There is spooky-like communication between God and His people, “The Lord is close to all of them that call upon Him, to all that call upon Him in truth” (Psalm 145:18).
What is truth? Truth (‘emet
in the Hebrew) is certainty. Truth is that a thesis agrees with reality;
that what the person thinks agrees with what is actual.
God communicates with anyone who believes
THAT He exists enough to communicate with Him. Why does prayer fail so often?
Only because God is not real enough to them; they have doubts that God exists.
There is an eerie communication
between Christians and God. Those who are not Christians fail to understand communication
with the Divine Being.
“Faithful is He that calls you,
who will also do it” (1 Thes 5:24).
The faithfulness of God is the certainty
that He will do what he says He will do. His Word is not to be questioned because
God will always come through for those who trust that He is real. God is always
reality, in fact the very “Existence.” He is Everything as all things come from
Him (John 1:3).
God calls every one of US, and He
responds to those who hear Him by doing something. There is a spooky
action, even at a distance, because “The Lord is close to all of them that call
upon Him.”
The kingdom of God is in another
realm that is not far away, but as close to the person as the person is close
to God, meaning that those the closest to God know Him better than those who
are far away from God. Those who are all the way distant to God, He
chooses not to hear, “We know that God hears not sinners: but if any man be a
worshipper of God, and does His will, him he hears” (John 9:31).
Just as God responds by His
actions, believers must respond to God by their actions. Hence, soon communication
is cut from God. It is like an impedance on the invisible line of
communication. Any faith at all allows some communication, but the more faith,
the better the communication.
Jesus once questioned, “O you of
little faith why do you doubt?” (Mat 14:31). That was a mathematical related
query. Doubt is the reciprocal of faith. Also, the absence of faith is doubt. Perfect
faith is that God who knows for certain that He is God. Anyone else only believes
it to be true but since we are not God, we doubt. The more certain we are that
God is who He says He is, the better the communication. In that God is always
God, if there seems to be no communication, the impedance lies with us.
Now think of an old-time telephonic
line. We cranked the arm on the side of the telephone; it sent a signal to all
those on the same line.
Early phones were party lines
wherein all got the call, but they understood to whom it was intended by the
code within the ringing. (Ours was two shorts and a long ring). Every so often others,
or even everyone on the same line, answered but some eavesdropped on the conversation
because the message was not intended for them.
God calls us all in the same
manner. He calls and the believer answers. His signal, like the code in the
ring, is for certain individuals. He calls everyone but only those who believe
it is Him on the other end, respond. If others eavesdrop, they do not
understand because they do not believe it is God on the line of communication.
Many pray, for instance, but all
they get is silence. God has called them, but they fail to understand that the
message is for them as well as one of the “whosoever” in John 3:16. He calls
all, but few here the ring let alone the message. That is not God’s fault but
the impedance in the line of communication. There is indeed a “silver cord”
between you and God and Solomon wrote about it. It is a line of communication
for only those who know God is on the other end.
The impedance on our direct line to
God is doubt. Many fail to believe that God calls or that there even is a God.
How can anyone communicate with God unless they trust that it is Him who calls?
It is not that God does not hear the prayers of sinners, but ignores them
because they are not His people, or that His people have drifted so far away
that they do not heed Him. They are mere interlopers who try to get God to do
things when everything else fails!
Many Christians do not heed God
because of impedance. Sin is so dominant in their minds that they fail to even
think of God. Nobody can commune with Satan and put him on “hold” as they
futilely try to commune with God. God knows just who is on “hold” as the
Christian hurried communicates with Him, as if the person cannot wait any
longer to get back to communion with Satan. In a sense, God hangs up because of
the silence on the other end from those Christians who are so distant and vain to
hurriedly commune with Him.
Most people know that there is a
Satan because he is always there in action. He speaks through other devices
that are always handy. His speech is limited, and since it is, Satan uses the
things of the world to commune with mankind: things like movies, television,
music, books, magazines, and recreations of all sorts. He mimics God who also
communes through His actions.
The actions of Satan are
enjoyable, even thrilling. The actions of God are always peace and joy. Joy is
not an emotional leaping, but contentment when a Christian is at peace with God.
The test for truth with God is
our actions as well, not that we are to act like Christians but that our
thoughts and behaviors are like Christ’s.
Of course, we cannot walk on
water because, like Peter who sank, all Christians have some doubt despite what
they say.
Those who say they “know that
they know that they know” imply that they are God because only God is certain
of His Identity. People like that are lying to you, to God, and to themselves.
The “faith of God” (Rom 3:3) is that God is certain of who He is. You
may say that you are certain, but each sin is an expression of doubt.
Adam’s woman sinned because she
doubted God. She had God in her but that was not enough. The fruit was more
pleasant to her than having God within. She traded her soul for things. That
was the birth of sin, and to this day, many Christians trade their rebirth for
some stronghold of sin. Whatever that stronghold is chokes off communication with
God and His actions are limited. Not that God gets weaker, but you do. Your
actions are the impedance on good and clear communication with God. His actions
are only limited by your actions and actions are the dynamics of divine
communication.
God is always on the “line” to
everyone who belong to Him — those who are paired, entangled, or engendered with
Him (“born again;” John 3:7). If we seem distant from God, it is us who are distant.
Impedance increases with distance on any telephonic line and God’s “silver cord”
is no different. God is always nearby but sin distances Christians more so with
each sin until they are so far away that God is no longer real to them. Soon,
they fall all the way away (Heb 6:6), not because God abandoned them, but they
distanced themselves from God a little at a time until the line of
communication was “loosed” as Solomon wrote it (Ecc 12:6). That according to
Solomon is “death.”
Death is not the cessation of
physical life but the loss of communion with God. Sometimes death comes quickly
because all are stillborn in the manner of David (Psalm 51:5) who was “shapen
in inequity.” If even a Christian dallies with Satan long enough, God doesn’t
hang up; “leave nor forsake you” (Heb 13:5), but it may be you that gets so
distant from Him that He is no longer real to you. God does limit His
actions to them that get far away from Him. We don’t know how far away is too
far, but be sure it is when God gets no time in the lives of Christians.
Sometimes I pray hurriedly as if
I have no time for God. Oftentimes, when I have temptations, I pray even more
hurriedly, or even cease to pray at all because I know that I do not deserve
for my prayers to be answered. I know that God is always close to me, but with
each sin, I get further away from Him. I know how far I have drifted when God ceases
being dynamic in my life. Answers to prayer is how I know how close I am to God.
If we do not communicate with God
does not mean that He is gone, but we have drifted too far, so far that we do
not hear Him.
Sometimes God does something to
get our attentions. For the Jews, several times, he allowed their enemies to destroy
most of them; and they were humbled. Perhaps when bad things happen to us, it
is God’s actions to get our attention. Perhaps my encounter with catastrophe
this very week was to wake me up and to strengthen my own communication with
the Word, and here I am… in the Word!
All we need to do is to get a better line; for us to get closer to God and that is heeding His Word from the Bible.
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