April 29, 2024 - When the Time is Right

Judges 9:22-10:18

Luke 24:13-53

Psalm 100:1-5

Proverbs 14:11-12

One Year Bible Audio & Daily Reading (oneyearbibleonline.com)

Luke 24:31 Then their eyes were opened and they recognized him, and he disappeared from their sight. 32 They asked each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and opened the Scriptures to us?”

Luke 24:45 Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures.

They had spent a lot of time with Jesus but they didn't realize it was Him. The time was not right for them to recognize Him. "Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us...?" There have been times that I think that He has been talking to me about something and my heart has been burning because it was something I didn't really want to hear or see. He speaks to us through scripture, preachers, and other believers all the time. They had the scriptures, and Jesus had reminded them of them before His crucifixion but they didn't understand what He was saying. I am sure it was not what they wanted to hear but it also was not time for them to understand. He is patient and will repeat himself. When He repeats Himself in different ways that is how we receive confirmation. That is how He begins to open our eyes. But we will not understand until the time is right. And He knows exactly what it is we need to open our eyes to recognize it is Him and understand what He is saying. The most powerful time that He did that for me goes with the end of my story yesterday.

He had been talking to me a long time about my need to confess to my husband. I didn't want to believe it was Him the first time when I felt the burning in my heart but He repeated it over and over again until I finally had to admit that I knew it was Him and understood what I needed to do. He started it way before the time was right because He knew what it would take for me to respond. I kept negotiating with Him and asking Him if we could wait till my husband was saved because then he might be more forgiving. (I had been praying for his salvation for years). When the time was right, in the middle of my prayer time just as I was praying for my husband's salvation, I heard God's voice say to me "You aren't listening to me and until you do I am not listening to you." He knew it would take that for me to hear, understand and respond and it needed to happen now. The next day I talked to my husband and told him what God had told me to say and this took us down a 3- or 4-day journey that led to the thing I was asking God to wait for, Dave's salvation. He had to give me eyes to see His word ears to hear His voice and a heart to understand what He wanted me to do and He orchestrated it so that it would all come to a crescendo and the exact moment it needed to so that there would be a glorious finally.