Hope-Filled Christian
Hope-Filled Christian
Unveiling the Divine Design in Life's Serendipity: The Story of Saul and the Lost Donkeys
Prepare to be jolted into spiritual alertness with a story that's as urgent as the blaring of a fire alarm, calling us to immediate action. We share an intimate narrative of dreams divinely designed to awaken the soul to God's pressing call, challenging us to respond with the same speed we would to life's emergencies. As the conversation unfolds, punctuated with playful puns and the unexpected "Saul prize," we invite you to join us in embracing the joy and lessons found in life's serendipitous turns. Tune in for an episode that promises to stir your heart, provoke your thoughts, and perhaps even elicit a chuckle or two.
Hi, welcome back to HFC. So I'm guessing the timing is not going to be two weeks, since it's been two weeks since I last recorded. So before we go into this week's episode, I just want to talk about something. I was reading this book and it kind of changed my mindset about how I want to try focusing on these.
Speaker 1:I feel like a lot of times we as Christians tend to focus on oh, that verse means this to me. Oh, that verse means this to me. This means to me, this tells me this, me, this about me. This means, oh, I can do this for me or I can get that for me. And it's all about, you know, figuring out what we can get from the Bible and and figuring out, you know, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me. And we're still self. So that's really bad, self-centered, um, not in like a narcissistic kind of way, but also kind of maybe narcissistic kind of way.
Speaker 1:And there is a question of the Bible isn't meant to tell us about us. The Bible is more meant to tell us about who God is and who we are. I mean it does mention who we are, but the purpose isn't was never to say who we are, but it was more to tell us about who God says we are, and, as in, still telling us about God. And so they said the way that we should focus on the Bible is by focusing and not on you know what it means to us, and you know and what it says about who we are and why it's important to us more about. What does it tell us about God? What does it tell us about his character, what is his motives? You know who he is, how he loves, what he does, and instead take the perspective off of learning about ourselves and you know our lives and how this, what this means to us and how we can use it to better our lives, and instead use it as a way to get to know God, which, in essence, is kind of the whole point of being a Christian, of, you know, believing God, of accepting Jesus into our is. We're trying to build a relationship with God. And so once I read it, I was like, oh, that makes sense. Yeah, um, anyway, this week's episode is focused on, or this bi-weekly episode is focused on.
Speaker 1:First Samuel, verse three through four. It says Now, the donkeys belonging to Saul's father, kish, were lost, and Kish said to his son, saul, take one of the servants with you and go look for the donkeys. So he passed to the hill country of Ephraim and through the area around Shalisha, but they did not find them. They went on into the district of Shalim the donkeys are out there and he passed to the territory of Benjamin, but they did not find them. And so, in essence, what are we learning? Well, this story is about Saul looking for donkeys, and it sounds really stupid because obviously there's more to the story, because it would be really weird to see a story about, you know, a man looking for donkeys. But in essence, that's what this is.
Speaker 1:The thing that struck me so vividly about this, and I immediately wanted to say, like I wanted to focus on me, is what this tells us about God. In this, in this part of the Bible, it's telling us about Saul being annoyed to become king. But it's kind of like a Wait, what? That's a twist, because I wasn't expecting Saul to become king, because we're reading about Saul looking for donkeys, so how does that even relate to a man becoming king? And again I'm like, okay, well, fresh off of that book, that told me you know, focus on what does this tell me about God.
Speaker 1:And what this tells me about God is that even when we're in the day to day and just going through life and and I would consider this a struggle going through struggles and just, you know, living our busy lives, god is doing stuff that more than we could ever imagine, more than we could ever think of, and it's not always going to be, obviously, us becoming king or queen, but it still tells me about God. What it tells me about God is he's doing things and caring about me in ways that I could never imagine, setting things up in ways that I could never imagine. That when I can't hear him or when I can't, you know, see him moving in my life, that that doesn't mean he's not moving, because I'm sure Saul was never let, was ever saying oh yeah, I know that God is making me king. God is making me king at the very moment and I can feel it. He was never like that and he would never expected to become king and he would never have, you know, maybe hope to become king later on. I don't know if he directly said that or if he understood it from what Samuel was saying. I don't get what what Samuel saying is saying that he's going to be king.
