I was out and about the other day and I witnessed a father trying to discipline his (roughly) three year old son. The father instructed his son to "Come here." and his son screamed back, "NO!" This "conversation" continued for several more rounds until the father just gave up and let his child walk away.
I sat quietly as God began speaking to my heart about His children. God was asking me, "Is this any different than when I speak to my children and they, too, decide not to listen and eventually walk away, going about their own business?" I was personally convicted from the times in my life that I have heard the promptings from the Holy Spirit but did not follow through on God's Word to me. This began about an hours worth of praying for all of God's children, for the times where we will hear His voice, and still, choose to not obey.
My heart broke as I felt I got a small glimpse of the heart of God. When I sat there and pictured our Heavenly Father speaking words of instruction, discipline, wisdom, and guidance to those who call Him Father, and then played out in my head the same scene I had just witnessed, I couldn't help but to feel, even if ever so slightly, the small sting of pain and rejection God must feel when we choose not to listen to Him.
Proverbs 1:2-7 says this:
2 for gaining wisdom and instruction;
for understanding words of insight;
3 for receiving instruction in prudent behavior,
doing what is right and just and fair;
4 for giving prudence to those who are simple,
knowledge and discretion to the young—
5 let the wise listen and add to their learning,
and let the discerning get guidance—
6 for understanding proverbs and parables,
the sayings and riddles of the wise.
7 The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge,
but fools despise wisdom and instruction.
God wants the best for us. He wants to see us obediently heeding His instruction and His Word.
So, my question to you is: Are you listening? When you feel God speaking to you, instructing you to do something or disciplining you, do you heed that instruction or discipline?
And I have felt...a sense sublime
Of something far more deeply interfused,
Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,
And the round ocean and the living air,
And the blue sky, and in the mind of man;
A motion and a spirit, that impels
All thinking things, all objects of all thought,
And rolls through all things. William Wordsworth
When God speaks, He does so through His spirit and His Word. Listen for Him - God is not silent.
"If God had wanted to be a big secret, He would not have created babbling brooks and whispering pines." ~Robert Brault
I sat quietly as God began speaking to my heart about His children. God was asking me, "Is this any different than when I speak to my children and they, too, decide not to listen and eventually walk away, going about their own business?" I was personally convicted from the times in my life that I have heard the promptings from the Holy Spirit but did not follow through on God's Word to me. This began about an hours worth of praying for all of God's children, for the times where we will hear His voice, and still, choose to not obey.
My heart broke as I felt I got a small glimpse of the heart of God. When I sat there and pictured our Heavenly Father speaking words of instruction, discipline, wisdom, and guidance to those who call Him Father, and then played out in my head the same scene I had just witnessed, I couldn't help but to feel, even if ever so slightly, the small sting of pain and rejection God must feel when we choose not to listen to Him.
Proverbs 1:2-7 says this:
2 for gaining wisdom and instruction;
for understanding words of insight;
3 for receiving instruction in prudent behavior,
doing what is right and just and fair;
4 for giving prudence to those who are simple,
knowledge and discretion to the young—
5 let the wise listen and add to their learning,
and let the discerning get guidance—
6 for understanding proverbs and parables,
the sayings and riddles of the wise.
7 The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge,
but fools despise wisdom and instruction.
God wants the best for us. He wants to see us obediently heeding His instruction and His Word.
So, my question to you is: Are you listening? When you feel God speaking to you, instructing you to do something or disciplining you, do you heed that instruction or discipline?
And I have felt...a sense sublime
Of something far more deeply interfused,
Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,
And the round ocean and the living air,
And the blue sky, and in the mind of man;
A motion and a spirit, that impels
All thinking things, all objects of all thought,
And rolls through all things. William Wordsworth
When God speaks, He does so through His spirit and His Word. Listen for Him - God is not silent.
"If God had wanted to be a big secret, He would not have created babbling brooks and whispering pines." ~Robert Brault
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