Finding God in All Things: Part 5 — A ‘Time With God’ Audio Devotion

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The Lord is my light and my salvation –
whom shall I fear?
The Lord is the stronghold of my life –
of whom shall I be afraid?
…
One thing I ask from the Lord,
this only do I seek:
that I may dwell in the house of the Lord
all the days of my life,
to gaze on the beauty of the Lord
and to seek him in his temple.

Full Chapter: Psalm 27

Transcript

Good morning,

I’m John North, and I meet with you at this time each weekday morning to help you start your day right, and that is by putting God at the center of your day, putting Him first.

You know, so often we have good intentions about spending time with God, and we think, I know I need to, I know I ought to. Maybe one day I will. I know I should. It’s important, I know, but it doesn’t ever happen. Why? Because there’s so many other things in our lives, crowding our lives, crowding time with God out.

One of the best statements on priorities I ever heard was by someone who said, you always have time for the things that you put first. So here we are at the beginning of our day putting God first, and I hope your time with God will not end with our little time together here but will continue on as you spend some time listening to God, speaking to Him, responding to Him, getting to know Him.

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We’re looking this week at the theme of how to find God in all things in my life. The fact is, God wants to be totally involved and he wants you to learn to recognize His involvement in your life.

To see Him as somebody who walks with you all day long, to trust Him no matter what comes, that only comes as you develop a mindset that God is always with you, always for you, always acting in your life.

We’ve looked at some of the foundational principles you need to learn to listen to God. You need to learn to praise God constantly in your life. You need to learn to see Him in all things, to set your mind on things above. You need to recognize too that God is working in your life and wants to be involved in your life so that you will be a witness to other people for Him.

And then today I just want to look at a little phrase that Jesus says quite often.

That is from Matthew 11:15. He who has ears to hear, let him hear.

Now this fits into a specific context here and in other places the context is different, but what Jesus communicates each time when he makes that statement, he who has ears to hear, let him hear, is the idea that, well, probably you have ears, don’t you? And probably your ears can hear.

But He’s making a point of not really just talking about hearing sounds but listening with understanding. That’s the idea, hearing with understanding. He who has ears to hear, he who is prepared to receive what God wants to say, let him hear, then listen.

Hearing with understanding, the goal of listening to God is to gain a greater understanding of what He is saying to you, how He is speaking into your life. When you spend time listening to God, asking Him to lead you, looking for Him in all things, then you begin to sense His presence with you. You begin to gain understanding. You begin to see how God would have you behave in your everyday life, and it leads to a greater development of spiritual strength in your life.

God wants to speak to you. But are you guarded in your relationship with God? Do you fear opening up to Him? What He may want in your life? You need to trust Him. And surrender your life to him and say, Lord, whatever you have to say, I want to receive it. I want to grow. I want to hear from you today.

Why don’t you take a little time right now, express that to God and allow Him to speak to you through His word.

I’m John North.