- Write Down Your Thoughts. This is just a suggestion that has helped me. I've been doing it for years. As I sit at my computer I type out the questions I have for God. Sometimes even when I'm driving during the day, after I've had my devotional time and I'm thinking about the Lord and meditating on a scripture I've read, God will give me a thought or an insight, and while I'm driving I'll write it down so I don't forget. I don't suggest you do that while driving! Pull over, and then write it down. But write down your thoughts, whether it's a question, or an insight, or an answer that God has given you.
When God tells you to do something, you should write that down, too. If God tells me to do something, I'll write it down because I forget easily. I personally keep a master list of things to do. So when God specifically tells me something He wants me to do, I write it down and make it a priority on my list.
Pay attention to the voice of God. Sometimes He will tell you to do something and at first you may not recognize it as His voice because you're expecting something big and important, like when He told Jonah, "Go to the great city of Ninevah and preach against it." But God may say very ordinary things like, "Cut the grass" or "Clean up your desk." He may tell you to write a letter or take someone a meal. So learn to listen for the little things God tells you, as well as the big things. And if necessary - write it down!
- Respond. After God speaks to you, you need to respond. This is probably the most important of all. If you just read the word and know what it says, what good has it done you? God's intention is not only that we know His word, but that we do His word. Knowing it means nothing if we don't do it. James wrote about this in James 1:22-26:
Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it-he will be blessed in what he does. (NIV)
We're not going to be blessed in what we know, we're going to be blessed in what we do. There's a big difference. The Pharisees knew a lot, but they didn't do a lot.
At times we look for the great commands like, "Go and be a missionary to the natives in the jungles of Africa!" That might happen, but many times in our devotional life we're going to read about things that are very practical in our daily lives. For instance, God knows how to teach husbands to love their wives. Do you know God knows your wife much better than you do? There are things that God tells me to do for my wife that I would never think about. It would never just come naturally. He knows my wife, and He knows her needs. And if I'm in fellowship with Him, guess what? He can teach me how to love my wife. Suppose I read in Ephesians 5:25, "Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her." (NIV) It doesn't do me any good just to read it and know what it says. I need to ask God how I can love my wife. He may say to me, "Go buy her flowers today" or "Mop the floor when you get home." When I recognize that God has just told me how to love my wife, I need to respond. If I don't do it, I won't be blessed in it and neither will she.
Read Part I, Part II, Part III, Part V, Part VI or Part VII.