Speaker 1:But later on, samuel basically tells him you know, you're the one I'm waiting for, kind of. So God had given him a vision saying tomorrow you're going to see someone and that person's going to become king. And here comes all like, all ragged and tired, and like very, having very much, having nothing. And God says this is verse 17,. When Samuel caught sight of Saul, the Lord said to him this is the man I spoke to you about. He'll govern my people. And so then it goes on and goes on, gone, and verse 19, I'm the Saul was looking for him to get guidance on how to get home.
Speaker 1:And verse 19, I'm the Sears sorry, verse 20. And he's telling him, basically he knew everything about him because God had told him everything about him, because God found him important enough to tell him everything about him. And that it just opens your eyes, because it makes you realize that even in those moments where we feel like God is not seeing us, and he is seeing us because he, literally this is what God had told Samuel as for the donkeys you lost three days ago, three days ago, do not worry about them, they have been found. So God knew his worry, god had taken care of it and God had given someone else the answer to provide to him. They have been found.
Speaker 1:Into whom is all the desire of Israel churned, if not to you and your whole family line? And basically Saul kind of freaks out. He's like I would never expect that, I would never want that. And if you keep reading the story of the story to see, like, what happens to Saul, basically, and I found it hilarious and I'd never read the story before, I've never even touched for Samuel. But basically when Saul sorry Samuel has gone before all of leaders of Israel to basically anoint the king and tell them who the king is, saul has hidden himself and he's hiding because he's like I don't want to be king. And Samuel basically like ask God, like hey, where's the guy you said was going to be king? And God points him out and he's like he's hiding there behind the boxes. So then Saul, samuel has to go find Saul hiding by the boxes and I just think that's funny.
Speaker 1:But again, when I think about what this reveals about God's character, what this reveals about who God is and what God does, a couple of things to note. First off, like I said, god is loving us in ways that we can never imagine, preparing things for us that we never thought we could have, that God is concerned about us and not concerned about us, focused on us. He loves us even when we don't think he loves us Because, even though I don't think that Saul was like, yeah, god sees me right now, whatever, he knew all the worries that saw it had. He knew the knowledge that would fix the worries and had told someone to tell Saul and God sees beyond what we see of ourselves and but, honestly, the main thing that I got from this thing was that God is doing stuff and that a moment of change could come at any moment, and that I know I said I wouldn't really focus on it, but that for us, what does that mean for us, if God is this kind of person, that we have to be prepared for these moments of change? Because I feel like we have this idea that you know we're just getting, oh, I know when something is coming from God and I'll just be ready for it. And I actually saw this on Instagram.
Speaker 1:But someone said, procrastination is having the arrogance to think that God will give you time to do what he gave you time again to do what you had time to do today and that procrastination is believing, essentially, that God told you, oh yeah, you should do it today, or that God reminded you of something so that you could do it tomorrow or the next week or something, putting something off, that God gave you time for today because you thought, oh no, I know time better than God, that I am more aware of when I could do things than God, when in reality that's arrogance because we're believing that you know we will have time tomorrow, when we don't know the time tomorrow, so that God is reminding you to do something, than maybe you should do it. Then there was something I was going to say that popped into my head for like a split second and then I completely forgot. But I just I thought that was like eye-opening because it just oh, the other one, sorry, there we go. I remembered, which is funny. That's weird. They both kind of relate to this idea that God can move in weird ways and speak to us in different ways. So the other one kind of speaks on the same thing.
Speaker 1:This man was sharing a story. He said you know, he was woken up in the middle of the night and God told him. You know he was woken up by a dream. I think it was Jesus. Came into his room and said come pray, I want to see you, or something like that. And then he woke up, went back to bed, said, oh, not important. And then again he in the dream, jesus, came into his room crying and said come pray, like I want to speak to you, wakes up, goes back to bed, says I'll do it later.
Speaker 1:The next time he wakes up it's not a phone alarm or anything, the fire alarm is going off. And he wakes up. And he wakes up standing and he starts running around like looking for the fire and stuff. And he says that what Jesus told him was and it was no fire, but somehow the fire alarm was going off, another fire alarm, the smoke alarm was going off. And and what he told him is that do you see the way that you, you moved for something that you believe to be urgent? And then he said the Jesus again said to him you have this misconception that what I'm telling you isn't urgent, but when I speak to you it is always urgent.
