Category: God’s Voice

Fearing God Openly

I remember years ago, when I was old enough to sit in church without being right beside my parents, that sometimes the temptation to misbehave was more than I could bear.  Maybe I was sitting with my sisters or with friends when a fit of laughter would overcome us, or we would pass those infamous notes back and forth between us.  Suddenly I would hear it…the sound of a man clearing his throat.  But this wasn’t just any man.  This was my dad, and that familiar clearing of his throat carried a clear message to me. 

He was telling me that I better turn from my wicked ways, so to speak, and straighten up and listen to the preacher!  If I didn’t, I knew that I would answer to Dad when we got home.  And that my accounting would not be pleasant was guaranteed!

Did I fear my dad?  You bet I did in that moment!  But it wasn’t a fear born of any hatred from…or for…my dad.  Instead, it was a fear that came from my dad’s love for me, and my deep love and respect for him.  He loved me enough to teach me to do right, even if it meant he had to discipline me when I disobeyed.  

I have been studying through the book of Ecclesiastes.  Solomon spent much time pondering life’s puzzling questions.  There was so much he didn’t understand about how the wicked seemed to prosper or how unfair life sometimes was. 

But there was a truth that Solomon held onto by conviction and strong faith.  He stated it in Ecclesiastes 8:12-13:

“Although a sinner does evil a hundred times and may lengthen his life, still I know that it will be well for those who fear God, who fear Him openly.  But it will not be well for the evil man and he will not lengthen his days like a shadow, because he does not fear God.”

What does it mean for me to fear God?  How does that look in my daily life?  

I love what William Barrick says:  “A true God-fearer lives with a full awareness of the omnipresence of the omniscient and omnipotent God.  He or she goes through life more conscious of what God thinks or knows, rather than of what people might think or know.”

We are bombarded today with what many people think or know…or think they know, as is often the case.  

Sometimes the pressure to conform to our culture is strong, and at other times it’s quietly insidious.  I know some wonderful people who are living lifestyles that are directly opposed to what God says.  It’s easy to condone them because I love them, or I am drawn in by their sincerity and kindness.  

But I, as a follower of Christ, must be conscious of what God thinks…of what He clearly says in scripture as to what is right or wrong.

Peer pressure is as sharp in my life today as it was when I was a teenager.  I don’t want to appear mean in any way.  And I shouldn’t be.  

But sometimes today we are told we are hateful if we don’t fully embrace lifestyles or actions that God clearly defines as sin.  Yet God says that those who do live in sin are living that way because they do not fear God.

I believe this is what it means to “fear God openly.”  It means to stand strong for truth…GOD’S truth…even if all around us are those who do otherwise.  We stand for God because we fear Him out of our love and respect for Him.

But more importantly, because of His great and eternal love for us who are His children.

Sometimes I think of God clearing His throat when I start misbehaving…when I stray into thoughts or activities that He knows are wrong.  I need to straighten up at His urging and turn from what He is telling me is wrong.  

God loves me even more than my dad did all those years ago.  

And that’s a lot!

Don’t Listen to the Loudest

When we moved to this home nearly 23 years ago, we lived in a semi-country setting.  Across the highway from us were farmer’s fields.  In fact, there were fields both to the west and east of us.  Things sure have changed over time.  There are several big new schools just over a mile from us, and across the highway the farmer’s field is gone.  Instead of tractors and combines there, now we see…and hear…all sorts of construction equipment as a huge housing development is being built. 

All the growth has brought lots of extra traffic.  Our property backs up to the highway.  We have a tree line that gives some privacy.  But there isn’t much that can hide the sights and the sounds of growth…progress, some would call it.  We miss the quietness, though, that we loved.

It’s now the time of year for open windows and chirping birds.  I was at my desk early this morning.  The birds were waking up, going about their early morning activities, and their various sounds were so pleasing to me. 

Yet the birds weren’t the only ones busily starting their day.  So were people.  Pretty soon I was having a hard time hearing the birds over the sound of all the cars and trucks and school buses and motorcycles. 

The birds hadn’t stopped singing, though.  I could still hear them even when a group of vehicles drove past.  I just had to concentrate on listening to them and ignoring the other sounds coming from the road. 

I’m amazed at the very loud sounds blasting us from this culture today.  Woke Disney.  Gender confusion.  Sexual dysfunction.  Open borders.  Drugs.  Violent crime.  Men in women’s sports…and the refusal of our top leaders to even define what a woman is!

