Theme: Quiet Expectations
As I listened and pondered Pastor Dan’s sermon yesterday there were two stories that came to mind, one told to me and one which I lived. Each is an example of different phases of hearing and then following God’s “assignments” for our lives, His Will and His action points for His Will. After all, we are now the Body of Christ on this earth, and by the power of the Holy Spirit, are to be His agents.
Before refrigerators, yes, I was born after this and sliced bread, people used icehouses to preserve their food. Icehouses had thick walls, no windows and a tightly fitted door. In the winter, when streams and lakes were frozen, large blocks of ice were cut, hauled to the icehouses and covered in sawdust. Often the ice would last well into the summer, and please don’t ask me what they did down south. One day a worker in the icehouse lost a valuable watch in the sawdust pile. He searched like mad to find it, and even recruited fellow workers to help, but to no avail. After they gave up the search and left for lunch, a young worker quietly went into the icehouse, shut the door, and soon emerged with the watch. When the workers returned, they were amazed that he had found the watch, and asked him how he found it. He replied, “I closed the door, lay down in the sawdust and kept very still. Soon I heard the watch ticking”.
The question is not whether God has a purpose or “assignments” for us and is speaking, but whether we are still enough and quiet enough to hear. Tuning out the world and our own desires to race into action prevent us from hearing His voice.
Now, what happens after we hear God’s assignment for our lives? This is the story lived. After I had prayed for months for God to reveal Himself to me in a very real way, he answered very clearly during a time of quiet prayer in the early morning hours. His answer and His means of showing Himself were clear, “Go to Ukraine”. Nowhere in my right mind or event planner was there anything about going to a country I had never considered visiting in the best of conditions, let alone one in which a war had just begun. What do I do? You see, I knew it was His voice and I knew that this was His answer to my prayers, even though I had never experienced anything like this before. Understand that I am the last person to expect God to specifically answer a prayer with an assignment, as I was always way too busy doing my own things for me to hear God, or even want to hear. His voice, however, was so clear and so direct that I knew I had no choice. Either I follow His Will and direction or risk never hearing Him again in this way. I went.
Once we were reconciled to God by the blood of Jesus Christ, we became His Body, His army. Finally, communication was re-established, and He could hear us and we Him. He now could use us as His Body on this earth to carry out His mission, while also discovering the joy of service for His Glory.
We must learn how He speaks to each of us, and be still, not rushing around fulfilling our own agenda. And once we hear His voice we now must answer and act. Pastor Dan spoke of choices we all have after we hear His Will and direction for us. Either we say, no, later, ignore it, or “Yes, Lord, here I am. Send me”. Do we really have a choice?
Scripture: Psalm 46:10 (NIV)
“Be still and know that I am God”
Prayer
Lord, teach me how to be quiet before you, to be still, patient and with expectations. Let me know that I wasn’t saved and reconciled to you in order to be just a spectator, and that my prayers should be about your Glory and your Will for my life, as your Body in this hostile world. We are not your arms and legs and mouth and ears for nothing and will wither and atrophy if we aren’t moving in you. Lord, provoke me to pray to be used for your Glory, then to be quiet and listen, and then to say like Samuel, “Here I am Lord” when you answer.
Comments