Speaker 1:And so I guess with all those three things in kind of connection, we reveal that you know, god's words have power. First of all, we know that everything he spoke and everything he desired came true in Genesis. We know that everything he did, he saw that was good. And so when we know that God's words have meaning and power, and then you know Basically in my what I'm assuming this to mean is that God doesn't waste his words. He's not a man that's just, or a God that is just gonna be like oh yeah, well, and talk to hear himself talk. When he says something it's urgent, when he says something it's important.
Speaker 1:And when we take into connection the story of saw, you know he can do something at any moment and you have no idea of what you're doing is urgent or if or not. And in a sense, if God is telling you do something, you should always assume that it's urgent. You should always assume you know I'm gonna do it now. Because, again, it's as that other post said, it's arrogance to assume that we would have time to do Something another day, when God has given us time to do it today. And if anything, perhaps God is giving it, it's time to do it in that very moment, because that's what he needs or that's what he's looking for for us to, you know, have our soul moment, not necessarily to become king or queen, but for God to put us on the right path, to meet that right person or that right Be, in the right situation in order to receive something that he's been planning and we've been asking for all along.
Speaker 1:I which I get that Saul wasn't asking to become king, but in essence, this could be something we're asking for or not asking for, something we're expecting or not expecting, because God works mysterious ways. But if we're not listening and being urgent and for not doing what God has asked us to or being where God has us to be, and if we're not prepared because you could you could I Mean he wasn't prepared physically because he didn't have any money, he was like run down but if we're not prepared spiritually, then God can't use us. And I guess what I'm saying is we have to be fully aware that we need to be in the right spot in our relationship with Jesus. And what is that right spot? The right spot isn't necessarily a specific spot. It's more a spot of adoration, a spot of humbleness and a spot of Wanting growth and desiring growth and moving in growth and listening to God and realizing that when he speaks to you, it is urgent, it isn't a well, I think you should. It's not a suggestion, it's a hey, you need to do this.
Speaker 1:And he's not a God of, you know, of words that with no meaning, with no importance, everything that he speaks and everything that he says has power. And so it's wild for us to believe that when he tells us that we should do something, or tells us, hey, you should go do that or say this or do that kind of thing, that it's not as urgent, it's not meaningful, when this is the same God who, with his words, spoke things into existence out of nothing, with the same God that, with his words, saved our lives, with his words, you know, sent Jesus down, with his words, shook mountains, and one on certain parts of the Bible, and, with his power, shook our, caused earthquakes and struck people down. Anyway, I Guess it's just having a sense of urgency and realizing that that what I, what I Learned from God about this, is that he can do things at any moment and we need to be prepared for them. And the only way we can do that is if we have that sense of urgency and Reverence for what God is doing and who God is in our lives, meaning reading our Bible and growing and spending time with God.
Speaker 1:Anyway, as always, let's end with prayer. Dear God, first off, thank you for being God and for providing us with a chance to have a relationship with Him, because I mean I was kind of thinking of this the other day like not every, not every person in power gives us an opportunity to have a relationship with them. But you are the most high power and here you are offering a relationship, offering a direct blind, and some of us ignore it, some of us think it's not important, when in reality, that's what we're always asking for, that's what we're always saying, like I wish someone would listen to me and hear you are offering your ear and we ignore it, we reject you. I ask that you forgive us for that, lord, but I pray that you open our eyes to see all these opportunities to realizing our own arrogance and pride and kind of laxness, idleness that we've been in, and just helping us to be more proactive in building our relationship, and opening our eyes to the ways that we can do that, because it's not just through reading the Bible. I pray that you forgive us more, since it's not an invitation, and that you choose this event.
Speaker 1:Thanks for listening to this week's episode of HFC. It's kind of sad, but after recording this I came up with the best pun, and so you know Saul was very much surprised because he wasn't expecting that from God, and so I guess what I'm saying this entire episode is be prepared for your Saul prize. Thanks See ya. Have a great weekend. Jeous, az 84843.