Hearing His Voice #13

I am the LORD who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans to give you this land as your possession.

Genesis 15:7

The man’s business was going well, even growing, and the future seemed bright. But one day he heard God tell him to hold a going-out-of-business sale and close his doors. On the surface, it seemed like bad advice, and his wife thought so too. Surely this couldn’t be God’s will. Maybe the man had misheard. But God doesn’t give bad advice, and sometimes His voice can’t be so easily dismissed as a misunderstanding. This word was clear. So the man went out of business and, in the painful aftermath, remained unemployed for a year.

What went wrong? Had God misled him? No, after a year of second-guessing God, he saw how the Lord began to provide new opportunities. The career change ended up being one of the best things that ever happened to this couple. They have prospered ever since. But it wasn’t easy at first. Following God rarely is. It takes time to see the fruits of obedience.

This is a common theme in Scripture. God called Abraham to leave home and go to a land He would show him later. Abraham had plenty of opportunities to second-guess his decision to follow—his wife was even captured at one point—but God eventually vindicated his faith. Plenty of other people in the Bible were led in seemingly absurd directions, yet following always proved to be the right thing to do. That’s what life is like when you believe God speaks. He leads in ways that, on the surface, don’t always make sense.

But His ways do make sense, and eventually we are able to see how. Hearing and responding to His voice is a real possibility. Others may question our hearing, but their voices aren’t the ones we follow. We follow God into whatever land He shows us.

Lord, if You will speak to me clearly, I’ll go in any direction You tell me, regardless of what other people think about it or how much sense it makes to me at the time. My steps belong to You.