Clay in the Hands

Since October, our church has been focused on creating moments – sacred moments. We continue to challenge one another to take time to have moments in God’s word, moments in prayer, moments in community and moments in giving and serving. The idea is that when we string moments together, they create habits and those habits lead to changed lives.

Yesterday, I challenged our family to grow spiritually. Each one of us needs to take seriously our responsibility to strengthen our faith. To be clear, God does the strengthening but we must do our part to be open and receive that transformation. A crucial aspect of sensing God’s movement in our lives is simply being still and listening for His voice. It is extremely hard to discern what God is saying if we cannot hear his voice over the chaotic roar that is our lives.

A passage that has my attention today is John 10. In this passage we find two different “I Am” statements of Jesus. He uses the illustration of sheep and a sheep pen and says “I am the gate” – the protector. He also says, “I am the Good Shepherd.” He is not the hired hand that neither knows the sheep nor even cares for them, but rather, He is the true shepherd that knows the sheep by name and truly loves them. Verses 3 and 4 say, “He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes on ahead of them, and his sheep follow him because they know his voice.”

As I have read these verses over and over, the question I keep asking myself is, “how well do I know His voice?” Can I hear His voice over all the others? My experience has been that He rarely shouts. So it is imperative of me to do my part to listen and grow accustomed to his voice so that I recognize it when I hear it.

Do you know His voice?

Each of us must train our ears to hear His voice. One of the best ways to do that is to spend moments just being still and listening for His voice as we read His word and as we pray. Prayer is a conversation but we rarely wait around to hear the other side.

Take a minute to make a moment right now – just being still and listening.