When God Speaks: How to Recognize God’s Voice and Respond in Obedience
Today’s lesson reminded me of the bookmarks we use in our browsers. If you find a place you enjoy, you “bookmark” it so that it is easy to return to. Blackaby talked today about those events that occur in our spiritual lives that we need to recall – key moments that we can turn to for a sense of direction when we are lost on the path.
Interestingly, a couple of the verses he used were the same as the pastors study Sunday night in Joshua.
Joshua 4:4-7 Joshua summoned the twelve men he had appointed from the Israelites, one per tribe. Joshua told them, “Go in front of the ark of the Lord your God to the middle of the Jordan. Each of you is to put a stone on his shoulder, according to the number of the Israelite tribes. The stones will be a reminder to you. When your children ask someday, ‘Why are these stones important to you?’ tell them how the water of the Jordan stopped flowing before the ark of the covenant of the Lord. When it crossed the Jordan, the water of the Jordan stopped flowing. These stones will be a lasting memorial for the Israelites.”
God told Joshua to do this so that generations to follow would have a guidepost, something to recall when they felt lost and abandoned. One of the exercises in today’s study was to pick a person in the Bible from a list of choices, read a passage about it and then answer a couple of questions about the marker or altar that person built as a reminder.
I chose Gideon because it’s been awhile since I read that passage. In the passage, a messenger of the Lord appears before Gideon and tells him that the Lord is with him. Gideon’s answer is so classic, so real.
Judges 6:13 Gideon said to him, “Pardon me, but if the Lord is with us, why has such disaster overtaken us? Where are all his miraculous deeds our ancestors told us about?
That cracks me up because it’s something I’d say. Pardon me, but have you looked at my bank account lately? Pardon me, but did you happen to notice that the house behind you, MY HOUSE, is flooded? Pardon me, but have you not taken the time to fly over the Sudan?
I love that about the Tanach, or, as we Christians tend to call it, the Old Testament. I saw something the other day where a person said that, well, basically the Old Testament is a history book, read it if you want but the New Testament is for today. What bunk. I wanted to scream, have you no clue?
The Tanach is full of character studies (all flawed like me), allegory, some history, foretelling of Christ – how can we relegate it to the bookshelf? It is so full of LIFE! Real people, real problems, real answers. I should have said, Pardon me, but are you illiterate?
But I digress. The point is, use your experience as a reference point. Treasure the special times with God.
Leave a Reply