{"id":582,"date":"2009-07-15T06:00:25","date_gmt":"2009-07-15T13:00:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/devonline.us\/dailyevotional\/?p=582"},"modified":"2009-09-15T10:17:20","modified_gmt":"2009-09-15T17:17:20","slug":"%e2%80%9cgod-calling%e2%80%9d","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dailyevotional.com\/prior2020\/%e2%80%9cgod-calling%e2%80%9d\/","title":{"rendered":"GOD CALLING!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Isaiah 65:24<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cBefore they call I will answer; while they are still speaking I will hear.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

One of my favorite comic strips is \u201cBaby Blues.\u201d\u00a0 Recently the creators, Rick Kirkman and Jerry Scott, had a strip where the first frame showed only the head of a dad lamenting that after feeding, educating, sacrificing, defending, encouraging and loving his children, the last frame revealed him on the ground with his foot tangled in a hammock and saying: \u201c. . .the only thing they will remember about me is the time he fell out of the hammock!\u201d<\/p>\n

As I thought about that humorous comic strip, I realized that none of us have the ability to know what people will remember about us. As a matter of fact, we do not know what (if anything) is going into their brain as we speak. It reminds me of the expression: \u201cThe lights are on, but nobody is home.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

While this reality may be depressing to some, it is encouraging to me. It allows me to just write or speak as the Lord leads knowing that it His responsibility to take my words to the heart of some soul who needs to hear.\u00a0<\/p>\n

A certain story has circulated for several years that I want to share with you. It seems that late one evening the pastor of the \u201cAlmighty God Tabernacle\u201d placed a call to his wife from his office at the church. Even though he let it ring several times, there was no answer and the answering machine did not pick up the call.<\/p>\n

He rushed home to insure that his wife was safe, which she was.\u00a0 When he asked her why she had not answered his call, she said that the phone never rang.<\/p>\n

A few days later the pastor received a call at his office from a man who wanted to know who had called him. It suddenly dawned on the pastor that when he had tried to call his wife, he had mistakenly dialed this man\u2019s number.<\/p>\n

The pastor began to apologize for his mistake, but the man interrupted him. He wanted to tell the pastor a remarkable story:\u00a0\u00a0 On the night of the call he was contemplating suicide. He asked God to show him some sign if He really existed. It was then that his phone rang and when he looked at his caller ID, he was stunned to see the words \u201cALMIGHTY GOD,\u201d \u2014 the first two words in the church\u2019s name. God had answered the prayer of a disturbed soul by a misdial!\u00a0<\/p>\n

Whether the story is true or merely a legend, it points out to me that God is able to take my most feeble efforts and use them for His purposes. It is none of my business how many people read these daily messages. From the very first day back in September 2000, until today, my prayer is that some person will feel that God had meant it for them.<\/p>\n

Blessings dear hearts. Draw near to God today, trust Him completely and be a blessing!<\/p>\n

– – – Pastor Cecil<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Isaiah 65:24 \u201cBefore they call I will answer; while they are still speaking I will hear.\u201d\u00a0 One of my favorite comic strips is \u201cBaby Blues.\u201d\u00a0 Recently the creators, Rick Kirkman and Jerry Scott, had a strip where the first frame showed only the head of a dad lamenting that after feeding, educating, sacrificing, defending, encouraging […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-582","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-isaiah"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyevotional.com\/prior2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/582","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyevotional.com\/prior2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyevotional.com\/prior2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyevotional.com\/prior2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyevotional.com\/prior2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=582"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyevotional.com\/prior2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/582\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyevotional.com\/prior2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=582"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyevotional.com\/prior2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=582"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyevotional.com\/prior2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=582"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}