What is God Saying?

Do you ever wish you could hear or understand God better? I often wish Jesus would just show up beside me and I could just ask Him whatever I am thinking about. Clyde and his family are planting churches about a days journey the other side of Altamira. Last week we were together at a leadership meeting. I was praying for Clyde and I saw a kind of vision. “I see you splitting wood, and throwing kindling on a fire in order to get it burning. Once it is burning good enough you will be able to move on.”

The next day, as Clyde was taking me to the airport, he told me about what happened the week before. “I made a fire to bar-be-que a big fish.
I invited Poli (the Brazilian church-planter he is working with) and his family for lunch. The fish cooked through on the one side, so I turned it over on the coals. Then I saw that I had used too small of kindling. The coals were almost burned out. I told Poli, ‘I should have used bigger firewood. Now I have to rebuild this fire. I think God is talking to us through this example. We need to invest more in the people we are working with so we can establish churches that will last, and will stay hot over time. We need to get bigger blocks of wood burning, not just some kindling.'”

I find God often speaks random words of encouragement. In my morning devotions I would like to hear God tell me how to heal my family from sickness, or how to help the neighbours with miracles. Instead God often seems to say things like: “Just keep going. This is not a sprint. You are doing a good job. Take a break. Keep watching for Me today. I’m proud of you.”

Here are a few things I have learned about God talking to us:

1. God talks to prophets with dreams and visions.
2. God talked to Moses face to face, directly and not in riddles.
3. The least in the Kingdom of Heaven is greater than the greatest Old Testament prophets.
4. Angels long to look in on these things.
5. Jesus talked clearly to His disciples. It often takes awhile to understand.