Are You Listening to God? - Oswald Chambers

Today’s Oswald chambers post radiates with truths. Every line, every idea and almost every word are true to us, today’s Christians.  If you have never been to a point in your life where you can see with your heart how much you do not love Him and how much you have been disrespectful to a God who deserves your full reverence, you are either PERFECT or you are knee deep in your lies as a Christian.

Through my walk with Him I learned that there is nothing wrong with listening to God’s servants. As the matter of fact, it is extremely important to listen to your leaders, and to one another. But, before we choose to listen to them, we have to learn to listen to God first. Otherwise, we follow after man and the end result is exactly what you see happened to the Israelites. Centuries after centuries, they have never learned to make God ‘personal’.  They have never learned to take ownership of their faith, their spiritual responsibilities vis a vis Him and their love for Him. These things cannot be found in traditions and rituals and we are left empty without a personal relationship.

Another thing that I have learned is that God will take all of us to a point where we realize we are TERRIFIED of Him. When this happens, He does not force you to go forward and come closer. Because, as much as He craves for intimacy with us which is the ultimate reason He put forward His plan of salvation, He will sit there, waiting for us to make the decision to choose Him too, in the same way He chose us first.  Remember, all this will be happening at the level of your heart, your spirit and your soul, so we have to be in tune with this life we have with Him, not to miss the cues. You might think it is impossible to miss those cues, but I tell you it is not.  Casing point, the Israelites missed out on God coming down to talk to them. (He did not have to come down)

When this happens to you, you are paralyzed because in your mind you keep thinking that He will throw a ball of fire at you or something to that effect if you go closer.  It will take all your strength, it takes an embrace of your fear and all that you are goes into embracing the fact that you have to go meet with Him face to face because of three main reasons: HE IS GOD! HE IS YOUR FATHER! AND YOU WOULD RATHER DIE THAN LIVING THIS LIFE WITHOUT KNOWING HIM PERSONALLY AND INTIMATELY! But, if you dare to make the decision to go closer in spite of what might happen to you, as you lift up your feet to move forward He takes over and you find yourselves in His arms of love. Some of you would say, well, if you have to do all that, it is no longer grace at work. Of course it is His grace at work changing you and me. Without His grace, you and I we have no interest whatsoever in Him.  WE COULD NOT CARE LESS!

As much as I was ecstatic to be in His arms of love, when all this experience was over, I was sad to see how much I did not love Him and most of all, I totally misjudged Him, even though I was repeating like a parrot that “God is love”. I also knew in my heart that I did not do it deliberately and I would never have known the difference if…..

Are You Listening to God? - Oswald Chambers

They said to Moses, "You speak with us, and we will hear; but let not God speak with us, lest we die." — Exodus 20:19

We don’t consciously and deliberately disobey God— we simply don’t listen to Him. God has given His commands to us, but we pay no attention to them— not because of willful disobedience, but because we do not truly love and respect Him. “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15). Once we realize we have constantly been showing disrespect to God, we will be filled with shame and humiliation for ignoring Him.

“You speak with us,…but let not God speak with us….” We show how little love we have for God by preferring to listen to His servants rather than to Him. We like to listen to personal testimonies, but we don’t want God Himself to speak to us. Why are we so terrified for God to speak to us? It is because we know that when God speaks we must either do what He asks or tell Him we will not obey. But if it is simply one of God’s servants speaking to us, we feel obedience is optional, not imperative. We respond by saying, “Well, that’s only your own idea, even though I don’t deny that what you said is probably God’s truth.”

Am I constantly humiliating God by ignoring Him, while He lovingly continues to treat me as His child? Once I finally do hear Him, the humiliation I have heaped on Him returns to me. My response then becomes, “Lord, why was I so insensitive and obstinate?” This is always the result once we hear God. But our real delight in finally hearing Him is tempered with the shame we feel for having taken so long to do so.