Is God Trying to Tell Us Something?

Dearest Saints

     When people often pray for the windows of Heaven to open up and pour out a blessing, I believe the Lord was revealing something to me.  When we think that God has shut the windows of Heaven on His people, it is not so much that God has shut the windows on us, but I believe it is more like we have shut the windows of Heaven from allowing God to work on our behalf.  In other words, God always wants to pour out rich blessings in abundance in every arena of our lives because Christ Jesus mentions that the thief (satan) is the one who wants to kill, steal and destroy our lives, but Jesus came to give us not only life, but life in abundance to the full, til it overflows (John 10:10 Amplified version).  To me, it's not so much that God purposely hinders us from receiving His blessings, but we have tied the hands of God who wants to do so much in our lives.  The things that I find that we have hindered God from opening up the windows of Heaven is often because we are filled with doubt, we fear, we worry or we simply don't believe He cares and loves us like He tells us.  We fail to believe His Word to the extent we need to.  We may not tell God in direct terms by our doubt of His care for us, but we may often act with doubt.  The doubts that often come is thinking we are never good enough for God to answer our prayers, or that He will hear the prayers of others, but not yours.  The only times I know that He won't hear our prayers is when we harbour iniquity in our heart (Ps 66:18), when we doubt (James 1:6-8), when we don't honor our wives (1 Pet 3:7) or perhaps not honoring His Word like we should (Prov 28:9).  We put ourselves in a difficult position when God is often trying to get our attention to get us to deal with our heart. 

 

     Other times we may find ourselves shutting the windows of Heaven when we fail to put Christ first in our lives.  In the parable of the Banquet feast (Luke 14:16-24), the master invites His Chosen ones to join with Him in the Banquet.  There were three types of people He speaks about.  One of them just purchased his land which he wanted to go see instead of accepting His invitation.  The second one had just bought 5 yoke of oxen and wanted to examine and approve of them.  Then the third type of person is the one who made the excuse because he just got married.  Each of these types of people will always make an excuse rather than putting the Lord first.  Each of these people represent a number of Christians who may be making excuses.  The first type of person is the type who would rather put their worldly possessions ahead of Christ.  He would rather count and see what he has.  The second person who purchased the oxen to do the work is the type of person who puts work or their employment ahead of Jesus.  In other words, he or she allows work to consume their lives that often interferes with advancing our relationship with God first.  These people forget that God is the true employer we really work for.  The third type of person who mentioned about being married relates to the people who put relationships with one another ahead of Jesus.  Although it is important to have good relationships with one another, however, it is wrong in Gods sight when it interferes from putting our relationship with Him first and foremost.  When I watched a video that mentioned this, it was a real eye opener and mentions that just because we call ourselves Christians, we need to question ourselves about putting any of these ahead of our Lord Jesus?  He mentions in vs 24 of that parable that the ones who were invited who made excuses will not be able to taste His Supper He has prepared for them.  In other words, when He comes to receive us, will we be prepared?  Many Kings in the Old Testament were made right in Gods sight when they had to break down idols that were previously built.  Could these be one of many idols we have built up ourselves?

 

     Perhaps when we do go through trials, could it be that we may be falling in to one of these traps and the Lord is trying to get our attention?  Have we been consumed with focusing our total attention on what we can get out of this life, rather than living by fulfilling His purposes to why we were created in the first place (Isa 43:7).  When I realize often that I make a determined decision and commitment to serve the Lord, it is through one of many trials that causes me to examine my ways and redirect my life that I needed to be focused to seek the Lords direction by putting Him first.  Often times from my past, I was so focused on fulfilling my lifes interest while leaving little concern for others.  It may not seem like He cares when we do go through hard times, but when I look back on my life, He uses these situations to put us in a position to prepare us to be mightily used or at times, to redirect our lives and to help us stop putting too much of our attention on this temporal world we live in.  When we question God about circumstances and complain to Him about why we go through what we do and become rebellious, do we think that we will ever outsmart Him or be justified by remaining to doubt and question Him?  When we think we can ever be justified questioning God, we will always find ourselves being ashamed of overlooking situations He was trying to get our attention what we realize we need to heed to.  When we do go through trials, we need to stop questioning God and humble ourselves before Him, ask and expect Him to lead us to what He is trying to lovingly teach us.  We will be able to hear from Him when we get ourselves in a position when we are ready to give Him our full attention and seek His counsel and direction.  We need to remember that His thoughts outnumber the grains of sands of this world (Psalm 139:17,18) while our finite minds may fill only one sizeable bucket (if that)!  

 

     When I think of messages like this, it is one that I believe is a turning point for each one to get our perspective right before Him and put our life priorities in the right sequence by putting God first in our lives.  When we do, we will never look back with any regret.  We will be able to look back and thank Him for caring enough to try to get our attention to move forward in the right direction, even though it may be getting our attention through trials.  May this be a turning point for you to receive richer eternal rewards because of it. 

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In the Matchless Name of Jesus
Richard
Associate Director
Answers2Prayerhttp://sites.google.com/site/greatestbuilderforourlife