For They Know His Voice

First things first, can I say how much I LOVE doing a post back to back like this? I love posting, and so getting to do more of it is good with me. Secondly, can I tell you how pleased I was this morning when I was working on my bible study and I had to look up a verse. Now, up until now my bookmark in my bible has stayed on the page that tells you what page the books are on for easy access, because whatever memory I had of bible order from my church days as a child had long disappeared. However, this morning as I was looking up the verse, without even thinking about it I knew exactly where I was going. I think that is a good sign about how much I have been opening my bible. So, progress is being made. Now, on to the amazing things that God is teaching me...

So, apparently, yesterday God directly decided to work on my heart hard, and He used my pastor to do so. Between the morning and night service, my feet were definitely stepped on pretty hard. So much so that I took over 3 pages of full page notes for each service. Since I don't want to make this post forever long, I am just going to share my notes from the morning service. Tomorrow you will get the Sunday night notes, so be looking forward to that!

I loved this sermon. It was about how God speaks to us in our lives. My favorite question that the pastor put forth was "How can I know that it is God speaking to me?". And the answer was two-fold. The first point, and one that I think is stressed too little is that God will never tell me to do something contrary to His word. Ever. So no matter how good that sin looks, and how much I feel drawn to it, I can know that it is not God doing the drawing. Secondly, if I spend time with God through His word and prayer, I will know His voice.

The verse the pastor chose to accompany the sermon was 2 Timothy 3:16-17, but he also quoted the above verses from John, and for some reason those verses touched me deeply, so I wanted to focus on them. What I really liked it the fact that the sheep know the voice because they have been trained by the Shepherd to recognize it. Even in this, we are not the one doing anything other than accepting His guidance. God will help us to know His voice if we are willing to give Him our limitless devotion. 

The second thing that he said that really impacted me was that, when the Holy Spirit leads you to some lesson or knowledge, you have just had an encounter with God. And I desperately, desperately want an encounter with God, and I realized that in the middle of the message. I was so thirsty for it, and like the Good Father that He is, He gave me what I was seeking. But that was later in the evening, so you will hear about that tomorrow. 

The third thing that touched me through this message is that reading and hearing the Word of God is not enough, I must respond. Confession is agreeing that I have sinned, but agreeing with God that I am wrong is not enough. There is one more step I must take: I must respond to the truth in obedience: that is true repentance. When the Holy Spirit reveals our sin to us, it is not to make us miserable; He wants nothing to hinder our love relationship with God.

The point of all of this: to become closer to God, I must adjust my life to the truth. God's truth.