The Voice

A Word is a medium by which thoughts and ideas are expressed into an understandable format among humanity. 

As such, it is a comfort to know that God is speaking to us; He has spoken and does speak personally to every person who knows Him personally.
God's voice to the human race carries with it a 'cause & effect' mode into our lives. 
For example, the Bible states in Genesis, 'God spoke...and it was so.'

Without this speaking of God, mankind would have no revelation of God whatsoever. 

Unlike other faiths, God did not give us a book to learn of Him → God spoke a book which revealed Himself to all who will trust Him.

We also learn through this that God's Word to humanity is final; when man disobeyed God, we were condemned to return to the dust from which we were formed. 
It is here the finality of God's Word is revealed because all men experience the finality of death.

One of the great tragedies of our time within the Christian world is the fact that our welfare depends greatly on our hearing the voice of God; yet, we have trained ourselves not to hear Him.
In one place in God's Word, when God speaks the description is in human terms - 'It Thundered.'
This is an appeal to the natural to describe something we are not use to hearing although He is constantly speaking through His Spirit and through His creation to His creatures who choose to remain deaf.

The truth of the matter is that every Christian has events in their life that they are not able to understand, nor explain. And some things occur that are contrary to all which we have learned.
Yet, the true believer does not need to always understand.
Although when it comes to God we often fear His voice as our first reaction; no person needs to fear because God's voice is a friendly voice.

Jesus said, 'He who has an ear, let him hear...'
And it is true, whoever chooses to listen will hear Him.

Sadly, listening for God's voice is not a part of today's popular religion.
Noise, size, activities and bluster are the things that are taught which make a man dear to God's heart.
This being true - the Christian is caught in an awkward place because God teaches us to, 'Be still and know that I am God.'
Therefore, our strength in the Spirit and our safety in Christ lie not within noise, but in silence before the throne.
For God says to our hearts that it is still important that we are quiet, patient and wait on Him to speak.

It is often said the Bible is a Living Book. 
Charles Spurgeon once declared of the Bible, 'You can cut this book into a thousand pieces and every piece would grow and live.' 
He was right.

Yet, the Bible will never be living to us personally until the individual is convinced that god has articulated in it His truths for the universe.
Most believe that the Bible is a record of what God said when He was in a speaking mood; the Koran is a believed to be a revelation of such nature, being dictated to Muhammad. 
I wonder when a person holds such a notion, how can they be a true believer at all?

God is not silent at any time;Never. 
It is in His nature to speak and He does speak to His children as often as we choose to hear His voice.
The Bible, far from being a simple record of God's speaking, is in fact the infallible declaration of God's mind put into familiar human words.
And if you read the Book He has spoken to us - you may very well hear the very voice of God rustling through its pages, bringing life to a deadened heart.

If you are a Christian and you have suffered under the yoke of a sterile, stagnate spirituality - there is a way to fix your situation.For no man or woman who listens and hears the voice of God will remain spiritually sterile.
If in such a state, approach the Bible expecting God to speak to you personally; He will.
This is not a notion or a thing you can manipulate; it is listening to a voice, a small, still voice which speaks directly and with authority. 
It is the Word of the Living God.

It is my prayer that the voice of God becomes a familiar melody in your life.
It is possible when the sounds of thousands of tunes flood your spirit that you can drown them out with the one melody and the others die away.
Only then will God's voice become as music to your heart.

Until next time, try to win one for the good guys.

The Sacrifice of Living

1 Corinthians 10:31
"Whatever you do, do for the glory of God."

In the ministry, I have seen a lot of people do some fairly strange things believing it glorified God. As a practice, even though I might not approve of something a brother or sister does, I do my best to leave it to God as to why they do it.
And sometimes that is very, very hard to do.
But I believe the Apostle Paul well states the commitment every Christian should make in living life to its fullest in obedience to God - whatever we do should be done for the glory of God.

Yet, the great hindrance to our constant praise and glory to God is the fact we live in two totally separate worlds which forever divide our lives - the Sacred and the Secular.
These two are morally and spiritually incompatible; or so we think.

