Not Your Formula: What a ‘Personal Relationship with Jesus’ Really Means

Reflecting on a Phrase That Shaped—and Shackled—My Faith

By LONNIE KING

There’s a phrase I heard my entire life growing up in evangelical circles: “a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.”

For the longest time, I thought nothing of it, except to try and conform to the ideas of what I was led to believe it was.

It was used like a spiritual litmus test. It wasn’t just about whether you believed in God or went to church—it was a way to draw a line between people who really knew Jesus and those who didn’t.

But over time, I began to notice something odd.

For a phrase that’s supposed to describe something personal, there sure seemed to be a lot of rules about what it was supposed to look like.

The Evangelical Standard of ‘Personal’

The irony of the phrase is that it suggests individuality, but often demands conformity. Once someone claimed to have a personal relationship with Jesus, the assumption was that their life would now follow a predictable template: regular church attendance, a daily quiet time, tithing, voting Republican, listening to Christian radio, and being suspicious of people who didn’t do the same.

And if your version of a personal relationship with Jesus didn’t fit that mold?

Then maybe you didn’t really know him after all.

What Real Personal Relationships Look Like

Here’s the fallacy in all of that: I have personal relationships with many people—my wife, my children, my friends, coworkers, even casual acquaintances.

And not a single one of those relationships looks the same.

More to the point: lots of people have relationships with me—and none of those look exactly alike either.

So why would we expect that everyone’s relationship with Jesus would follow the same formula?

My relationships are built on different experiences, shaped by different seasons of life, and expressed in different ways. Some are loud and playful. Others are quiet and thoughtful. Some thrive on frequent interaction, while others pick up seamlessly after long stretches of silence.

And more than that—genuine relationships aren’t always polished or predictable. Sometimes we laugh together. Sometimes we argue. Sometimes we say things we regret.

We ask hard questions. We express disappointment. We challenge each other. We confess fears. We even go through stretches of silence, not because we’ve stopped caring, but because life is complicated and so are people.

The beauty of a personal relationship, at least the way I’ve come to understand it, is the freedom to engage in raw, honest, unedited ways. We show up as we are, not as who someone else thinks we should be. There’s room for silence, for wrestling, for weeping, for celebration.

That kind of depth and emotional variety doesn’t generally fit into the evangelical definition of what a relationship with Jesus is supposed to look like. But I think it should.

Faith Beyond the Template

I’ve walked away from a lot of the structure, doctrine, and expectations that used to define my faith. I no longer attend church.

I’ve stopped parroting theological talking points that don’t hold up under honest scrutiny. I’ve left behind labels that used to make me feel secure.

But I haven’t walked away from Jesus.

If anything, I’ve stopped trying to make my relationship with him look like someone else’s, and I’ve started to trust that personal really does mean personal.

My connection to the divine isn’t dead—it’s different. More honest. Less performative. More rooted in lived experience than religious obligation.

Why the Language Still Matters

I’m not trying to throw out the phrase entirely. At its best, “a personal relationship with Jesus” points to something beautiful: a faith that isn’t transactional or mediated solely by religious institutions. A connection that can’t be reduced to rules or rituals.

But language matters. And when we take something that should be freeing and use it to judge, exclude, or demand uniformity, we twist it into something else entirely.

In the hands of the modern evangelical movement, this phrase has been used not as a gateway to intimacy with God, but as a gatekeeping tool to determine who’s “in” and who’s not.

It’s been used to shame people who didn’t fit the mold. To bully those who dared to question. To ostracize those whose lives didn’t conform to white, male-dominated, middle-class church culture.

Let’s be real: your relationship with Jesus might look different if you’re LGBTQ, or a person of color, or a disenfranchised woman.

It might look different if you’re more concerned with universal justice than nationalistic protectionism.

It might look different if you’ve been wounded by religion but still cling to some thread of hope in the teachings of Jesus.

That difference should be celebrated, not condemned.

But evangelicals have been tacitly allowed to co-opt the phrase and weaponize it. And in doing so, they’ve distorted it.

What could have been a source of healing for millions has too often become a source of spiritual trauma.

It doesn’t have to stay that way.

The Relationship Evolves, and That’s Okay

Like any meaningful relationship, my connection with Jesus has changed over time. It’s grown quieter in some ways, louder in others. I don’t always know how to define it—but I know it’s still there.

And if there’s one thing I believe about grace, it’s this: it meets us where we are, not where someone else thinks we’re supposed to be.

Because evangelicals have been allowed to co-opt this term—and others like it—I’ve found myself actively avoiding that language. Not because it doesn’t still carry meaning for me, but because I worry that if I use it, people will lump me in with a movement I no longer align with.

That’s not fair.

It’s not fair that I can’t talk openly about wrestling with faith, or finding quiet comfort in the moments that surprise me, or questioning so-called “non-negotiables,” without someone assuming I’ve fallen off the spiritual wagon.

It’s not fair that I can’t give thanks without wondering if someone thinks I’m parroting a partisan prayer.

I mean—Donald Trump literally thanked God after bombing Iran. At this point, even saying “God is good” in public feels like a political statement.

But here’s the truth: we all deserve the security of knowing our relationship is real, whether anyone else condones it, recognizes it, or even understands it.

And we all deserve the ability—and the desire—for that relationship to evolve and grow over time.

So, if you’ve been told your relationship with Jesus doesn’t count because it doesn’t look like theirs—keep going.

And if you’ve decided not to call it that at all, because it sounds like ‘Christianese’, that’s okay too.

You’re not off course. You may just be learning how to walk your own road.