Do you believe that God can speak to you? Did you ever wonder why you opened to a particular passage in the Bible that was relevant, and wonder if it was because of divine intervention? Perhaps you are being divinely guided.
Looking back on the first day of the National Flute Association convention that I was exhibiting at in Chicago this August, I asked God to speak a special blessing to me. I was anxious, as is normal for a big show, and concerned that I might not recoup the cost of exhibiting, or of not making enough sales in a traditionally slow month to pay my bills at the end of the month. I own The Flute Loft, a musical instrument business.
So on day one, just before going down to the convention hall, I asked God to speak to me through His Word. I randomly opened my Bible and began reading. I opened to Psalm 150, a psalm of praise. Psalm 150:4 said “praise him with strings and flutes”. Was it purely by accident or coincidence that I opened to this passage? I don’t believe so.
For those of you that believe that I randomly opened to this verse was just coincidence, I will not convince you otherwise, but I believe God was trying to get my attention. The reference to the musical instrument flute, was I believe, divine timing, and really got my attention being that I was exhibiting flutes at a flute convention. However, whether it was a flute or some other instrument really doesn’t matter. What God wanted me to know from His Word was to always remember to praise Him in all things, and to trust in Him for my success. And with praise comes trust in God and God’s abundant grace.
How do we praise God? We praise God with strong faith, with love for Him for which He is delighted, and with the confidence that He is in control. So then, what God was trying to get through to me was, “Don’t be anxious. Don’t worry about what tomorrow will bring, but live for the moment. Relax in My presence and trust me for your fortune and destiny, for I will always be by your side. Now just trust me and let go. And remember to praise Me always for I delight in it”.
Copyright 2014 by Bill Hutzel
Thank you for sharing such a special moment, Bill. May God continue to bless you.
Thank you Carla. I pray also that God would pour out His blessing on you.
Do you remember when I broke my wrist the day before Storm Sandy? Of course you do. And you also remember that we played a concert together one week after I had my cast removed. “Remarkable! Simply amazing”, the doctor exclaimed. But do you also remember the events immediately after I broke my wrist? God spoke to me in the same manner as He did through His Word the morning of the NFA Convention. Some would refer to this as the simultaneous occurrence of events that appear significantly related but have no discernible causal connection. I call it divine guidance.
In the devotional “Jesus Calling” for August 20th it said “As you grow more and more intimate with Me, I reveal My will to you more directly. When the time is right, I prompt you to ask …” So I asked God for a special blessing. “Ask and you will receive”, the Bible says.
Let me remember back to the days following Storm Sandy. God started showing me random verses in the Bible. One such verse was “Without faith it is impossible to please God” (Hebrews 11:6). The day that I broke my wrist, I prayed fervently for God’s healing, and God would hear my prayer.
One answer to prayer was first affirmed when on the day after the storm I went out to look at the devastation on my property created by Sandy and found five “trees uprooted”. Read the following excerpt from my post “Into the Storm”. “When I came back in the house, I randomly opened my Bible directly to a passage in Job, chapter 19 verse 10, that said “He breaks me down on every side (which He certainly did), and I am gone; and he UPROOTED MY HOPE LIKE A TREE”. WOW!, that got my attention in a big way! I don’t believe that this was a coincidence. A day or two later, again I randomly opened my Bible directly to the passage in Isaiah 58:11 that said … “and the Lord will continually guide you, and satisfy your desire in scorched places, and GIVE STRENGTH TO YOUR BONES”. This was the second attention grabber. The act of opening the Bible directly to a verse that applies to a circumstance in my life without searching for it is highly improbable, and especially two times in a row. What are the chances of winning the lottery?”