Have you ever felt like saying, "Boy, did I ever blow it."? If you haven't you’re either very blessed, or very blind. Well I pulled one of these one day years back. It had to do with a pen, a checkbook and two little voices.
I had woken up before the rest of the house on a Saturday morning. I straightened up, got my bible and started a pot of coffee. Just as I heard the first sounds of coffee dripping my wife came down the stairs. "Perfect timing," I said. "I just put a pot of coffee on."
She sat at the table and looked at the clock. "I should go to the store while Rachel is still asleep."
Good plan, I thought. A Saturday morning food store run is not my idea of bliss. So my wife got a piece of paper and sat down to write a list. "Do you have a pen?" I said I had one in my bag. So I went to get it. It was in the checkbook.
Now my wife and I each carried a checkbook at the time. They were on the same account. I kept one to pay the bills from, she had the other for food shopping. As I picked up the checkbook I thought, "Maybe I should give her the checkbook too." But then I reasoned that she might find this to authoritative, to overbearing. After all she is a grown woman. If she needed the checkbook, she'd let me know. So I just brought her the pen.
About a half an hour after she left I saw her walking up the walkway. She didn't look happy. I went to the door to meet her. "What's up?" I asked. "Why isn't there any money in the account? I just tried to use the MAC machine and it won't let me take money out. This is ridiculous. Where's your checkbook? "
I could have gone into an explanation of how she had gotten to the bank late the day before with the deposit so it wouldn't show up until Monday. I could have said, "You knew there wasn't any money available. I told you that you had to write a check." I could have said a lot of things. But from the look of disappointment on her face I could only say, "I'm sorry sweetheart." But it wasn't because I had done something to her. She could tell you that. She was frustrated that she had to come home again. She probably knew that she had no checks and forgot about the money. What I was sorry for was the fact that I hadn't listened to God.
When I said "I thought", I should have said, "I heard." He tried to tell me she would need the checkbook. But the enemy played on my fear of offending her. And I listened to the wrong voice. Had I just recognized His voice then I would not have seen the look of disappointment in my wife's eyes. I wouldn't have felt like a failure.
So many times we do the same to our Father in heaven. He whispers to us and we call it something else. We hear Him call us and we say, "Just a minute, I have another call." We reason in our own understanding, rather that believing that He cares enough to speak to us, even in what we think are small matters.
As you go about your day… listen. Give God the glory and the credit, acknowledge Him, and recognize that those moments when “you think” it may be that “you hear” the voice of the Father.
SDG
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