“There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death.” (Proverbs 16:25)
Our task is to train our spirit to hear what God is telling us. And even if your intellect is fighting and heart does not agree with what God says to you, anyway, say to God, “I do not know how it happens, I just believe in You!”
In order to hear God’s voice, it is necessary that you learn to stop and calm down – calm down your mind, feelings, emotions, and only then you can hear what God says to you. When you learn to hear God’s voice, not only will you have eternal life, but also life in abundance, which is concealed in you. There will be problems, but you will be able to rejoice, because you will be sure that your God has an answer for any question, your God is able to solve any problem. Human mind tries to calculate everything – how are all things going, how everything must happen. Our minds work like fast processors. But the problem is that situations appear in our lives, and we cannot solve them. What happens to our mind-processor then? It falls out.
There is another voice that we hear – it is the voice of other people and the voice of human standpoint. For example, the voice of experts goes in this category – a doctor who proclaims what the medical equipment indicates. A doctor may tell the patient that he will die in three days, because the medical equipment, the analyses and his own medical experience show that. Praise the Lord for our doctors, but we must know that the last word always belongs to God. God often says the totally opposite to what experts say. In such cases, it is necessary that we, while being respectful towards different specialists, put aside the expert conclusions and trust God, not people. The more you trust the expert conclusions and not the Word of God, the less God can give you life.
Apart from the voice of our common sense, we often hear the voice of our feelings. Also feelings have a voice. But neither this voice always reflects what God says. Our feelings are changing, quite often they depend on outer factors – our mood, weather, how tired we are, etc. If we listen to our feelings only, our chances to constant success are eliminated.
For instance, you can often feel lonely, weak, unloved, a failure, etc. Nevertheless, such feelings often do not accord with reality. If you are lead by your feelings and take them as truth, you will not be able to enjoy the life in abundance that God has prepared for you. God gives this life only to those who hear His voice and follow Him!
God speaks constantly! The question is whether you hear what He says.
God created everything by His Word, and He holds everything together by the power of His Word.
“And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light.” (Genesis 1:3).
If we learn to appreciate and cherish everything that God does in our lives, then it will be natural for us to sacrifice or build and altar for God.
Know that when speaking about sacrifice, God will never ever ask you for something that you do not have! His love does not require that, God’s love is not abusive. If you truly love someone, you will never ask from them what they do not have.
Forget about what you do not have, think about what you do have. Be sure that you own a lot!
What is our response like today? How do we express our gratitude to God for the fact that we live, that He protects us, that He has saved us, that we breathe, walk, and we have families and children? What God is doing for us today – does it help us be more open, sacrifice more and become better worshippers?
You cannot say you love and at the same time neglect spending time with the one whom you love. It is simply not possible! Time is our life. By spending time with the one whom you love, you are giving or sharing with them part of your life.
In order to earn money, you need time; in order to spend money, you need time. If you have money but do not have time to spend it, this money will not bring you any blessings. If you lose the money, you can earn it back tomorrow. But if you lose time, you are not getting it back!
I want to tell you that singing to God, praising Him, enjoying His presence is not a difficult task at all, if we will only take a moment to reflect or think of His grace. Even when you are having very hard times in life, you can still find something in your life that you can thank God for. Even when you think everything in your life is falling to pieces and your situation is the worst on earth, nevertheless, continue to believe – you simply have not encountered a situation that is worse than yours. But, when you see such a situation, you will find that you live in paradise.
It is not hard to love God – simply think about Him, think about what He does for you every day, and your natural response will be gratefulness. Worshipping God will become a natural thing for those who think about Him and His works. God loves you very much. But, if you live and at the same time do not think about Him, do not see what He does for you, it is hard for you to sacrifice; particularly – it is hard for you to sacrifice your busy daily schedule, your finances, your time, your comfort, because you do not think about Him.