Those of us who follow Christ know that we must be in two worlds at once.
As such, we have two separate lives and we try to compartmentalize each life.
One life is as a son of Adam or daughter of Eve - subject to the limitations of the flesh and its desires we inherited from so long ago.
The other life we lead is more spiritual and has a higher calling for we are children of God.

As a result, in the back of our minds that our two lives in our two worlds constantly struggle with one another.
We are constantly and continually engaging in two separate acts - one set is to always please Christ; these acts spring solely from our faith.
The other side is secular acts which seem to us to be ordinary, natural and repetitive. And we tire easily and get bored with these acts.

Have you ever wondered why there are so many divorces? 
Some stop seeing their marriage as an act of worship and it becomes an ordinary, repetitive thing they just 'do' in life.
We get bored with what we see as a secular act and we quickly have no time or energy for it.
But I digress.

The truth is that somewhere in the middle, the Christian somehow believes he is caught.
We tend to think the humdrum acts of life are a waste of time as we walk the tightrope of life.

But the problem with this dilemma we seem to have is the fact that the dilemma is not real at all.
There is no foundation of separating the sacred from the secular in the New Testament.
Once we belong to Christ, there is to be no such thing as a divided life.
Jesus' summary of deeds in life - 'I do always the things that please Him.'
That 'Him' is of course God the Father; we should do the same.

Now, this is not pious idealism; nor is it an unrealistic faith.
Jesus Christ never performed a non-sacred act in His entire life - now, let that sink in for a moment.
Jesus, the One who we say we follow, never once in His entire life from childhood through adolescence to adulthood and death, ever committed a non-sacred, non-holy act.

As an example, when Jesus sent the disciples for the donkey in the last week of His life, He commanded if anyone asked what they were doing, they were to say, 'The Lord has need of it...'
The same should be applied to us.
Every act should be considered a sacrificial, sacred act before God Himself with the purpose of worshipping Him.
The Lord has need of us and we should have an aggressive faith - offering all of our deeds to His glory and demonstrating His goodness through our lives.

This thought is demonstrated throughout the NT: an aggressive faith, a sacrificial faith, a living faith which glorifies the Lord at every turn.
And it is possible.

In Israel, the holy teachers would always teach principles and their subjects by starting at the beginning.
When Jesus appeared on the scene, He taught in this manner: 'You have heard it said....but I say to you...'
It didn't matter what the subject matter was, Jesus took the principle and made it into an act of the living; translation - it is great to talk about principles, but it is better to let people see the principle alive in you every day.
This is what glorifies God.
In  more practical terms - school is over, let real faith beget real living that praises God at every step.

In essence, all we do is to praise and glorify God; and all we do is the sacrifice of living.

The Apostle Paul taught us that everyday was to be treated as Holy, all meat was clean and that all acts are acceptable to God.
Now, this does not mean everything is of equal importance or of equal value before the Lord.
Paul's sewing of tents in the Mediterranean heat is not equal in importance to writing the Book of Romans, but both are accepted of God as true acts of worship and praise.

When it comes to Christians, all are to engage in the sacrifice of living because it is through this we can glorify God and praise Him in all that we do.
In Christ, our seemingly separate worlds have been joined for the purpose of the glory of God.

But it should also be said that while all men are created equally in the sight of God, not all men are equally as useful.
Yet, a 'layman' should not think of himself as being inferior to a 'minister.'
Serving God and glorifying Him is not just a minister's job, it is the privilege of every man or woman who has been called of the Holy Spirit to grace.
Every man is to serve where he is called and we are all called as His ministers with the purpose of serving, worshipping and glorifying Him.

It is not what the individual Christian  does that determines the sacred or the secular. 
It is Why He Does It!
When it comes to honor before Christ, motive of the heart is everything.

May we all have the right motives in our hearts with all that we do, so that God may be honored, praised and glorified in this sacrifice of living in which we engage in each day before Him.

Until next time, try to win one for the good guys.