11/7/08
Walking around the parking lot I was trying to be observant, I did notices new flowers (okay they are weeds that flower), they were purple and fuzzy and I liked seeing them. I’m trying to hold onto signs of summer for as long as possible in this autumnal season. It’s not that I don’t want the season to change (actually if I’m honest I don’t want the leaves to leave, don’t like naked trees, and I don’t like cold) I really just want to hold on to as much life in what seems like a season that things die. Ask me why leaves have to fall and I will tell you why they physically do but why they have to, I haven’t a clue. It seems to me that if Live Oak, Cedar and yeah the commonly found up here, Pines don’t have to lose their foliage then everyone should have the equal opportunity to keep theirs as well. Down seasons, hibernation seems like a waste of valuable time to me. Then it’s probably a good thing I’m not in charge because it’s a personal preference. So I decide today to close my eyes, figuratively since I don’t want to fall on my face, and listen to the sound of fall. I instantly noticed the sound of the leaves clicking across the pavement. If you are a Stargate fan you will be able to identify what it sounded like to me if I say, it sounded like replicators. Those little machines that don’t reproduce but replicate themselves and are usually identified by the characters of Stargate by the clicking sound that precedes actually seeing them. With a vivid imagination I was able to picture little leaf replicators skittering across the parking lot on some insidious plot to cover up my flowers and frustrate people with rakes by replicating over night to spread across their yards ad infinitum. It seems like a never ending cycle (at least in areas not privileged to be southerly enough to escape this plot of nature) to be mowing, weeding, raking, or shoveling with a few respites in between.
I shut out the replicating leaves and I heard birds and insects which aren’t season harbingers except maybe in greater numbers in warmer season and I heard crickets. I was struck by the fact that these sounds had to have been there all the time but I had not noticed them due to my preoccupation with sight and my own thought processes. Kinda reminded me of the ‘he that has ears, listen up’ Scriptures, it seems we can have ears but be so preoccupied that we aren’t listening. How often do I have people telling me Abba isn’t talking to them, they just don’t hear the way I do, they can’t get an answer to something they’ve been praying about? A lot actually. I know there are times when He might be silent for one reason or other but He is not pouty and is willing to speak to us, perhaps the issue is the way we are trying to hear. An audible voice from heaven might be nice once we’ve been resuscitated from the shock, but with this would come great responsibility that most of us really don’t want to take on. He speaks through Scripture but then we have to make sure we are listening with unbiased ears so as to hear what He is actually meaning in a passage. He can speak in that inner voice by Ruach who dwells in us (in my opinion the most common way He speaks) but to really hear that inner voice we must still our own and that is a task that many seem to have problems with. We know the Scripture says we walk by faith, not by sight, what we trust that keeps us moving along (2 Cor. 5:7) and that faith comes by hearing, or belief comes by hearing the spoken Word of God (Rom. 10:17). My simple advice is stop looking around so much, being driven by what you see and feel, still your mind and listen for He promised His sheep would know His voice. Then open your eyes and step out in confidence with His word resounding in your heart and spirit.
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