John 10:2-4 But he who enters by the door is a shepherd of the sheep. To him the doorkeeper opens and the sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he puts forth all his own, he goes before them and the sheep follow him because they know His voice.
Have you ever net (remet) someone who says they know you, and you think they look familiar, but cannot pull a name up for them, nor place where you are supposed to know them from. That has happened to me more than once, and when you consider that I have been in the education field or ministry life for 40 years, I have met a lot of people. Certainly there are some people I have little trouble remembering, even though I met them even 40 years ago. Those are the people with whom I spent a lot of time , those I worked and played with, and especially those with whom I suffered.
And there are people that you don't even have to see to know; I can hear and recognize my husband's voice across a crowded room, even if I don't expect him to be there. It's because of the depth and longevity of our relationship.
This passage reminds me of, not only how God pursues us, as a shepherd pursues and cares for his sheep, but how those of us who have a long and close relationship with God can recognize His voice. Have you ever had a choice to make, two options from which to choose, and only later you find out the one choice had serious consequences? Most of us who are responding to God's pursuit have experienced that conundrum - two of what look like similar choices.
But, if we listen carefully after we pray, we can recognize God's voice through those around us or through our circumstances as He calls us by our name and leads us out. Funny, as I sit here, memories flood of just those kinds of situations: when we had to choose whether to go to Liberia or Chad, and God led through a variety of circumstances....or when we had to decide whether Jim would leave Africa without us to go for treatment of his broken leg. We followed God's voice, for the kids and I to stay in Africa, and I believe God used that to demonstrate to the Africans our faith.
Oh, I could list a lot more, but there is something else here at stake. The point is that you have to have a close relationship with someone to recognize their face and their voice. If much time passes between the period when you became acquainted with them and you next saw them, there is little likelihood that you would recognize them. If we want to know God's voice, we must hang out with Him, a lot, and regularly. We must not just hang out at the edge of the crowd, but respond to His pursuit of us by loving Him back...and loving someone is demonstrated by the quality and quantity of the time we share.
This passage reminds me that God opened the door to me, made my faith possible, but that He wants to lead me to pleasant places - sometimes through storms or scary places, but always to end up inside with Him in safety and peace. Still it is possible for me to wander off on my own, and if I do so for very long, I may struggle to recognize His voice and get stuck in a very dark place. I'm so grateful that He will never leave me nor forsake me, and I'm sorry that my failure to listen will also cause Him, the lover of my soul, pain.
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