| Good morning everyone, Our theme for this month: “Mighty Prevailing Prayer” Our Bible verse for today: “You will seek me and find me when you search for me with all of your heart. I will be found by you – this is the Lord’s declaration.” Jeremiah 29:13-14 (CSB) Our thought for today: “How serious are you about hearing from God?” One of the most exciting truths I have ever learned about God came to me when I was a fairly new Christian. In the Bible study “Experiencing God: Knowing and Doing the Will of God”, Henry Blackaby taught that one of the greatest truths revealed in Scripture is that God wants to be heard and understood by His people so we can then obey Him. That made so much sense to me. Obviously, in order for us to obey God He first needs to make Himself heard and understood by us. That must mean that God does speak to us and that we can learn to understand Him. Evidently, hearing from God isn’t as mysterious and difficult as it might at first seem. But it does take time. We have to want to hear from God and we have to spend the time to place ourselves in a position before Him whereby He can and will speak to us. That’s the thought He was expressing in Jeremiah 29:13-14. You will seek Him and find Him when you search for Him with all of your heart. In other words, no half efforts. Hearing from God and connecting with Him must involve more than a quick mumbled prayer as you rush out the door in the morning. It must involve more than just absent-mindedly reciting the Bible verse scribbled on the note card pinned to the sun visor in the car. If you were to study Henry’s Bible study Experiencing God (I hope you will), you will learn that God typically speaks to us in five basic ways – through the Bible, through prayer, through the circumstances of our lives, through the counsel of other Christians, and through the testimony of the church. Almost always, when He’s trying to get our attention so He can say something to us, He will say it more than once and in more than one way. And, He will typically reveal it to us progressively, over time. Henry writes, “He is more likely to call you to follow one day at a time than He is to spell out all the details before you begin to obey Him.” In other words, as we’ve already discussed in previous devotionals in this series, God wants to hold us in prayer so we will continue to have fellowship with Him. If He were to quickly reveal the full answer to us, we would probably go on our merry way and forget all about Him. So that then begs the question, “How serious are you about hearing from God?” Serious enough to spend the time and to make the effort to seek Him with all of your heart and in multiple ways? Serious enough to persist in prayer until you prevail in prayer? He does want to be heard and understood by us, but we do have to make the effort. More about this tomorrow. God bless, Pastor Jim |
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