cell phones

Communicating and keeping in touch is very important in our busy lives. Cell phones are in and every where you go in restaurants, in super markets, driving down the streets and even in church you see people using them. Yesterday, I read how some teachers are using cell phones and their text feature as motivational equipment in middle schools. The teacher promoting their use says, "Most middle schoolers hate to read but live to text. And text gets them to read." The article mentioned that even the free lunch kids had a cell phone so there would be no additional cost. The pilot program is having some tremendously positive results.

I sometimes see people on cell phones talking or text and wonder what all do they have to talk about. Yet, even though I cannot hear on a phone, my husband insists I carry a cell phone in case of emergencies. So Charlas taught me how to text and a whole new world has opened up to me in "talking" to my daughter and sister in other states and my kids just around town.

I have seen GOD maybe calling you but HE isn't using your cell phone so please turn it off on several different church overheads. The different rings can be very distracting. Yet, GOD does want to talk with us.

GOD says,
Call unto ME and I will answer you and show you great and mighty things that you don’t know! Jeremiah 33:3

GOD wants to talk to you. Yet many believers doubt that GOD talks to us personally today. But HE does speak. And over and over GOD cries out in the Bible, "...but you would not listen" Over 900 hundred times the Bible uses the word hear or listen, Repeatedly it is used as a command..

Many people are so use to an audible voice, song on the radio, sounds all around that they negate that inner hearing, that still small whisper of those nudges when GOD places in you HIS desires 1 or directs your thoughts 2 or a verse comes alive as you read it 3. When the nudges initially come or that verse jumps off the page at you or comes to mind, you know that you know what you are suppose to do and what GOD is saying.

But too often we push that knowing aside for one reason or another.

We have all had a scripture come to mind that gives us instruction.2

I love it when a verse jumps out at me while I read the Bible and I know that is the direction I need. Sometimes it is completely out of context and is not the meaning of the verse at all, but it is clearly telling me personally what I am to do. For instance, my son was out of state and I was at home reading my Bible and the words, "Don't fight this, for this is from ME" jumped at me and I somehow knew it concerned my son and I was to accept what was going to happen as from GOD. Well, something did happen and without those words to hang on to I would have been a mess through the long ordeal that followed. But with them I had joy and assurance that GOD was somewhere working through this.

The Bible says in all your ways acknowledge HIM and HE will direct your paths 4. I was having to get ready for a class and that verse came to mind so I asked, " What should I wear?" All of a sudden this old pair of loose, back zippered polyester slacks came to mind, instead of the in style tighter front zipper jeans I had laid out. So since I asked, I went with the old pair of slacks. When a while later boiling water was spilled down the front of me, I was grateful for listening for getting out of the slacks quickly kept me from more serious burns.

But sometimes HE speaks as we go along our business. One day I was hurting in my kidneys and the word ibuprofen came to mind and I knew that I had to stop the ibuprofen I was using for pain. I quit and that hurting in my kidneys stopped. Once in awhile the pain bugs me and I take a small dose of ibuprofen and the hurting in my kidneys comes right back.

Several weeks back I was getting huge bruises and from two friends I heard how aspirin could be the culprit (since I bleed excessively). When yet another huge bruise came from nowhere and the word aspirin came to mind, I received it as direction and stopped my daily aspirin... guess what? No more bruises. So my ears really perked up when Colleen described how she was in intense pain and nothing helped until she cried out to GOD and the word aspirin came to mind. She stopped her daily aspirin and the pain ceased and remains gone.

Colleen has many other stories on how the LORD gave her precise instructions... once on a water pipe issue and I also have many stories as do many seniors I have talked with. You could not convince any of us that GOD has stopped talking to HIS people.

One last story and I will wrap this up. 30 years ago, I was struggling with some thoughts, nothing I tried helped and I threw myself on my knees and cried out to GOD, "I don't know why YOU ever even listened to me!" and the words came, so clear GOD could have been standing right beside me. "Sharon, I've never listened to you because you are good, but because of MY SON."

So do what GOD invites you to do:
Call unto ME and I will answer you and show you great and mighty things that you don’t know! Jeremiah 33:3

1 Philippians 2:13for it is God who works in you to will and to be able to act according to HIS good purpose.
Dueteronomy 30:11 Now what I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you or beyond your reach. 12 It is not up in heaven, so that you have to ask, "Who will ascend into heaven to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?" 13 Nor is it beyond the sea, so that you have to ask, "Who will cross the sea to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?" 14 No, the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart so you may obey it.
2 Proverbs 21: 1 The king’s heart is like a stream of water directed by the Lord; HE guides it wherever HE pleases.
3 Hebrews 4: 12For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.
4 Proverbs 3:5 Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding;6 in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight. 7 Do not be wise in your own eyes; fear the LORD and shun evil.