Do you Write?

 Teach me Your way, O Lord, that I may walk and live in Your truth; unite my heart to fear Your name. Psalm 86:11   Added to this request is the result that flows from God doing this good work in us.  "I will praise You, O Lord my God, with all my heart, and I will glorify Your name forevermore. For great is Your mercy toward me."

When we let God teach us and we choose to receive His Word with meekness, our hearts are transformed or "healed" to realize He is worthy of all our affection.  Sometimes we let other things in our minds and hearts and simply forget what we read and how good He is. Therefore, it is necessary for God to unite the various desires of our heart, or at least refocus on what really matters, so we can praise Him with all our heart. 

Which brings me to my question for the day: Do you write?  God told Moses to write a book of remembrance.   In Habakkuk 2:2 God instructs the prophet to "Write the vision and make it plain on tablets, that he may run who reads it."  Likewise, Psalm 103 reminds us to "forget not His benefits."  I suggest the reason God's Word tells us to "write" and "forget not" is because in the fallen human condition we do forget.  We can look in the mirror of God's perfect law of liberty and forget what we look like, according to James.

Here are two suggestions and my reasons for establishing this practice.  First, whenever I sit down to write this blog, it forces me to seek God and decide in my heart what I believe He is saying.  Writing it down and sharing with you actually settles the truth for me!  Secondly, as a high school teacher, I require my students to take notes rather than just think they are going to remember what is said.  Therefore, I suggest that having a notebook and jotting down the key points that the Holy Spirit is giving you is a powerful way to not only hear God, but then to "walk and live in Your truth."   This is also a helpful way to "let the Word dwell in you richly," as instructed in Colossians 3:16.

God's voice is so much closer than we think.  He lives in us and prompts our every thought and desire.  "In Him we live and move and have our being," according to Acts.  However, we are required to take every thought captive to obey Christ, because Jesus stated that we know the Shepherd's voice but do not know the voice of strangers.  This suggests discernment or choosing the right one and rejecting the wrong one.  Rather than just having a myriad of different thoughts or voices, writing, to the best of our discernment what we believe or determine is God's voice, helps us focus on the truth.  Writing this message down also reinforces our thought process to remember and think about what He is saying to us. 

 

Humble man asks and depends upon God to teach us.  However, we also want to be faithful like Mary "treasuring the word" and like Samuel who "didn't let a word from God drop to the ground."  Receive the Word, write it down, and let the Word dwell in you richly.  These simple steps will cause you to grow in wisdom, understanding, and especially in bearing fruit.