An Hour a Day Part 2

A couple of days into my special prayer time, I was kneeling at the recliner in our living room, sitting quietly, listening for the voice of the Lord to speak to my heart. I remembered our pastor telling us how God would sometimes speak a scripture to him to look up and how it would apply to his life. I have heard of others doing this as well. I asked the Lord to give me a scripture like he did those around me. I was quiet. I was listening.

All the sudden Ezekiel 4:12 popped into my head. I wasted no time. I went straight to my Bible in anxious anticipation of what the Lord was going to reveal to me. I read these words: You shall eat it as barley cakes: and bake it using fuel of human waste in their sight.”

HUH? Really? This is the verse you had for me? I shook my head, hoping this was my flesh and not the word the Lord had for me. I told this story to couple of people, hoping for some insight, only to receive laughter. I will never forget what Ezekiel 4:12 reads. I guess that is one way to memorize scripture! God does have a sense of humor!

While working on a Bible study by Donna Pyle on Jeremiah 29:11&12, I came to understand the message that God was trying to teach me. While it is great for me to ask the Lord for revelation, through His word, through words of affirmation by those around me, and through Him speaking directly to my heart, I am to desire what He has for me, not what others have. I desired the type of communication others enjoyed with the Father rather than the communication itself. I wanted to see the Father do for me what He did for others.

I am sure that someday God will choose to use that method of communication to communicate with me. It was not wrong of me to desire Him to communicate with me in that manor. My only error, my only mis-step, was in desiring what other’s have.

Jeremiah 29:11&12 gives us this insight: “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future, then you will call on me, and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you.”

I’m going to add verse 13 as well: “You will seek Me and find Me when you seek Me with your whole heart.”

God has plans for me! Those plans are not leftovers from someone else, they weren’t thought up at the last second, in hopes to appease me. They were mine from the very foundation of the earth. His desire for me, the road that He has chosen for me, was carefully and meticulously set-aside just for me.

I don’t know about you, but that knocks the wind out of me and makes my legs a bit wobbly. God believes in me!

So God knows the plans he has for me, all good mind you, but He wants me to call on Him, pray to Him and seek Him with my whole heart. Ladies, I do not know that I could accomplish that if I wasn’t spending time on my knees!

When Donna Pyle won a contest in which a copy of my novel, Until Forever, was the prize, she graciously offered me one of her Bible studies. After going through the list, she has many wonderful titles, all applicable to our lives, I chose “Our Hope and Future” which is a study of Jeremiah 29:11&12. If you comment on this posting, Donna is offering you this study, completely free of charge as well. She will need your email to forward your copy to you and your email address will not be sold or used for any other purpose. She, as do I, simply desires you to be in the Word of God as much as you can.