Over the past six weeks or so I have been writing a series of articles called “Building a Relationship with God”.  During the course of the series, we explored talking to God, hearing God talk to us, looking for the signs God gives us in our lives, and how we know and learn the word of God or, in other words, what He has already told us.

If you would like to go back and read any of the previous installments, here are links to the first five parts of the series:

Part 1

(more…)

Where I live the days are getting shorter and the air is getting crisp and cooler.  As the leaves on the trees paint themselves into a myriad of beautiful colors before they fall to the ground, the birds, squirrels, and other animals outside are getting ready for winter.

There is something so beautiful about this time of year.  The temperature is wonderful – you don’t get baked by the heat of the sun yet you only need to wear a light jacket to stay warm. 

If you have never experienced the fall season, it is something you have to do.  The smell of the fallen leaves is intoxicating.

(more…)

I took a little break from our series "Building a Relationship With God" partly because other things came to me that I felt I needed to write about and partly because I was waiting for inspiration to hit me again.  Well God has inspired me again so lets continue with part 5 of our series.

In the past few articles of our series, we explored the topics of talking to God, hearing God talk to us, and looking for the signs God gives us in our lives.  Now let’s discuss how we know and learn the word of God or, in other words, what He has already told us.

God has given us His word and His word has been recorded by various people throughout history.  While there are many books and writings that we can look at to find what God has taught men over the course of history (some ancient writings were not found until fairly recently), the Bible is the primary source of our knowledge of God’s word.  In fact, with estimates of between 2.5 and 6 billion copies being sold, the Bible is the most published and best selling book ever.  So let’s start there. 

(more…)

In parts 1 – 3 of our series “Building a Relationship with God”, we have taken a look at how to start to talk to God (through prayer) and how to start to listen for God (through mediation).  Now let’s take a look at how God gives us signs that He is all around us.

When I tell some people the story about what had happened to me a few months ago they look at me as if I’ve absolutely lost my mind.  As a matter of fact, at the time, I thought I might have been a little off my rocker and kept this to myself for a while.  But in an article that I previously posted called God Helps Ease Our Concerns, I tell the story of how one night I was really feeling quite all alone.  That night I asked God to give me a sign that everything was going to be okay.  This is what I wrote in that article:

The other night, while at the end of a vacation, I was upset about what seemed to be a lot of little things. I was sitting at a restaurant on the water and had just watched a beautiful sunset. After the sun had set and the sky had darkened, I was thinking about why I was upset and, as I do sometimes, I asked God to give me a sign to let me know that everything was okay. As I asked that, simultaneously a star appeared in the sky and a light from a boat appeared on the horizon. I was wondering if this was supposed to mean something when a thought popped into my head: I am like a boat at sea navigating with a sextant (a compass) and God is my guiding star.

(more…)

I once read the following:

“Prayer is when you talk to God; mediation is when you listen to God.”

In part 2 of our series we looked at talking to God or, if we base it upon the above, praying.

Now it’s time for us to talk about how we listen for God.

(more…)