"Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, who confidence is in him.
He will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream.
It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green.
It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit"
No doubt in my mind that I should have been on here sooner, surely typing up thoughts, words or even passages of scripture is something I can make time for???
Then it hit me, I have been so busy planning, diarising and meticulously organising the new call on my life in moving to Brighton, that I had simply shot off the starting line and gone full steam ahead into 'cope' mode.
God calling me into a huge, bustling and bright city like Brighton was something of a shock to me, as I for one, do not usually hear from God, well not in the way I would like anyway. You imagine hearing loud speakers of 'Naomi your going the wrong way' or Flashing lights on motorway signs, or even huge billboards with words written just for you, but this is not the way God will speak to everyone and is certainly not the way God had spoken with me in the past. To be honest even if he had, I am not sure I would have even noticed, I probably would have said "what a coincedence". Thankfully my knowledge of the way God works in our lives is growing, my desire to learn more about him is developing at an ever increasing rate and I simply cherish those times when I sit in his presence. Now through scripture, incredible teaching and testimones, I am more aware of lots of these 'Godincedences' and am desperately slowing up my pace of life to see, enjoy and be greatful for these times of God working in my life.
God speaks in may ways but his quiet, small voice can be too quiet for the even the most seasoned of listeners, making those 'hard of hearing' feeling left out in the cold. When I say hard of hearing, I am talking about brothers and sisters in Christ that like me don't stop enough and in silence wait on him, one can be so desperate to hear God speaking with them that they even forget to listen! Someone said to me once 'why do you think God gave us two ears and only one mouth'? We definately need both of those ears, we need to learn to turn them on, tune them in and allow them time to listen. Really the point of this little picture is that we should be listening to God more and talking less!
Leaving my 60hr working week, my home, family and personal space behind in very rural Seagry, Wiltshire I have suddenly realised how noisy my life had become. There really wasn't room for silence, I was so busy that the noise just filled my every crevice of my being and I barely noticed. There is a profound silence right now, Yes! I can hear a bird singing, Yes I can hear the buses passing on the road outside and workmen destroying the house opposite....... but these sounds would have been swalloed into the noise before...... I can finally listen!
My ears were deafened and I feel like they are in a time of healing...... a time where still and quiet silence will allow my ears to restore the level of hearing that God intended. God is not silent, we just need to prepare ourselves to hear him and prepare our lives to receive what we has to say. God will not suddenly start speaking to me in the way I want or I would prefer, more like he is waiting on me, for me to be waiting on him. Giving God my all, making him my desperate need and desire before anything else.
"He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust" Pslam 91
I am learning to wait, learning to trust in the God that has a perfect plan for me and that does mean trusting and waiting patiently with no map for the road ahead. Imagine being blind-folded and being guided through every part of life...... if you didn't trust the person holding your hand then you would probably not take even a single step, however if the person holding your hand was the person you trusted the most and had the most confidence in then you would step out in faith, knowing that you would be cared for, looked out for and provided for.
That is exactly how God wants us to be, stepping 0ut in faith, confidently knowing and trusting that he is the ONLY way! His ways are good and only he can make our paths straight!
"Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding: in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight" Proverbs 3 v 5-6
"The Lord will keep you from all harm, he will watch over your life; the Lord will watch over your coming and going both now and for ever more" Psalm 121
