In his book Directions, author James Hamilton shares this insight about listening to God: “Before refrigerators, people used icehouses to preserve their food. Icehouses had thick walls, no windows, and a tightly fitted door. In winter, when streams and lakes were frozen, large blocks of ice were cut, hauled to the icehouses, and covered with sawdust. Often, the ice would last well into the summer. It happened that one day a man lost a valuable watch while working in an icehouse. He searched diligently for it, carefully raking through the sawdust, but he didn’t find it. His fellow workers also looked, but their efforts, too, proved futile. A small boy who heard about the fruitless search slipped into the icehouse during the noon hour and soon emerged with the watch. Amazed, the men asked him how he found it. ‘I closed the door,’ the boy replied, ‘lay down in the sawdust, and kept very still. Soon I heard the watch ticking.’”
Often, the question is not whether God is speaking, but whether we are being still enough, and quiet enough, to hear. Yes, Jesus assures us that our Heavenly Father always listens to us, but do we really listen to God? Worthy advice for this week: follow the instructions of Psalm 46, 11 – “Be still, and know that I am God.”
