Listening to God

Isa 30:21

21        And thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, This is the way, walk ye in it, when ye turn to the right hand, and when ye turn to the left. (KJV)

Have you ever gone somewhere and gotten the impression that you were supposed to do something, but ignored the prompting within?  I have.  My husband has.  We had an example of that the other day when we went canoeing.  We had made plans to go Canoeing down the Guadalupe River all the way to the state park from a camp ground -it would have been an 8 mile trip.  We had tried a 4 mile trip which went well and was fun.  So this time plans were made and started for an 8 mile trip.  As you can guess by now, something interfered.  We were taking with us in the boat our cell phone and I remember thinking to myself it would be foolish not to take it stuffed into a ziplock bag or two, just in the event that we capsized.  But instead of listening to that, I passed up bringing any ziplock bag with us and my husband said he had a plastic bag in the car so we went on without it.  Interesting thing-that very thought had occurred to him too, that phone should be packaged in a bag that would make it safe from damage should we capsize.  He did have a bag, a zip lock type which he stuck the phone in.  So we take off, and manage the river pretty well until we reach some rapids that had some good sized boulders in it.  The last time we had gone around these boulders, but this time my husband suggested we try going inbetween some of them.  Well, we did try and did capsize.  It took me a little while to get somewhere to get my footing and I was really grateful for the life jacket I had on.  Mike, on the other hand when he went overboard, was floating down the middle of the river -he had even gone under the boat which was then floating upside down, and he had gotten scraped up a little, and when I first was able to get over to the side of the river near a bank, there he was going down the river holding on to the overturned canoe and was trying to get it right side up.  He called me to join him and after discovering my shoes were hindering me I took them off and left them and the paddle that was still in my hand on the bank as the paddle was no help, and swam toward him, but not with any decent speed.  At the same time, he was approaching another set of rapids, so I hollered to him to let the boat go as I knew he could get more hurt by the rapids trying to hold on to it.  He did let it go and finally as he got near the rapids was able to get a footing in some shallow water.  So as I am coming along-I take a look and see him on his feet and he motions me to swim to the other side of the river where we could climb out.  We succeeded.  After going up the hill a little way, Mike checks his pockets-had a vest with lots of pockets in it. The phone was still there, and so were the car keys.  The card with the campground and the brochure I had had in one pocket were gone.  And here I am in stocking feet getting to walk on wild ground, which was grassy so I was fortunate.  God did protect us from really getting hurt, no doubt about it.

However the phone was a different story. It was irreversibly damaged.  The bag it had been in had come open and the phone had been soaked.  So no way to call for help.  So besides canoeing that day we had the privilege of hiking back to the camp ground, me in my socks, and him still with his shoes on.  Even though the grass was high, a lot was laid flat and made a soft and safe, thorn free surface to walk on.  But there were spots where we were on a hill side climbing over logs and tree stumps that had been washed onto the side of the hill by past floods and we had to be careful at times where we stepped and sometimes even to testing whether something could hold our weight.  So we did have our little hike -about a mile and a half or two-don’t know how far-and fortunately we were heard by a couple who were on the bank opposite.  A lady was able to direct us across a shallow part of the river and the man and his wife drove us the rest of the way to the camp.  We were wondering how we would find a shallow way across to get to the camp.  And of course, with God’s ways, a coincidence happened.  As if it were really a coincidence.  The lady happened to be a retired Spanish teacher who had taught my daughter-in-law and two of her sisters in high school.

So what is the moral of this story?  When you get those inner promptings, heed them.  It is most likely that it is the Holy Spirit warning you to do something to prevent something from happening that He knows is going to happen if you don’t listen.  It is obvious God knew we were going to capsize and was trying to save us some problems, possibly even some money.  You see, God does care about ALL the details of our lives and was trying to help us protect that phone.  Sad to say, neither of us listened very well.  I believe it has taught the both of us to listen and heed more closely and readily to the promptings He gives. 

Next time we do something, we will be a lot more sensitive to His voice.

I really praise God for His watchfulness and for taking such good care of us.  The scrapes we got were nothing compared to what could have happened.  And I want to encourage you too to heed His voice-these promptings you get within, because many times it really IS His voice.  So remember the verse-I shall much more readily-

Isa 30:21

21        And thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, This is the way, walk ye in it, when ye turn to the right hand, and when ye turn to the left. (KJV)

Have a great weekend.  Your Good News Lady