We hear from God, but do we listen and obey what He's telling us to do? "My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me." John 10:27. I don't always obey the Father's voice.
God showed me this week how my disobedience, hurts the Church. When I speak of God's Church I am not speaking of a physical location or denomination, I am reference people who are walking in Christ. His church.
Back to ok let me get back to the meat. This winter, as always, I had my boys go through their clothes new things come in, old things go out. But this time, God said, "Take the clothes to the Giving Closet (A special ministry that helps the church with physical needs). For weeks, I heard, take the clothes there. Did I listen? Nope, I thought of every excuse that came to mind:
It's going to take too much time, Does it really matter where I take the clothes? God really doesn't care where the clothes go-i'm still donating them not selling them for profit. Finally, I got so frustrated at seeing the clothes take up space. I threw them in the trunk and drove to the Goodwill-was on my way there anyways. Task complete. Yeah! I'm happy, husband is happy the clothes are gone.
This week, I get a call from my distraught sister, who found a young boy in desperate need for clothes and guess what? She thinks he's about the same size as my son. She also said that she's going to the Giving Closet.
The Giving Closet? Oh, my Lord. My heart stung bad-I directly disobeyed God. I ignored His voice. I had to confess the truth. I'm sorry I don't have anything to give, because I didn't obey God. Then shared the same story with her.
That wasn't the first time. I also failed to listen to God almost a year ago. This time was different, I allowed the snake to cause me to doubt God.
Several months ago, God put on my heart to write an article for a police wives support group. The article would be about how to keep a police marriage alive and well. Not many people understand what it's like to be married to a cop. The divorce rate is 75% among police families. This is 25% higher than national marriage stats. They also have the highest alcohol, abuse, and infidelity rates.
Since I've been married for 20 years and hubby's been a cop for the last 14 years, God knew something I didn't. Maybe it was the testimony I share with my husband, or the things we do to help keep our marriage strong and on track, or how God saved our marriage during a rough time in our history, or how God is the center of our marriage.
Whatever the purpose, I started to write, but then that evil snake (the devil) started on me, whispering things to me to bring me down: You don't know what your writing about, you're not going to help anyone, you're not a good writer, who cares what you have to say, what if you're wrong, etc....I didn't finish writing the article. I have a huge problem with fear of failure and that slimy snake knows it. So out of fear, my article was never published.
Couple weeks ago, one of the leaders of the police wives organization, emails me and tells me she's getting a divorce. STAB STAB STAB in my heart. I hate divorce, God hates divorce. This woman was our leader and encourager she's married to a successful cop, she went to Bible school. How could this happen?
I know I didn't cause the problems in their marriage. Divorce doesn't just happen over one day. However, I played a roll because God told me to write an article that she would have had to read and edit before distributing it to the rest of the women.
This got me angry. Very angry first at myself, then at the snake for playing tricks in my mind, and for me, listening to the lies.
Ok, that's been my disobedience testimony, let me move onto something to end this post on a high note. Something to The only reason you're reading this blog, is because So God calls me to develop this web blog, I'm not sure why. Could it be to help me get over the fear of failure, to obey God, to help someone else. I don't know.
All I know is that when I hear God telling me to do something, as long as it lines up with the Word of God, then I better step up and do it.
God tells us that sacrifice isn't what He wants, He wants us to obey him.
