December 15, 2018

Listen for Him

“For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

– Genesis 3:5

“Son of man, say to the ruler of Tyre, ‘This is what the Sovereign LORD says:

‘“In the pride of your heart you say, “I am a god; I sit on the throne of a god in the heart of the seas.”

But you are a mere mortal and not a god, though you think you are as wise as a god.”’ – Ezekiel 28:2

From the very beginning, we’ve been trying to pretend we’re like God. We think we can be smart and know all things. Arrogance and the devil tells us we can.

We can’t, of course. Just as the serpent led Eve to destruction, so will he lead us to destruction as well. It’s that arrogance that tells us to disregard God’s rules and focus on our own wants and desires.

I was in a church meeting recently where a controversial topic was being discussed. We weren’t making decisions or even voicing personal opinions. We were there to learn about the various options and what they might mean for us two months from now.

That said, body language clearly revealed the sides that are forming. It is not going to be pleasant. Some people have set their beliefs in stone. They’ll gladly pull out Scripture to back those beliefs up. Both sides, I might add.

That’s how it is with controversy. Everyone thinks they know God’s true will better than anyone else. We tell ourselves that over and over again. It helps us stand firm in what we believe, whether it is truly God’s will or not

The hard truth is that some things make us uncomfortable. We don’t want to read what God says about welcoming foreigners into our land. We’d rather pull out the passage about obeying the law. Which is right and which is wrong? Maybe both views are right and both views are wrong.

Our churches are facing some hard issues. There are no easy answers. But there are a few basic things we should remember. God is love, would be the first thing. Jesus told us the greatest commandment was to love God above all else and the second was to love our neighbors as ourselves. When we get those two things in the correct order, everything else falls into place.

Before we left that day, one committee member said something really basic and totally true. He told everyone not to spend the next two months fretting over what might or might not happen. He suggested that instead we spend that time in prayer, asking the Holy Spirit to provide discernment and for the delegates to be led to vote however God would have them vote.

We don’t know what’s the best direction in this situation, no matter how much we might think we do. We aren’t God. What we don’t know far outweighs what we think we do know.

My friend offered all of us wise advice. The question now is whether we can get over ourselves long enough to actually pray and listen for God’s voice or whether we’re going to be so focused on what we “know” that we miss Him in the midst of it all.

May 1, 2018

We Can Say No

Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?” – Genesis 3:1

We are good at rationalizing our choices, aren’t we? It’s a trap that leads us to a place we never intended to go. We fall for it all the time.

First, it’s the voice that asks us if the Bible really says what we think it says. Surely the pastor didn’t mean we should deprive ourselves of something we really want. God wants good things for us and we would really enjoy a new toy or vacation or outfit.

We could take it to the Bible. We could pray and ask God to reveal to us what He really said. We could seek His wisdom. But we’d really rather not. Why? Because what if God doesn’t tell us what we want to hear?

We want to follow God when it comes to blessings. We want to seek His will so long as His will conforms to ours. We aren’t so quick to follow His plan when we don’t really understand or agree with Him.

Ah. There it is. We don’t always want what God wants for us. We want to be the god of our own lives. We want to do what we want to do and we want God to, in turn, bless it all and give us loads and loads of riches and great success.

Did you feel just a twinge of conviction when you read that? Good. It’s a first step in getting your life in complete alignment with God’s will.

Notice that the serpent (Satan) didn’t directly attack God when he first approached Eve. She would have seen right through that. His words were subtle, seeds planted to make her question if God really had Eve’s best interest in His mind.

The conversation continued. Eve told the serpent what God had said. And Satan responded. Satan always responds when we try to resist.

“You will not certainly die,” the serpent said to the woman. “For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

– Genesis 3:4

We want to be like God, don’t we? We want to know what’s best for us. We want to control our own destiny. We want our will to be our first priority. We want what we want when we want it. Surely God can see that we deserve only good in our lives.

When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. – Genesis 3:6

Eve got what she wanted. Her eyes were opened, as were Adam’s, and life changed forever. I wonder how much time she spent wishing she’d never listened to the serpent. I wonder if she truly regretted a decision she couldn’t undo. I wonder if she ever thought she’d just give anything if she’d said no and walked away.

How many times in your life have you thanked God for saying no? Sometimes hindsight reveals that what we thought we wanted, what we just knew we had to have, wasn’t really good for us. It could be a relationship, a job, an opportunity that looked so very enticing.

When God says no, there’s a reason for it. When we push forward anyway, there are consequences. Sometimes there’s nothing really wrong with what we want – it’s just that God has something better planned for us. Sometimes God sees how we’ll get tangled up in something we never intended and that mess will lead us where we really don’t want to go.

Here’s the thing: We can say no. We can walk away. We can follow God even when the world tells us to go a different way. It’s your choice. What are you going to do?