Does God show up in your life?  Do you generally see Him only in actions, answered prayer or do you feel His guidance in the those quiet, truthful, loving or rebuking moments?  How has your faith grown, looking for a measure, empirical response, perhaps miracles or have you gone seeking God’s Will in His word.  Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of the Lord.  Does that line from the Bible resonate within you?  If the Bible says that your faith will be increased by being washed in His word, why then would you be looking for evidence of God’s Will through manna, birds, finances or floods?  Isn’t obedience about following the direction of an authority to whom you have willfully surrendered?

I love when God shows up in song, circumstances and situational salvation, but I crave those moments when I hear and positively respond to His quiet leading within my heart.  Think on that for a moment.  When the Jews had been oppressed for four hundred years and were set free into the desert to find the promise land they shook their fists at God demanding miracles.  Why were they in the desert, because of the miracles of God.  We must not, like the unbelievers be reliant upon signs and wonders for proof that God is there.

Faith in God is what it requires to please God and grow.  We must therefore counsel our own hearts to listen to sermons, read the Word, go to Bible studies and spend time with the Lord in prayer, for this is the road to faith and relationship with God.  Above all I must agree to be honest with myself regarding my own misgivings, expectations and demands upon God before I can righteously align my heart with His quiet urgings.  If I am simply looking for Him to show up when I rub the lamp, repeat mantras like incantation or roll the dice in life looking for Him to step in our defense, then we have designed a graven image that is certainly not God.  So though you are tired, bored, ill equipped or not “feeling” it, God wants us to gather together to share fellowship, worship and hear the Word, so, just doing it applies.  If you want to hear the voice of God then take the time to get to know His voice, so it is recognizable above the din of the world.  And we all agree this world and its many screaming voices vie actively for our attention as Christians.  We must learn to self-control our focus and apply it to listening, looking, searching and praying for God’s verbal and active participation in our lives.  He is inviting us, will we accept and show up for the event?  I pray that we have hungry hearts for God’s Word and a lasting relationship found only through the door of Jesus Christ.  Amen