“Lord,” Ananias answered, “I have heard many reports about this man and all the harm he has done to your holy people in Jerusalem. And he has come here with authority from the chief priests to arrest all who call on your name.”
But the Lord said to Ananias, “Go! This man is my chosen instrument to proclaim my name to the Gentiles and their kings and to the people of Israel.”
Acts 9:13-15 (NIV)
A dialog between Ananias and the Lord took place through a vision. The Lord wanted Ananias to go visit Saul of Tarsus, but Ananias was resistant because every Christian feared Saul, who was notorious for leading the persecution of Christians at the time. Still, the Lord urged Ananias to “Go!” and he finally went.
Yesterday, I shared a true story of a woman who heard an audible voice warning her not to go somewhere and by obeying, she avoided a bomb explosion which saved her life.
God’s Spirit may urge us to go or not to go somewhere. When someone is resistant to the Spirit’s urging, He simply presses them a little harder as in the following true story.
Jim, a devout Christian young man, preparing to go to seminary, heard the Lord speak to him while he was driving home from his restaurant job one night. It was around 11:30 pm, and while he was driving home, the Lord told him to go visit an old friend that he hadn’t seen in a while.
He kept insisting that it was too late at night to bother his friend’s family for a visit, but he felt a strong urge as the Spirit kept pressing him, saying two more times, “Go!” so he finally did. He headed in the direction to visit his old friend for a reason that only God knew.
When he arrived, the parents of his friend were very welcoming. Despite the late time of night, his friend was also happy to see him. Jim and his friend spent time in the man cave of his basement, sharing stories and reminiscing old times from the days together in their church youth group.
When Jim was preparing to leave, his friend looked at him curiously and asked why he came over in the first place. Jim told his friend that he came because God told him to, explaining how the Holy Spirit kept urging him to “go”. His friend invited him to come look at something inside his bathroom. Jim walked into the bathroom and saw a noose hanging there. His friend told Jim that he was going to commit suicide that very night.
Jim’s visit changed his friend’s heart and turned his life around. He had a new awareness that God loved him so much that He urged Jim to come see him late that night. No one is too lost, too depressed or too alone, to keep God from reaching out to them. The Lord could intervene directly in anyone’s life, but He chooses to do it through people. He wants us to know that He isn’t up in the sky somewhere far away, but right here in people like us, where He has chosen to dwell.
We might be prompted to call an old friend, or to pray for someone. Beautiful things happen when people hear and respond to the Holy Spirit. Jim learned that God has no borders regarding time of day to respond to Him.
It doesn’t need to be a dramatic intervention such as preventing a suicide. The Spirit works in odd ways, sometimes just by slowing us down from our busyness, in order to give our time to a lonely person. We never know how it will impact a person’s day.
One day, I was on an errand at a Home Depot store, and an elderly stranger started talking to me. He mentioned that he immigrated here from Greece, which caused me to perk up and tell him that my father was also an immigrant from Greece. He asked what town he was from, and when I told him, he was thrilled because it was a neighboring town that he knew very well.
Nick talked to me for 15 minutes, and before we parted, he told me that I made his day. I’ll never know why a brief dialog with a stranger made Nick’s day, but God knew.
Since then, I believe in the daily providence of God, working through brief interactions with strangers we meet. God is writing people’s stories, and our role is to be whoever God made us to be. As we slow down and listen, someone’s eternal destiny might change for the glory of God.
Lord, help us to live each day with awareness of divine providence, and keep our hearts open to go and share your love with whoever you bring our way. Amen
