God Would You Speak to Me

What’s true for everyone is that we have to make decisions all of the time. Some of those decisions are big and some are not so big. There are various life stages that force us into making decisions. We finish school, we need to choose what we’re going to do next. There are life circumstances that come our way, whether it be the decision to remain single, to get married, as well as decisions that come that are out of our control. Unexpected things occur. There are also things within us that stir us. So often you hear people talk about feeling compelled that they need to do something in their life. When I look back over my life, the truth is I’ve made some very good decisions, but I have also made some poor decisions.

At times I wish that I had a direct phoneline to God. God, who knows everything about my circumstance. God, who knows everything about your circumstance, but God also, who can see the future. God, who knows what is to come. I wish I could ask God to tell me what to do? Wouldn’t life be easy if that was the case?

The title of the blog today is ‘God, would you speak to me?’ It comes out of a place where I’m trying to discern some things in my own life and in the life of our ministry, the life of our work here and that I’m trying to do. I’m trying to make this big decision, because it will affect many people, our team, and many others. In one sense it is a hard decision to make but in another sense not because I know what’s stirring within me. In the end it will be up to God.

Have you ever asked God, ‘Why did you make me?’ If we go to the scriptures in the book of Ephesians 2:10, we get told clearly:

For we are what he has made us created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life.

Another translation says that this way:

For we are God’s workmanship created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us.

In other words,

1. We are God’s workmanship. God made us and everything else and God does everything with intention.
2. God created us, not just to be, but to do good works. Some of those good works are done in public but many are not. No one ever sees the prayers we say, the friendliness that we express to people that we meet in our daily life, the way we look after our children at times, or the things we do at work.
3. God made us to do good things, and He has prepared the works that we will do in the future.

So, every decision that we make is aimed at God. God made me to do good works and He prepared works for me. The question that I find myself asking is God, what are the good works you’ve prepared for me to do?

For me right now, are you calling me to go traveling again around the world? Is that what I should be doing at this point in time? I haven’t travelled for the last couple of years, but are you saying that that’s what I should do again?

We all have decisions that we have to make. If we are made by God to do good works that He’s prepared, how do we figure that out? Let me tell you a story from the Old Testament. We are going to pick up a story from 1 Samuel 30:1 and at the time, King Saul was the first King of Israel.

King Saul has been anointed by God but in time he becomes corrupt. Another young man named David rises and is tremendously popular. It’s pretty apparent to everybody that David one day will be king. David is popular and King Saul gets jealous of him, so King Saul tries to kill David on repeated occasions. David hides in caves and out of the way places in order that he won’t be caught and killed, but his reputation grows. Over time, others come to join him but they’re not as caring towards King Saul as David is, and they urge David to kill King Saul and become the king himself but David refuses,

He said, “this one was appointed by God and God will take him down at the right time or will remove him. And if I’m meant to be there, God will place me into that place.”

Living in hiding on the outskirts, David sometimes gets involved in the affairs of other nations. There was a battle coming between the Philistines and another nation, so David gathered all his men and they go out and fight and even die with the Philistines. However, the Philistines suspect David because they know of his reputation. They know that he killed Goliath. David and all his men have left their homes, families and children, but when they get to the fight, the Philistines reject them and tell them to go home. The Philistines suspect what might happen if in the middle of the battle, David’s men change their minds and start to fight against them and not with them.

When David’s men get home, they discover that their camp had been attacked by another enemy and so, we read in 1 Samuel 30:1.

Now when David and his men came to Ziklag on the third day, the Amalekites had made a raid on the Negeb and on Ziklag. They had attacked Ziklag, burned it down, and taken captive the women and all who were in it, both small and great; they killed none of them, but carried them off, and went their way. When David and his men came to the city, they found it burned down, and their wives and sons and daughters taken captive. Then David and the people who were with him raised their voices and wept, until they had no more strength to weep.

They had gone off to fight even though it wasn’t their fight and they had been rejected. In the meantime, while they had left their wives, children and everything they had unprotected, their own land had been raided and all their families had been captured and taken away.

