Every Friday during this season of Advent, the group I’m meeting with comes to the time called, The Inquiry. Each week, one by one, we attempt to answer the question, “How would you like to grow in your relationship with God this next week?”

What a good question! Maybe good enough to be addressed daily instead of weekly? Maybe good enough for us to address prayerfully every morning? Or, maybe good enough to give it a grand answer and set your life’s course around it. A good question indeed.

This week I realized my usual answers weren’t actually appropriate to the question. I was using different words but generally speaking, all my answers could be lumped under, “I would like to do more of the things that I should and less of the things I shouldn’t.” It occurred to me that answers such as this aren’t really addressing how to grow in a meaningful relationship. Doing more good stuff and less bad stuff probably comes from the place in me that wants to feel worthy of God’s love. Doing more good and less bad would be a better fit if the question was, “What can I do to get God to love me more?” and the answer to that question is, nothing. There isn’t anything we can do to get God to love us more.

In that case, seeking to grow in relationship with God begins with the knowledge that we are known and loved right now. The foundation of our relationship is that we can trust that no matter what happens or what we do, God isn’t going to desert us. We are a delight in God’s eyes. How in the next week, are we going to grow in that relationship?

Just as there are many ways to grow in our human relationships, there are many tried and true practices that can serve as pathways to a better relationship with God. The key is to remember that we are invited to walk those paths without masks. We can bring those things that we wish everybody knew about us, and we can bring those things that we hope no one will ever find out, all openly and without fear.

So again I ask, how would you like to grow in your relationship with God in this next week, today, in this lifetime?