Years ago, I would laugh at some of the lingo used to describe church events and/or spiritual things. If you were not raised going to church, some phrases were completely foreign. I was reminded of that just this week when a friend told me that at her church “they had dinner on the grounds”. Inside my mind I laughed because I truly envisioned a picnic outside in the yard. Honestly, we should give every person who decides to become a Christian a dictionary of common church phrases. I do however think that the phrase that puzzled me for the longest was when someone said, “I heard a word from God”.
How do you hear a word from God? There was no book to explain this and truthfully no one ever could help me to understand how. Even hearing stories from the Bible would confuse me because there were not many burning bushes, seas splitting wide open, donkeys talking or audible words being whispered or shouted in my ear. Yes, praying helps and so does getting quiet enough to clear your mind, but then you wonder is this really God? Personally, I believe we all hear God differently. For you, it might be through a song, nature, a sermon, a book, a friend or maybe even silence in the night. For me, it is all of the above.
I don’t have a scripture to share today just “a word from God”. Yes, I heard a word as I sat in the dark thinking about a lot of disappointment. People disappoint us, jobs disappoint us (still people) and we disappoint ourselves, but there is a problem that can get wrapped up in the disappointment. Often times we focus so much on the situations and people that the disappoint becomes everything and always on our mind. As I sat in the dark thinking about many disappointing things, the thought that came to my mind (God word) was to stop focusing on the disappointment Callie because you will miss the appointment that God has for you. That was a life moment that changed my thought patterns very quickly. So, I challenge each of us to get still enough to look, see and listen because God does have a word for us and many times what we focus on might be the very thing keeping us from hearing it.