connection is a shared interest. They look at the same thing and one says to the other: you too. I get you.

When we speak of friendship with God, we are describing standing side by side with God, looking at the same things, saying: I get you.

The question then is: what can a sinful human being possibly have in common with God — such that we can look at something together and say you too?

Three things:

1. The Image of God

   Man was made in the image and after the likeness of God. That image is not form — the God of Genesis 1 had no physical form. The image is Christ. 2 Corinthians 4:4 identifies Christ as the image of God. Colossians 1:15 calls him the image of the invisible God. Hebrews 1:3 calls him the express image of God's person. Man was made to reflect the son within the Godhead. Humanity is not synonymous with sin — Adam was human before sin entered. We are derivatives, not sources.

2. The Trinity — God's Fellowship Nature

   God is triune. Elohim in Genesis 1 is plural. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. God has never been alone. God does not merely have fellowship; fellowship is integral to who God is. The Godhead exists in perfect union — three persons who always want the same thing, always say the same thing, never out of sync. Their oneness is not a merger of persons — it is perfect agreement. The will of the Father is the will of the Son. At the cross, for the first time in eternity, the Father and Son were not in sync. Father, why have you forsaken me? That pain cannot be comprehended — a union of eternal bliss broken for a single moment to restore friendship with humanity. As Augustine noted: if God were only one person, his first action would have been power. But since God is three in one, God at his core is love, relationship, and friendship. God wants to be your friend more than you want to be his.

3. The Incarnation and Redemption

   John 15:13 — Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one's life for his friends. He was not only dying — he was dying for friends. At the core of redemption was the restoration of people who believe into friendship with God. In the incarnation, God gives humanity an invitation to perfect friendship. When God experienced betrayal, rejection, and death, humanity gets to look at him and say: you too. And he gets to say back: I get you. In his resurrection, looking at the same enemy — death and sin — they are overcome together. He came to be like us. Now, in the friendship, we become like him.

Friendship Through Obedience

John 15:14 — You are my friends if you do whatever I command you.

Why does God connect friendship to obedience? Because friendship means being alike. You do not choose your father. You do not choose your child. But you choose your friends — and you choose them because you are alike. Obedience is the pathway to becoming like him, to conforming to how the friendship requires us to be.

The commandments are not burdensome. They are designed to better a person — to conform them to what they were created to be, so that perfect synergy with God becomes possible.

Abraham was God's friend. That means if God was doing business and judgment, Abraham had standing — he was a stakeholder. Jesus himself illustrated this in the story of the rich man and Lazarus, where Abraham is a figure of authority in the afterlife. God's friend carries that weight.

Our Friendship Begins Where Moses Left Off

Moses had friendship with God and was still asking for more. Our friendship with God begins from the more he was asking for. He lacked the nature — the indwelling Spirit. We begin there. What Moses desired as a destination is our starting point.

The enemy tries to convince people that what they have in Christ is only sweet words. But God who called Abraham his friend, and corrected Moses, and struck Miriam with leprosy for speaking against his friend — that God sees his people the same way.

It is possible to walk with God so closely that even angels know you by name — not because of what you did, but because of who you fellowshipped with.

Enoch walked with God. One day God said: I do not want to go back. Come with me. And Enoch entered heaven full body. That was not a religious achievement. It was the fruit of a life spent fellowshipping with the Divine.

How to Be Friends with God

• Obedience — Not as servants following orders, but as friends who think alike. The obedience of friendship is the obedience of shared nature.
• Invest in the friendship — A person cannot only reach out to a friend when they need something. God says to certain people: you weary me with your complaints. Their prayer is always petition — always look at my side, remember me, go there for me. Friendship is standing side by side looking at what God is looking at. Ask what is on his heart. Look at what he is looking at together.
• Cultivate a constant consciousness — Not setting aside a seat in the car for Jesus. But a constant awareness: thank you Jesus, glory to Jesus. That consciousness renews the mind. It interrupts arguments, displaces frustration, and keeps the spirit tuned.

The Prodigal and the Father's Running

In the parable of the prodigal son, there is a cultural layer worth noting. When someone left a community having squandered what was given to them, that community had a practice: if they saw the person returning, they would run toward them, break a pot in front of them, and declare them unwelcome. The father ran toward his son — not as pure emotion only — but to reach him before anyone else could enact that rejection. He did not give his son room to doubt that he was accepted.

God does not give room to doubt acceptance.

Our love for God is not self-generated. It is the overflow of the revelation of God's love for us. That revelation — comprehended and received — produces our love in return. Many people cannot say with confidence: I believe God likes me. That confidence, received and settled, is the beginning of the friendship Jesus died to restore.

Father, let the revelation of your love sit in our hearts. Let us see ourselves the way you see us — in the beloved. You loved Jesus so much and yet crushed him for us. That is the measure. Let that love become real to us — not merely believed as doctrine, but received as experience. In Jesus' name.