Really! I'm not insane! But I suppose a person who doesn't know me might think so! You see - I am trying to be more deliberate every day with what I call "conversational Christianity!" Christ has redeemed us - and in doing so has imparted right into our very being the Spirit of God! WOW! That is a pretty good deal for us!!!!!
In light of MUCH scripture, we know that we are to follow Christ, to obey Christ, to listen to Christ through our daily communion with the Spirit of God! This is not mystical, though the full mechanics of it are somewhat a mystery to us! We are not perfect in our understanding of things, but the more we are in God's word, the more we are people of devoted prayer, the more conversational we will be with Christ!
We sometimes make the mistake of putting all our "time with God" in a box for a certain time of day! Morning devotion 0r evening devotion times end up being the "God time" in our lives. Hey, nothing wrong at all with having elongated times spent specifically studying the Word and praying!
But we live in a rough and tumble world! Though morning time spent with the Lord is wonderful, it alone is not sufficient out in the trenches of ministry! So, the longer I live the more "conversational" I am trying to be with the Lord. The Lord and I just talk about everything - all day long! Like Paul, I have not arrived or attained perfection in this! But I press on!
Every day I have something of a broad outline of what I believe I have to accomplish! But life happens during those times and I find the Lord conversing with me through the Spirit! If we will converse with God throughout the day, we will find MANY opportunities of ministry! We will find ourselves engaging with people we do not know! We will find ourselves seeing things we would never see! But one has to be willing to have an ongoing conversation with God! One has to be willing to respond instantly to that conversation.
Some people get nervous when we declare "the Lord spoke to me!" Well, to be clear, He often speaks to me through His Word! That is often where our conversation begins! Then the Spirit prompts my heart - turns my head, opens my eyes, helps me hear what is going on all around me! I absolutely believe that the more closely I walk in the Word and prayer, the more my spirit will agree with His Spirit! And, to know His Spirit, we talk! Some folks would say, "He claims to talk with God - He is insane!" Well, I suppose it depends on what you say God told you to do!
God will never tell you to do something that contradicts His Word! God will never tell you to do something contrary to His character and nature! That does not mean that God will not tell you to do things that people will not cause people to raise an eyebrow!
Throughout your day today, as you go through it, try making a conscious effort to just be open to hearing from God! Like this: "Lord, I am about to be in this place of business - help me be alert to opportunities to serve You in this place!" or - you are about to leave a location - an area - to go somewhere else - and you ask, "Lord, is there anything else I need to do while I am here?"
You know - with us being the busy, busy people we are, we can easily go through all our daily travels and never even think of Jesus! Now for the believer - that is insane!
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