“The Lord was very angry with your ancestors.  Therefore tell the people:  This is what the Lord Almighty says:  ‘Return to me,’ declares the Lord Almighty, ‘and I will return to you.’  says the Lord Almighty.  Zechariah 1:2 NIV

” ‘When I called, they did not listen; so when they called, I would not listen,’  says the Lord Almighty.  Zechariah 7:13 NIV

Have you ever gone to someone for advice and then refused to hear what they had to say?  Well, I hope not because honestly, that doesn’t make sense, right?  I will say, though, that I have had people come to me for advice and when I told them what I thought was in their best interest, they didn’t want to hear it.  The reason being is that I didn’t tell them what they wanted to hear.  Sometimes when we go and claim that we are asking advice, we are really just wanting to talk and have someone agree with us.  We don’t want them to question what we are doing, we just want them to blindly agree.

Well, we need to take something into careful consideration.  There is a reason that God gave us two ears and two eyes and one mouth.  James 1:19 tells us that we must be quick to hear, slow to speak, and slow to anger.

I’m gonna be brutally honest here, there are two kinds of people that I have a very low tolerance for.  The first one is the braggart.  You know the one I’m talking about.  He never talks to you, just at you. He spends the whole time bragging and boasting about all he has done or intends to do and you just sit there.  You don’t have to say anything unless you want to worship him, because that’s about all he’s gonna listen to anyway. There are two ways to do things, his way and the wrong way. Then there is the other person who is your best bud when he needs something and then you don’t hear another peep out of him until he needs something else.  Usually with this person, if you need help, his phone is mysteriously not working or he’s busy.

Now imagine what God goes through with us.  I myself am guilty of running crying to God when things go bad.  There was a time in my life  when God was my 911.  If things were going really badly, I prayed my little heart out.  Of course it was all gimme, gimme, gimme.  Asking God to fix this and fix that and this person and that person.  Sound familiar?  But when things were going well, I was partying and having a good time.  This kind of makes me like the guy that only calls me when he needs something, uh-oh.

Now the problem here is that I was not listening to God. I was just like the braggart, I couldn’t possibly be the problem, right?  If my life was a mess then it had to be someone else’s fault.  I didn’t want to hear that I needed to make some changes. When we do all the talking and are not listening is when we really get into trouble.  You see God is not a fan of these one-sided conversations either.  If you take the time to cry out to Him, then you need to take the time to listen.  Otherwise, you are wasting His time and yours.

Now I know some of you are reading this and you have come to that point in your life where you and God talk to each other regularly and you have learned, maybe the hard way like me, that listening to God and doing what He tells us to do makes your life much easier.  But some of you are like I used to be and you are making that  911 prayer to God and then not  listening to what He has to say.  Some of you are reading this and saying that you have never heard God speak to you.  Well then, my friend, maybe you haven’t been listening.  It doesn’t happen often, but I have had a couple of dire situations in my life where I heard the voice of God just as clearly as if He had been standing next to me.  So, how does that happen?  Well, I’m glad you asked.

The first thing we need to know is that the Bible is God’s instruction plan for our lives. God speaks to us through the Bible.  This is why people refer to the Bible as God’s Word. If you read the Bible you will see that there is nothing that we can experience that is not covered in the Bible.  Now from years of working in law enforcement, I would have thought that this was not the case, but I assure you it is.  There are instructions for marriage, friendships, parenting, being obedient children, employers, employees, you name it and it is in there. There are also plenty of stories of people like you and me that messed up and were hard headed and then there are also stories of guys that did it the right way.  There is a website called openbibleinfo.org that gives you a search engine that allows you to type a topic in there and it will pull up a bunch of Bible verses on that one topic.  You should give it a try the next time you are facing a problem.

When we pray, we are talking to God.  When we read the Bible, God talking to us.  Now you may say, how can God talk to me through things that happened over 2,000 years ago?  Well, you can go anywhere in the Bible and read a scripture and apply it to the world today.  Don’t take my word for it, try it. Also, once you develop that close relationship with God, you may actually hear Him even when you are not reading the Bible.  When we pray, God will sometimes use scripture to speak to us.  I didn’t hear God speak to me until I was in a close relationship with Him. I guess He wasn’t going to speak until He was sure that I was listening.

The problem is that we want to cry out, we just don’t want to listen.  We don’t want to hear that we are sinning.  We don’t want to live by God’s commands.  We just want God to fix our problems.  Well my friend, this scripture passage, that we have today, clearly tells us that if we return to God, then He will be there for us.  The thing we must understand is that God never leaves us nor forsakes us (Deuteronomy 31:6, Hebrews 13:5, Matthew 28:20).  When we find ourselves away from God, we have moved.  God is steady and solid and steadfast.  He never changes.  We are the wishy-washy ones.  It also tells us that if we want God to listen to us then we have to listen to Him.

Open your eyes and your ears.  Look and see what God will do for you.  Listen to His word.  Pay attention to what He is telling you.  Who are we to approach God and tell Him what He needs to do for us and not be willing to listen to what we need to do for Him?

My prayer for today is that you take time to hear God and that you not only hear, but listen.

We serve a loving God that wants the best for us.  When you are willing to put yourself aside and trust completely in God, you will be amazed at what He can do.  If you are skeptical, then by all means don’t take my word for it, try it for yourself.

Have a great day!