House Church Talk - God Speaks

[goodwordusa at att.net]

God speaks.  

The universe exists and remains, therefore God speaks, and His Word is able 
to be heard by things having no ears, hearts or minds at all.

But being human, we do get confused about so many things.  Is there anything 
at all that we do not get confused?

 I can walk across a room and when I arrive not know why I went there.  I can 
look at a green light and think it's red -- without being color-blind.  I can 
think that a comment is meant one way, when the speaker really meant 
something else.  I can think one thing and write or speak another.

Our own state of mind, our own preoccupations, our fears, our ideas about 
things, our belief system(s), our desires at any given time -- all this and 
more can keep us from seeing, hearing or thinking clearly.  We’re creatures 
not designed to know and rule the whole universe, or to know “all things” in 
our present state.  We seldom know what to eat for breakfast.

And being fallen, we’re not very accustomed to listening closely to God when 
He speaks.  We do not listen because we seldom plan to obey.  A habit that we 
develop very early in life.

Even as believers, more often than not, the voice of God breaking into our 
busy thoughts, our busy plans, our busy hopes and ambitions and desires (etc. 
& etc) is a distraction, opposing our own thoughts, and even offending us if 
we’re really set on doing whatever it is we already want to do.

But God speaks anyway.  And He often will say things that really challenge us 
in significant ways.  

When Abram was busy mourning his lack of an heir, his old age, and his wife’s 
infertility, God told him the most impossible thing that Abram could have 
heard.  God told him, "Look now toward heaven, and count the stars if you are 
able to number them." And He said to him, "So shall your descendants be."

When The Lord visited with Gideon, who was hiding in a winepress, trying to 
thresh wheat, He told Gideon the very opposite of what Gideon and his family 
were thinking.  God’s message was, "The LORD is with you, you mighty man of 
valor!"

When God told Samuel to anoint David as king in Saul's place, it’s very 
possible that Samuel wondered until his death if maybe he'd made a mistake, 
since only trouble seemed to come from that move.  Had he really heard God 
that time?

And what about Able who was led of God to offer a sacrifice, and who died for 
his trouble.  Or Noah who spent many years building a box big enough for all 
the animals in the world to float in -- many years before there was any hint 
of a flood that could require such a box.  

And what about Jeremiah who prophesied all his life, and was often laughed 
at, thought crazy, or even worse a traitor to Israel.  And even after some of 
his prophetic words came to pass, he was still not believed when he spoke for 
God among the remnants in Jerusalem, and was hauled off to Egypt by the 
unbelieving Jews.

And only trouble seemed to come from those dreams that Joseph had -- 
especially when he told Jacob and the family.  For many years, things just 
got worse and worse and worse.  You can’t get much lower in life than the 
dungeon in Egypt.  How many times did Joseph think that life would have been 
better had the dreams never happened?  Only after many years did he finally 
see God’s true hand in the events of his life.

And another Joseph, many generations later, was also told the opposite of 
what he himself felt and believed.  He was told impossible things.  And the 
result was that he had to flee into Egypt with his wife and her child.  And 
returning, years later, he continued to live far away from Jerusalem.

What about Jesus, our Lord, whose words and actions were almost never 
understood during his time on earth -- not even by those who loved Him and 
believed in Him.  And there is Saul of Tarsus,  When the Lord spoke to 
Ananias about visiting Saul, this godly man felt compelled to remind the Lord 
of who and what Saul was.  

And Peter had to remind the Lord that his lips had never touched any unclean 
thing, when God gave him the vision of all kinds of creatures in Joppa.   But 
long before that, a more interesting situation.  God is giving Ezekiel 
instructions on how to act out the fall and ruin of Jerusalem.  In Ezekiel 
4:9-15, we see God (the Author of the Law of Moses) telling the prophet to 
cook with human dung as fuel.  But Ezekiel protests, that he cannot eat any 
defiled thing, and the Lord relents, allowing him to cook over cow's dung.

And so on.  

In 2 Kings 5, the word of God to Naaman was simply unbelievable and highly 
offensive.  By the same prophet, (2 Kings 7) God spoke to the king of Samaria 
about a sudden reversal of a famine brought on by the siege of the city by 
Syria.  It was unbelievable, and one officer said so.  But outcast 
lepers “had an idea.”  Acting on a “hunch” they walked right into the enemy 
camp -- against all common sense, except the kind that comes down to us from 
heaven when God is directing our steps.  And so the message of God proved 
true and the city was saved.

