Psalm 85:8 I will listen to what God the Lord says;
    he promises peace to his people, his faithful servants—
    but let them not turn to folly.

This should be the prayer of every believer, because we should want to hear what the Lord is saying to us. However, far too often we are oblivious to what He is saying to us, because we want to live our lives according to our own desires and imaginations. That’s what the Psalmist is talking about when he says, “folly.” We have an incredible capacity for being stupid! As the Psalmist recognizes, God speaks peace to those who are committed to Him, but if our hearts are rebellious, those same words of God can come across as judgment. There is no way we can fool God! His corrections are as gentle as our submission to Him, and as severe as our turning from Him. The author of the letter to the Hebrews got it right when he wrote about the Lord’s discipline in Hebrews 12:4-13. We don’t enjoy discipline, but the way to avoid it is to be listening accurately in the first place. We have the outline of God’s plan for mankind recorded in the Bible, so the first step is to become as familiar with the Bible as we can. When our hearts are committed to obedience, then we can hear His directions for increasingly granular areas of our lives, down to even such things as what clothes to put on in the morning. However, if we think of His words as suggestions, on a par with some social media “influencer,” then we aren’t likely to hear Him at all, until it’s too late. If we want to hear His words of peace, we need to start with repentance of our folly.

This is entirely logical to me, but it has taken many years to get it through my head – and I still have room to grow! My problem was pride, thinking that I could figure things out. I did acknowledge that God was a lot smarter than I was, but several years ago it finally got through to me that God’s smart and I’m not. It doesn’t matter at all what numbers might come up on an IQ test, the fact of the matter is that there is absolutely no comparison between God’s omniscience and my feeble intellect. I must not return to the folly of conceit, but rather seek God’s guidance in all humility and gratitude at all times in every way. I also need to be willing to hear Him through someone I don’t consider to be as “sharp” as I am! It is only in humility that I will be able to hear His words of peace.

Father, thank You for this reminder. Thank You for the help from the Ricoh salesman yesterday in relation to our local computer network. Help me apply what I learned from him to correct the remaining issues there. That doesn’t seem to have great spiritual implications, but it affects our lives, so You care about it. Help me indeed operate in Your wisdom and not my own on all levels, so that Your will may be done in and through me in every area of my life, for Your glory. Thank You. Hallelujah!