Making the Right Choice
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We make a thousand choices every day, beginning from the first moment our eyes open.
Will I get up now?
Or will I stay in bed a little longer?
Will I drink one cup of coffee or two?
Creamer or black?
Breakfast or not?
Check my email?
Facebook?
Twitter?
Shower?
Wash my hair?
Read my Bible?
Meditate?
Exercise?
In fact, our ability to choose is one of the ways that we are made in the image of God and it is one of the things that has confounded mankind for centuries. Why would God give us the ability – and the right- to choose incorrectly? Why would God allow us to make choices that would harm us – even to the extent of choosing heaven or hell? Well, that is a theological debate for another day – or not – I’ll choose later:)
I’ve often heard it said we make our own choices, and then those choices make us. How painfully true I’ve found that to be at times! But on the flip side, our good choices make room for a good results in our lives.
Love of God
By · CommentsLove of God – Has it captured your heart?
I could paint with a broad stroke and speak of His love for all humanity. I could talk about the affection of God as it relates to the Church. Those aspects of God’s love form an important framework, but what we all long to know – or perhaps to know increasingly -is the love of God for each of us individually.
And lest you think that is selfish, let me assure you that that is precisely what God wants for you! God has moved from the beginning of time to insure that any who wanted, could have a very personal relationship with Him and receive the affections of His heart.
As a child, when I first committed my life to God through Christ, I was looking to escape judgment. I came to the foot of the cross in fear. I was motivated more by the fear of God than the love of God. Yet the longer I walk with God, the more my understanding of Him becomes relational. The more I have come to know Him, the more I understand that our relationship is anchored in love and the less I am motivated in immature ways by my fear of God.
Tuning into the Voice of God, pt. 2
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Having been in ministry for more than 26 years, I can’t count the number of times someone has asked me how they can hear the voice of God. On the other hand, I probably couldn’t count the number of times I have listened to believers tell me about how they heard God on a subject when it was so obvious to me that the voice they had heard was not God’s. And certainly I have wrestled at times to discern what God was saying.
Is it really that complicated? Doesn’t God want us to be able to hear Him? We often believe that God wants to speak to us but feel totally inept at knowing what to do in a given situation. How then do we hear the voice of God?
Let’s begin with the basics and go on from there.
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God speaks.
From the very beginning, God spoke. Actually it was His voice that spoke everything into existence. The Spirit hovered and God spoke. When mankind was created, God blessed them and SPOKE to them. He clearly laid out their purpose – fruitfulness, multiplication, dominion- and He clearly laid out their boundaries. He SPOKE these things to Adam and Eve.
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Satan also speaks.
Gen. 3:1 He said to the woman….
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Satan’s voice tempts us to question God’s voice.
Has God really said…?
Tuning into the Voice of God
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God, the author of communication, speaks in a million different ways. We, as His people, have to learn to listen to His voice. One of the sweet ways that I have learned to hear God is by tuning in to what I hear “in my Spirit” as I awaken in the mornings.
For example, on Saturday, just as I was opening my eyes I heard, “The steps of a good man (or woman) are ordered by the Lord.” Knowing that oftentimes my mind is quiet in my awakening moments and I am able at that moment to hear freely from God’s Spirit, I sensed God was speaking to me. Therefore I pondered that verse from Psalm 37 all that day. As I went about my day, I asked God to order my steps and I was alert to the idea that God had some particular things in mind for me that day. I got a pedicure. I wondered if my steps were destined to cross the technician’s path. I listened for more direction from God as I had conversation with a young girl from Vietnam. As I waited in the line at Wal-Mart and felt frustrated at the clerk for being slow, I remembered that God was ordering my steps and I suddenly was alert to what God might want for that moment.
Hope Against Hope
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Hopelessness leaves a man or woman frozen in despair.