Jesus rarely told people what they expected to hear, what they wanted to 
hear, or even what they could understand, much less what they could readily 
accept or believe.  Not only was this true before He was crucified, it was 
also the case as soon as He rose again, and even after He had ascended into 
heaven.

How well would we do, telling people -- even good religious people -- that 
the guy we had been following, the criminal who had been executed a number of 
weeks ago, was not only alive, but had also risen by some unseen power or 
force, right up into the sky until no one could see Him anymore?  And then we 
could tell them that He would soon come again right back out of the sky.   
This same guy that everyone had seen in the streets and in the Temple area -- 
that this very man would return to earth, splitting the sky wide open with 
all manner of radiance and power, to rule over all things.

It’s often pretty easy for us to accept what God said and did long, long ago, 
in some other, far away place, among a people we have never known.  That way, 
it's like a nice bedtime story that we might tell our children.  We can see 
the lessons in the story, and its moral.  But it can become very difficult 
for us when we are suddenly placed by the same God in the hot seat.  For now 
we have the same difficulty that those long ago people had to deal with.

We smile to think of Gideon trying hard to believe that this stranger is 
really God or an angel of God.  We may chuckle to think of Joshua challenging 
a man outside of Jericho, and then falling on his face when he learns that 
this “man” is the Captain of God’s hosts come to give the real "battle plan" 
for taking the city.  

But when we’re the ones who must believe God, when we are hearing God and 
trying to make up our minds if this could really be God -- the living God who 
rules all the universe -- speaking with us -- with me, right here and now?

The most troubling thing, for me, about the voice of God in my life, is that 
I know with all that I am, that it is the Lord.  And He rarely intervenes in 
some clear way, some obvious way, just to tell me to have a nice day.  

For God break in and speak in an absolute way -- where there is no mistaking 
His voice -- often means that I have already ignored the "still, small voice" 
that should have directed me into His will.  I have ignored the gentle 
leading of His Spirit, the unseen and unheard prodding & prompting of my 
heart -- or worse, I have been ignoring the very clear teachings of Scripture.

Anyone at all can and will hear God's voice.  Not just prophets and terribly 
important saints of God.  To hear the voice of God does not mean that you are 
spiritual or obedient or godly at all.  It does not even mean that you are 
physically alive.  It simply means that you exist -- that you're either a 
living creature, or a dead one waiting to be raised up again.

Likewise, to speak clearly what God wants you to say, as we all should know, 
could even mean that you are a donkey or a mule.  It does not mean that 
you’re godly or more spiritual than others.  Even Balaam, a man eaten up with 
greed and treachery was able to speak the profound truths -- by God's Spirit -
- words still appreciated and quoted very often today.  

Words like, "God is not a man, that He should lie, nor a son of man, that He 
should repent. Has He said, and will He not do? Or has He spoken, and will He 
not make it good?" (Num 23:19)

Fear God and do not think to add to His words.  Do the best you can to honor 
the Lord in all that you do and say -- following the words and examples and 
teachings of Scripture.  Never wrest the words of Scripture around to please 
yourself or to try and approve your own actions, ideas, or feelings.  Never 
think of yourself as "the one person” in your family, your area, or your 
fellowship, who hears and knows God.  Always remember that the Lord can use 
anyone and anything to get His will across and to accomplish His purposes.

The above would be my advice to anyone who wonders if God is speaking to 
them.  Because He is always speaking, I believe, to all of us -- to the 
saints and to the sinners.  

The real question is: Who is listening to the voice of God?  

Who spends time alone with God, just to receive His good counsel, and to know 
His good will?  Who seeks God for Himself, to simply have God's Presence -- 
and not always to get some answer, some gift, some miracle or sign from God?  
Who loves God and pants after His good Presence with all their heart?

The Lord knows that I myself am often guilty of wanting some THING from God, 
and I seldom take to heart how wonderful it is just to know Him, just to be 
alone with Him, to have the Lord Himself and nothing else.  May the Lord 
forgive me for so often being as hard-hearted and unbelieving as any unsaved 
sinner walking the earth.

Even so, the Lord is gracious and kind to us all, and He woos each of us ever 
closer to Himself. And in Him, under His wing, we have perfect shelter in 
every difficulty of life and death.  In Him we have peace and joy 
forevermore.  In the Lord is abundant goodness and mercy to go around for 
every human soul that thirsts and hungers for more of Him.

And so we sometimes become aware that we have heard the voice of God.

Jim