There are times when I’m thoroughly convinced that I’ve heard clearly from God. Without mistake. It’s as if he shouted in my ear exactly what fork in the road to take. Like when he handed Moses the tablets of stone and wrote on them himself.
There are other times when I barely hear a whisper but know it’s his still small voice.
And then… I’m not sure if I hear, but think I do, yet it’s more like silence. I proceed convincing myself it’s the right choice.
But….
Ok, we’re not talking about going off the grid to senselessness and sin. It’s decisions that we’re not likely to find written anywhere, including the Bible. Sorta like, what vacation should we take this year, do we visit my daughter in Colorado during the spring or the fall. Or, like recently, do we trade in two older cars with high mileage for an eight-year-old one that’s nicer but with much less wear and tear on it?
You know – the decisions we rarely pray about, and we should, because God cares about all of them (a foreign concept for me until the last decade or so).
Yes, it’s hard to fathom but he cares about every single decision we make; except maybe what color socks I wear today. But I definitely must match the belt with the shoes. Everybody knows that.
So….
We brought home the new used car and took it to the garage to get checked and found out it was in a severe front-end collision where the axle needed replaced and a whole bunch of other surprises. None of which showed up on Carfax (buyer beware when it comes to Carfax). We never would have bought the car had we known.
Uh-oh….
Did I hear right? This is a disaster. Was that really you God, or me wanting to hear it was time to get our vehicle more current and upsized, so we don’t get stuck later with a big repair bill and wished we’d have done it when the opportunity arose? See the logic?
I’m still not sure, even though the end of the story is a workaround where the dealer takes the car back and finds us another one, but it ends up costing us more. Doesn’t sound like a sound decision, does it?
Or maybe it was God showing us how important a no clear answer is, so the next time, when it’s a 10 on a scale of 1-10, that we’ll sit tight and let him lead the way.
I’m not going to pretend I know the mind of God, but I believe I can. At least that’s what the Bible teaches.
“Yet among the mature we do impart wisdom, although it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to pass away. But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed before the ages for our glory. None of the rulers of this age understood this, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. But, as it is written,
‘What no eye has seen, nor ear heard,
nor the heart of man imagined,
what God has prepared for those who love him’—
these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. For who knows a person’s thoughts except the spirit of that person, which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God. And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual.
The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. The spiritual person judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one. ‘For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?’ But we have the mind of Christ.” (I Corinthians 2:6-16, ESV)
And you say wait, Steve. That’s referring to deep spiritual truths, not everyday life. I’m not so sure about that. God cares about every single thing that we care about, and some.
Was that really you God? Keep asking until you know. He will answer; if we wait on him.
By Steve Adams
