"Ruined for the Ordinary: The Adventure of Hearing and Obeying God's Voice" (Joy Dawson)
Joy Dawson writes on a topic many of us are unfamiliar and uncomfortable with (me included, why I read it).
For those of us foreign to the idea of hearing God's voice, this is a good read. She gives good reasons why it's for every believer, and conditions that should be met to hear God (humility, faith, confession, a submissive will). She also provides ways between discerning between God's voice, our voice, and the devil's.
My favourite theme that runs through the book, and which she nails on the head near the end, is obedience. It's easy to see she has a white-hot desire to obey God, and find her fulfillment only in Him.
One thing that really caught me about this book was that it's not the sound mind theory, where someone prayerfully weighs biblical values and decides. In more ways than one it really flies in the face of such logical thinking, and exhorts readers to simply listen. As of now, I don't agree with Ms. Dawson completely, but I am putting most of what she said to practice, and it's been pretty helpful in drawing closer to God, and making some good decisions. I say people should really check this topic out.
posted by amac at 2:19 PM
3 Comments:
sounds interesting for sure...it seems like people like me get nervous when things like this are spoken of...wrongly of course...this sounds very interesting. So often I have a hard time going to God in prayer because of something in my life or whatever when I haven't really spent time listening to him. I think that is something that is so important to our walk...can you post some of her actual points on the site so I can get an idea of where she is coming from?
peace out Drew
i hear you, i'll post them when i get back from Mon-real
4 characteristics Joy claims are needed to hear God is a humble spirit. She makes a good point about sins of presumption, where we just assume all is right in our lives.
The second is faith, that God is capable and willing.
Thirdly, a clean heart (Ps 66:18).
Finally, a yielded will. Our guidance will be incomplete if we have not fully yielded ourselves.
She also has a section on the different ways God speaks to us.
But here's the deal, after reflection and talking to a pastor, I think Joy often takes verses out of context to back up her claim, or ignores the power of a reasoning mind based on biblical values. In short, she helped open up a new area of prayer for me, but it's something that I'm taking with caution and trying not to feel pressure over.
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