Have you ever been disappointed because something that is cherished is taken from you and you cry the cry of devastation? I remember that was what it was like when my dad died. I remember being just so utterly hollow and crushed. That is what David and his men would have felt that day. Everything they had was lost. All that mattered to them was now gone. Their families were gone. They probably wondered if they should have even been away fighting. If they had been doing the right thing and to make it worse, it wasn’t even their battle. Because of this, the men begin to turn against David. And in verse 6, it says:

David was in great danger; for the people spoke of stoning him, because all the people were bitter in spirit for their sons and daughters. But David strengthened himself in the Lord his God.

Things just got worse for David. Not only had he lost all his family, but they had lost everything else and then the people began to turn against him. When things go poorly, have you noticed people often look for someone to blame? The problem with blame is it doesn’t help anybody. Whether you blame others or blame yourself, it just leaves you in the same place.

Have you ever made silly mistakes in your life where you stop and say I shouldn’t have done that? If we got together some time, I could give you a list. At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter how much you blame yourself, how much hurt you have caused how much devastation, blame doesn’t do anything.

In verse 7, David is wondering what to do:

David said to the priest Abiathar son of Ahimelech, “Bring me the ephod.” So Abiathar brought the ephod to David.

The ephod was the priestly clothes.

David inquired of the Lord, “Shall I pursue this band? Shall I overtake them?”

David was asking the Lord shall I go back and get what is ours? Shall I fight for our wives? Shall I fight for our sons and daughters? God answered him:

Pursue; for you shall surely overtake and shall surely rescue.”

David asks God, ‘What shall I do? I have a decision to make so shall I stand up and fight now?’

You and I, right now, are thinking, of course you should! If it was your wife or children, then that is what you would do. But when we make decisions ourselves, we stand in our own authority. When we make decisions ourselves, we stand in our own power. When we make decisions ourselves, we stand with only our own ability, but when we go to God, and asked if this is something that we should do, we unleash all of heaven’s power on our side into the circumstance that is to come.

We need God to speak and convict us. There are some of you that God is calling to start a business. There are some of you God is calling into new careers. There are some of you where there are new things you need to do. There are some of you need to enter retirement. If God leads you into those things, you’ll live there in power and you’ll live with his grace and his blessing. But if you just go into some of those things all by yourself because it just seems a good thing to do, you are leaving God out of those decisions.

David comes to God with something that is obvious. Do I go after them? The he hears the commissioning of God to pursue them. When you face difficulty, when you want to make the best decision, you need to pause and say, ‘God, would you give this to me? Would you help me in this? Would you be with me?’

Because of this, David makes the right decision. God answers David. In verse 18, it says:

David recovered all that the Amalekites had taken; and David rescued his two wives. Nothing was missing, whether small or great, sons or daughters, spoil or anything that had been taken; David brought back everything.

Can I ask you this question? Is there a stake in the ground that holds us to a certain spot or path? Is there a stake in the ground where we say this is just where I am. This is the way life is. Sometimes we have got to be freed from that to say, ‘God, you lead me. You guide me. You take me to a new place.’

For many of you, this is the time to fight, or the time to leave behind hurt, disappointment, or the mistakes that we carry. We have all made mistakes but that is our human frailty and they do not need to be a weight that destroys our future happiness and prevent us from becoming who God is calling us to be. What do we do when we face decisions?

We have to go to God and say ‘God, what should I do? Then give God permission to tell us what to do. When you hear God and experience it in your spirit and in your knowledge, you know, you know!

If you’ve got a business on your heart to do, ask God if this is what you should do and is now the time to go and do it.

Be prepared that God will cause you to do it slightly differently. We see what happened with David. When all seems lost, David teaches us that if we pray to God for wisdom when we are in the midst of struggle or of not knowing, that is the time to pray to God for wisdom.

Believe in your goal. When things seemed paused, never lose the vision of what God has asked you to do.

There are always choices and if you say, ‘God speak to me,’ I guarantee you God will speak. I was only talking to someone on the phone while driving here today who said, ‘God speaks for us. You know He speaks if will listen.’

If you listen, God will guide you in the things that you need to discern right now. What I’m trying to discern is what I’m trying to discern. We all are different. Maybe your marriage needs a clean-up or a renewal. Maybe it’s your work. Maybe it’s your attitude. Maybe it’s your health. Maybe it’s you as a parent. Maybe it’s some dream you have for your future.

God wants to speak to you about your life and he wants to speak to you.