Andrea and I have a group of friends. Very good friends, actually. In the essence of full disclosure (with no
offense intended to any church people we know), they are, in fact, some of the very
best friends we have. Each and every one
of them was born and raised entire states away from us. Some of them across the country, even. We met them through our Tim McGraw concert
outings. What started as basically general
acquaintanceships, has turned into deep, honest loving friendships. We only get
to see them about twice a year (and that’s on a good year), but through the
magic of internet communications and texts and emails, we talk to them almost
every day. And they’re good Christian
folks…and it’s truly a “sometimes we laugh together, and sometimes we cry”
group of friends like we sing about in the old church hymn “God’s family”.
So why did I tell you that? Because we have other really good friends
that we take for granted that they’re so close.
They’re not better friends or closer friends – other than the general
location sense of being closer. But
since they’re closer, we don’t take the effort we should to stay in touch like
we do with our “Tim Friends”. And when
we finally bump into them it’s always the same old stuff…you know the words,
because I’ve said some of them to the very people reading this…”Boy, I haven’t
talked to you in so long! We’ve been busy, and dad’s been sick, and
homework and big projects and work” – and it’s all the typical reasons we give
for why we’ve not made the effort to pick up the phone and call. And we say things like, “we should get
together and go eat during the Christmas break when everyone’s off.” But we don’t.
But we make plans months in advance for the out-of-state friends. We schedule weekends specifically to meet
them. But won’t take 10 minutes to call
the ones across town on a Friday to meet up.
Not sure why that is…but then we run into them at the store again, and
it’s the typical “Boy, I haven’t talked to you in so long! We’ve been
busy, and dad’s been sick, and homework and big projects and work” excuses
again.
And those are the exact same excuses we give for not
talking to God.
When those are the VERY reasons we should be talking to
Him more. We ought to
take more time for our friends, and we ought to make more time for God. I’ll be honest. I’m not the best giver when
it comes to the collection plate. That’s
not to say I’m not generous when it comes to giving when it needs giving, but my
general weekly giving…it needs work. But
here’s the thing. (And it’s principle
proven by games like Candy Crush.) We’ll
throw tons of money at a game to keep from waiting 30 minutes. And why is that? Because there’s no little joint on the corner
called “Time in Flash” – or some rhyming version to make a better analogy to
the Cash place. You can’t offer anything
as collateral to bargain more time.
Father Time is undefeated as they do say. SO while money may be worth a lot, and we may
work hard for it, your time is more valuable.
You might give God 50% of all the money you make, but how much of your time
do you give Him? Even if it’s just to
talk to Him?
Is God worth more to you than 10 minutes
of sleep? Is God worth more to you than
30 minutes of a lunch hour? Is God worth
more to you than a reality TV show? Or
even an obnoxious commercial during the goofy reality show? Well, of course He is!! So why can’t you spare that time to talk to
Him? Get up 10 minutes early…or step out
for 30 minutes of your lunch hour – you know, give up talking to Steve in
accounting for 30 minutes to talk to your Creator. I’m sure Steve’s got juicy gossip, but how
about a little Thank You For Being There For Me chat with God? How many times have you given up an episode
of Honey YooHoo to spend that time praying?
Or when Chuck Woolery says he’ll be back in “two and two”, have you ever
muted the TV and spent that two minutes and two seconds asking for forgiveness
for your shortcomings – or just telling God “Hi, it’s been a good day”?
Oh, I’m sorry, I forgot you were
standing there. Sorta got lost talking
to myself. Although I refuse to ever
watch Honey YooHoo…but the shows I watch are just as important. Maybe say a little prayer during the Duck
Dynasty commercials…or pray by yourself when Phil prays at the end of the
show. If you really stop and think about
it, there are a hundred different times during the day that you could use to
talk to God. Stopped in traffic. Sleeping through a boring update meeting at
work. Standing in line at the
store…instead of griping about the line, take that time to thank God for
allowing you to be alive to talk to Him one more time. Maybe when you’re on hold on the phone for
the doctor’s office, say a little prayer for health…or thank Him for the
doctors. Or when you’re standing there
pushing that elevator button over and over again…you pushed it once, it’s
coming (but that’s a different devotional)…but instead of hitting the “Going
Up” button a hundred times, stop and say a little prayer. It doesn’t have to be a bowed head, hands
folded deal. There are a lot of prayer
positions described in the Bible. Just
clear your mind, take a deep breath, and talk to God for a minute or two.
Time:
Our most valuable asset. And the
one we waste the most. God’s told us
that our days were numbered before we were born. We know that and quote that to other people,
then we squander it anyway. When Job’s
tests were all over…after the loss of riches and family and health and all that
he had lost, God blessed him double what he had before. But through it all, there’s one thing that
Job didn’t get back. Listen for the
Whisper that reminds you that Job didn’t get that time back. So the time you’ve wasted complaining when
you could have been praying is time you’ll not ever see again. When you pray, you have a chance to talk to
the Maker of the Heavens and the Earth.
How awesome is that? Why would we
want to spend our time doing anything else?
So the next time you’re stuck in traffic, or sitting at a restaurant
waiting on your food, or taking a day off and waiting for the cable dude to be at
your place sometime between Monday at 8:00AM and next March, take that time to
do something amazing. Take the time…no, make
the time…to talk to God. Once you get
into the habit of filling in the gaps of your day with little chats, you’ll
want to start purposely setting aside larger parts of your day for deeper
conversations. Jesus Christ WAS God, but
while He was on Earth He took the time to talk to the Father in Heaven. So why shouldn’t we? Like the old hymn says, “Take time to be
holy. Speak oft with the Lord.”
~Dwayne
ListenForTheWhisper@comcast.net
http://listenforthewhisper.blogspot.com
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