At Christmastime we sing, *Do You Hear What I Hear? And Christafari sings Listening, encouraging us to listen to God’s voice in the midst of all that is going on around us. It’s great to listen to the advice of others, especially, to God’s word. But we probably should listen more often.
How many times have people not taken counsel and then lived to regret it? Ignoring counsel might be because it doesn’t make sense to us, we think it’s silly, or we think we know more than the one advising.
I’m currently reading NIGHT by Elie Wiesel and he tells of a quiet man who’d sing and chant, who was taken with other men by the Germans. After digging a mass grave, he witnessed their execution. Wounded and left for dead, he was able to make his way home. He shared with everyone the horrors to come but was laughed at and ridiculed. Even after the enemy moved into the neighborhood, his words fell on deaf ears, until it was too late. The singing man stopped singing. He was never the same.
Traveling back in time, consider the amount of mockery Noah and his sons faced for over a century of building an ark on dry ground when as yet it had never rained. That was like someone making a spacesuit a century before the concept of flying entered men’s minds, or aircrafts existed. Over a billion people perished because they didn’t listen to Noah until the heavens opened and the rains came down. But by then, it was too late; God had shut the door (Genesis 7:16).
When Elie Wiesel was herded onto train wagons where many would never again see life, like others, he wished he had listened.
How about you? Will you wait until it’s too late to change your fate to listen to God’s voice? Are you waiting for someone to grab you by the collar and shake you left and right before listening? Or maybe you’re waiting for Ethel Mermen to tell you, “Will you shut up and listen to me…Sylvester!!! (It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World).
Oh, He’s not trying to scare you! He’s trying to save you from yourself and from Satan’s lies. Ultimately, millions are waiting for that midnight train, not to Georgia, but to eternity to attempt to save themselves. Friend, it’ll be too late then! Besides, we can’t save ourselves! Jesus alone can save us, and He’s already done it!
So, listen to me! “And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt. And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars forever and ever” (Daniel 11:2,3).
God Bless!
Sam
*1962 Noel Regney and Gloia Shayne Baker