Seeking God – But Are You Listening?

   Often times we find ourselves seeking God's revelation, His direction, His Truth, ect. Some times it's just because a Pastor or someone else tells us we should and we don't want them to think that we wouldn't seek God so we say a prayer with idol words or put a half baked effort into it. Some times we are use to hearing from God in one way and we choose to stick to that. For some hearing from God can be threw reading Scripture, hearing directly from the Spirit, observing creation, or any number of other ways. The trouble is that we become accustomed to relating with God in one way, when God says He wants to bless us with every Spiritual gift, although He also says no man will have every spiritual gift. To hear from God the Holy Spirit must be involved; that is to say that you have to have received the Holy Spirit into your heart (I believe after you have went threw baptism, or if receiving the Holy Spirit prior to baptism you should be baptised shortly after as they did in the Bible.)

    I've found in my life that God likes to use me as a mouth peace one on one with other people who need a word, or who are having trouble understanding God or His scripture. I also have found that some times God tells me to stand out of the way and let someone else do it that He has picked instead of me. In that case I'm just the person who introduces them to someone else.


    Now here is what is really strange. I want you to ask yourself this question. If God were to come down from Heaven today in physical form would you listen to Him? Even if you couldn't tell if it was God but knew the words were from God would you listen to Him? Well the Bible says we are Jesus to the world and to each other. As brothers and sisters of Jesus and sons and daughters of the Father God (Matthew 23) we are part of the body of Christ. We are all used differently by God but we all work together threw the direction and unity of the Holy Spirit. Some are primarily prophets, some are primarily wise men, some are teachers, etc. Keep in mind Jesus said that God is the only teacher, wise man, counsellor, etc. Because He is the source of all truth and we are only the vessels He uses to speak and or act threw. So you may have answered yes to saying you would in fact listen to God if He was speaking to you or if you knew that you were listening to His words. Here is where the rubber meets the road.

    So God decides that to be more effective at speaking to you, He is going to send a brother or sister in Christ to speak to you on His behalf to reveal to you threw the Spirit what He has already revealed to the person He has sent you or is revealing to the person He has sent you. What a blessing? Well I've often had people tell me that they know I've been sent to them by God to give them advice, speak to them, etc. When asked what changed about me and why people should listen to me now one man said: “Justin hasn't changed, what changed is the fact that I learned that I should listen to him.” and right before saying this he refused to pray for someone that the Lord lead to me asking for prayer. Another individual told me that when they met me they knew that God had sent me to them so they could listen to me and so I could guide them, yet they told me not to give them any advice or quote scriptures to them or give them scriptures. This might not seem strange to some of you, but is seems very strange to me. I've always been open to any word anyone has given me no matter how crazy they are or how crazy they sound, because I know God can speak threw anyone to me. I usually can tell if it's from God or not by listening to the Spirit, seeing if it clashes with the scriptures, if it does the Spirit will bring the scripture to my attention, or speak to me threw someone or something else about it. If the Spirit really wants me to hear it and take it seriously then the Spirit will repeat itself threw many different people, just as God repeated Himself in the Bible to give extra emphasis to certain parts. Some times the word someone gives me is subject to human error threw interpretation and I can usually see that too (threw the Spirit). Meaning that if the Spirit tells someone something and they don't understand it right and they tell me, I can usually understand what the Spirit was trying to tell them to tell me. Now of course I always tell people to ask God about what I tell them when I tell them something, but not listening or rejecting the one who comes in the name of the Lord is a bad thing. Jesus said that it would be easier for the people of Sodom and Gomorrah to enter Heaven then for the people who rejected the message from those He sent with His word.

    Jesus told the people He sent out that if the people rejected the word He sent them with that they were to shake the dust from their sandals, and take the peace back with them that they had blessed the people with. Now if God sends you to someone and tells you to be patient with them, and not to give up, but to wait it out, then what do you do? In this situation I've tried shaking the dust from my sandals and taking my peace back and leaving, but God won't let me and tells me it's wrong. 19 out of 20 times God tells me to shake my feet of and run, but in a recent case He has told me not to run, but just stand back and wait for them to come back and talk to me again. This is very frustrating.

    This was a problem for the followers of Jesus in Jesus' time and shortly after, and in Matthew 23 Jesus says that we are only to have God as our leader, teacher, Rabbi, etc. however He said He would send prophets, wise men, and teachers to the religious people who reject His word, the stiff necked. So maybe that's something to think about. If God has put someone in your life who He is using to speak to you, then maybe you are stiff necked, and you have a problem accepting His direction and guidance without Him sending you a prophet, wise man, or leader.

    Jesus said He would not return until the Pharisees said “Blessed is the man who comes in the name of the Lord”.

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