Hearing from God

1 Kings 19:11-13 (New International Version)

¹¹ The LORD said, "Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the LORD, for the LORD is about to pass by."
Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake. ¹² After the earthquake came a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper. ¹³ When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave.
Then a voice said to him, "What are you doing here, Elijah?"

God's voice can be hard to hear sometimes over the noise of the world around us. What He speaks can be bent by others, and by our own interpretation. What seems powerful and urgent is not always the word of God.

Isaiah 30:21 (New International Version)

²¹ Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, "This is the way; walk in it."

If you've read my previous blog, you know that I am wrestling to hear clearly and follow God's will for me and my family. In particular, I have been praying that God clearly illuminates where I am to go work, by shutting down or making all other possibilities unattractive. I have also been praying for his clear revelation, that somebody would essentially come up to me and say "God wants you to work in xxx".

This morning as I was praying I feel that it was revealed that (a) I'm asking for the wrong revelation and (b) I'm listening to the wrong thing. I'll explain (b) first.

There have been two sets of input that we (Kris and I) have received in regards to my job situation. The first is from people who are aware of what is going on and are praying for us, or generally trying to offer advice. Whether godly people or not, we seem to get more negative input from this group - that the path we are looking at is not the right path. Much of this is based on emotion - fear for our safety, grief at the loss of friends moving away, desire to have us closer to family members. All of this input, while not unbiblical, does not seem to consider what God might have planned. I call these 'the word of the world'.

The second set of input has been from people who don't know the details of what we are evaluating, yet are delivering words which are divinely inspired. This includes words which Kris and I may receive ourselves during our prayer and devotional time (these coming directly from the Holy Spirit). [I'll apologize to those who do not have a close personal relationship with Jesus - this may seem like a lot of spiritual mumbo-jumbo, but it is very real to us - we can certainly talk with you in detail about why and how we believe that Jesus is real, alive and helps us.] These words all seem to be leading positively towards the path we see before us. I say seem because we do have to interpret the words we receive. It is possible that we are missing the interpretation - however, there are a number of different things we've heard from different sources, individually, that all together point in the path we see. Any of these individually could be interpreted to go somewhere else, but together it is difficult to see God saying anything but what is before us. We feel that we have the working of God as described in the passage from Isaiah above - when we look back on the promises of God, and his guiding words, we can see that we are on the right path. These are the 'words of God'.

I also said I was asking for the wrong revelation. I was asking to see where God wants us to be. The right question is to ask where God is working, and how He wants me to join. One of the things that we realized yesterday is that due to some aspects of the current economic situation, we may well be able to afford a much nicer home than we have now - in particular in a more upscale neighborhood. Looking at this from God's view, there is a known tendency for people who are well off to be self-reliant, they feel they don't need God. We currently live in a good, vibrant community, with many neighbors who profess Jesus as their Savior (not all do, but many). This I feel to be a spiritually safe place (maybe also because of the two churchs across the street...). By moving to a new neighborhood which does not respect the need for God, we move to a spiritually darker place, someplace that while it may be physically safe is not spiritually safe. One thing that I heard this week in a sermon was that if you feel that you are safe, then you aren't doing God's work. We need to be out in the world, so that people can see and learn to know Jesus. One way is to be in a place of people who are hurting economically and need to know good news of the eternal provision which is available for them.

So, the more we compare notes and interpret what each other has received, the more alignment we see in one direction - that we will be moving, and this will be difficult for us and our families - but there is some immediate good we can see, as well as some long-term possibilities.

We don't have a date just yet - I have been told by HR that an offer is being prepared, and they are trying to get the right management in the office to approve that, and then I will learn of whether this is the path God has for us or if he has been testing my discernment...