Stubborn Ears!

This was originally typed on Febuary 12, 2012.  I just found it this morning when I was cleaning out drafts, but I thought it worth publishing.

Greetings All,

It has been one of those weeks, with meeting after meeting that eats into my time to make blog posts and I would like to tell you that it is slowing down, but the Lexington District Clergy have a meeting with the Bishop this afternoon.  Amidst the busyness, I wanted to share this with you from my quiet time this morning. Let's start with scripture:

Num 24:10 "At that Balak was very angry with Balaam, beat his hands together and said, 'I summoned you to denouce my enemies and three times, you have persisted in blessing them.  Off with you to your own place!'" from The New English Bible

 Balak has brought prophet Balaam to curse Israel before they go into battle.  We all know Balaam from the story where his donkey speaks to him to chastise him for his behavior, but this is the rest of that story.  Despite beating his donkey, Balaam in coming to Balak has professed that he will only speak the words the Lord gives to him and that is what he does.  The Lord speaks only blessings of Israel to Balaam and those blessings are what he has professed before Balak.  Each time those words are professed Balak gets upset and brings Balaam to a new place to look at Israel from a different angle hoping that in seeing them in a different light Balaam will profess what Balak wants to hear, curses against Israel.  Each time Balaam professes only the words of the Lord and not what Balak wants to hear so Balak finally gets mad and sends Balaam away.  He refuse to listen to God because God is not telling him what he wants to hear.

How often is that true for us?  How often do we ask for a word from God, words of encouragement, direction, decision, or even of blessing and God does speak to us, but not what we want to hear so we ignore Him?  God will respond to us when we call upon Him, but we must be prepared to accept what He has to say.  He is the creator of the universe and He knows what is best for us; yes, even better than we know for ourselves.  Balak's stubborn refusal to listen to God doesn't end well for him and the same is true for us, when we persist in our stubbornness and refuse to listen to God because we don't like what He has to say, it will not end well for us.  The question before each of us today is simply this: "When we seek God's face and word are we willing to accept what He has to say, or will we persist with our stubborn ear, refuse to listen and go our own way?

Your brother in Christ,
Faron