And one of the saddest of all is the horror of abortion and the fight from the left to keep the murder of babies available and legal.  Yesterday the governor of Colorado signed a bill that ensured women could kill their babies at any stage of pregnancy, for any reason.  My friend who lives there, a pediatrician, said that this action is celebratory now…and she is right. 

All of this, and so much more, is just heavy and sickening to those of us who follow Christ.  And the voices who promote these lifestyles in our world today are often the loudest.  They blast at us from the news, social media, corporations, movies, music, television, classrooms…daring us to disagree and trying to silence us when we do.

A couple verses I have just studied describe this so well:

“But evil men and imposters will proceed from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived.  You, however, continue in the things you have learned and become convinced of…”   (II Timothy 3: 13-14)

Paul told Timothy to expect evil to get worse.  Alfred Plummer says it well when he described their personal deterioration as the seducers being duped by their own deceit. 

And so the evil ones GO, but Timothy is told to CONTINUE.

Evil loudly goes from bad to worse.  Isn’t it interesting that the word ‘go’ means to progress?

 Progressives today are nothing new.  But their direction…their progress…is totally in the wrong direction. 

Unlike the progress of the wicked, we who know Christ are to continue in the things we have learned from Christ.

We learn by listening to God, for He has not been silenced.  He is still speaking, just like the birds outside were still singing.

We also need to continue in all that we know…that we have learned…in our life walks with God.

The word “continue” means to cultivate stability.

The brash noises of sin all around us being condoned and celebrated must not move us from hearing God’s voice above it all.

Now more than ever we need to be still and be stable in God’s truth and listen carefully to Him above all the noise of our ungodly culture. 

On Christ, the solid Rock, I stand;
All other ground is sinking sand.

  

I Don’t Hold My Breath

It started last week with some strange pains in my chest.  The pains didn’t seem to be heart related but they were disconcerting regardless.  I talked to my doctor’s nurse, who spoke with my doctor, and I got some advice along with an appointment to see her.

Yesterday, after conversation and an exam, I found myself being ushered to various rooms.  Labs…chest X-Ray…EKG…a CT Angiogram…and all the waiting that is an inevitable part of the whole process.

After my CT scan, I was led to another waiting area.  For a long time, I sat there by myself.  There was a small, tall table beside me.  I hadn’t paid it much attention.  I was looking at the other table across the room and for some reason wondered if the one beside me matched it.  So I leaned forward to look at the table next to me.  Then I saw it…the Bible laying on the little table. 

I felt compelled to pick it up and to open it.  I have opened my Bible often in my life at times like this…times of stress and concern.  I have never been disappointed in what God has to say to me when I look down and start reading. 

I opened the Bible.  I looked down to find myself in the book of Job.

I was a little let down.  I mean, why couldn’t it have been the Psalms?  Not that Job doesn’t have words of God’s encouragement, but the Psalms are stuffed full of really great verses that are meant for these moments of uncertainty such as I was feeling. 

 I started reading chapter 12.  Just look at these verses!  Job was speaking:

“But ask the beasts, and they will teach you;

    the birds of the heavens, and they will tell you;

 or the bushes of the earth, and they will teach you;

    and the fish of the sea will declare to you.

 Who among all these does not know

    that the hand of the Lord has done this?

 In his hand is the life of every living thing

    and the breath of all mankind.”

Job looked at his terrible suffering and could still say that the Lord’s hand had done that.  He knew, and said that even animals and nature know, that all of life is in God’s hand.

But I was blown away by that last line.  The breath of all mankind is in God’s hand. 

I had been given breathing instructions in every exam and test that morning.

 Take a deep breath.  Now let it out. 

Take a deep breath and hold it. 

You may breathe normally now.

Hold your breath.

Now breathe.

And as I sat there waiting on test results, wondering if something serious was wrong, God so gently reminded me that He was holding my very breath in HIS hand.

If something was wrong with me, could I say like Job did that God’s hand had done that?  The same hand that held my breath could do with me what He wanted, but whatever it was that He did would be good. 

Did I really believe that?

It turned out that the radiologist that we were waiting on to read the CT results was gone.  I sat there for an hour only to be told to go home and results would come in later. 

It would have been easy to be frustrated by that…to feel like I had just wasted an hour, hungry and tired and with no results.

But I look at it as a sweet gift from God, that time of opening a random Bible and listening to what God had to say to me in that dismal waiting room. 

Right now it seems like I am fine, and I’m thankful for that.

But most of all I’m thankful for God sitting with me in that waiting room.

 Thankful for the very timely reminder that every breath I take is in His hand.

And on the day I take my last breath, I’ll be holding His hand.