Welcome to a new weekly feature on The Hill…

Tuned in Thursdays…Listening to God

You may have noticed from previous posts, that I am having a difficult time lately in my walk with God. I have been feeling like I may have missed an important road sign and I went one way…and God went the other. Early this morning while sitting here on the porch, I noticed an envelope fall out of the back of my Bible. I picked it up and opened it. Inside I saw the little slip of paper with My Decision to receive Christ as my personal Savior and my Certificate of baptism:

In obedience to the command of our Lord Jesus Christ and in the imitation of His example Sissy B. was buried with Him in baptism, March 18, 1993.

How long ago that seems…both by the calendar and in my heart.

In a previous post I wrote about the fine art of listening. Being the educator that I am, I began to do a little research about listening to God. I found a great article at All About God.

If you want to hear God speak, you must be quiet. It means making a deliberate choice to block out the chaos that swirls around our daily activities. It means learning to focus your thoughts in an ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder) world.

There was also no surprise when I read that the Bible is one of the main tools through which God speaks. But I needed this reminder…listening to God requires a heart committed to understanding His message. It is here that I felt God slapping me on the back of the head. “Your heart, dummy, look at your heart…is it fully surrendered to Me?” For “God honors the heart that is fully surrendered to Him” Psalm 40:8 Sadly the answer has been no. Hence, my need for a fresh start with God. So please join me as I embark on some new “first steps”. I hope you enjoy the journey.

For a frest start with God there are certain things that I need to place in my heart and believe.

I need to believe that I am a new person in Christ. That I have truly placed my faith in Him and invited Him into my heart. But I need to understand that I am not instantly made perfect.

“What this means is that those who become Christians become new persons. They are not the same anymore, for the old is gone, a new life has begun” 2 Corinthians 5:17

I need to believe that I have been adopted into God’s family. I am a child of God. He wants to have a relationship with me. I need to believe that because I am His child he will:

• feed me
• direct me
• protect me
• give me strength

But I need to understand that a relationship is a state of connectedness between two entities…I need to include myself in the equation, it cannot be one sided.

“His unchanging plan has always been to adopt us into His own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ. And this gave him pleasure.” Ephesians 1:5

Restarting this journey takes trust. Trust in God’s character, trust in God’s plan and trust in God’s goals. I must listen carefully and follow closely. To do this I must do these things daily, not just every thirteen years or so:

• I must admit that I have sinned and that I am not walking in oneness with God.
• I must repent of my sins and turn to God.
• I must receive, by faith, His forgiveness based on His dying on the Cross for me.
• I must open my life to receive Him as my living, resurrected Lord and Savior who has promised to come and indwell in me by His Spirit and live in me as the Savior and Master of my life.
• I must walk with Him day by day…reading and listening to His Word, spending time talking with Him in prayer…and realizing the role He has in my life.

Dear God, help me as I begin this fresh start and learn to listen to you more clearly. In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen.

I am using the Following God Discipleship Series as a basis for this fresh start with God.