Nuances of God (Part I)

When you walk with God day in and day out, you learn to pick up on things. When you begin to know in your knower (as some might say) that God is your best Friend and that nothing in your life happens by chance, you start to notice little nuances of instruction. And when stuff like this happens, you smile from the inside out.

For instance, Matt and I will be married nine years next month. During the first years of our marriage, God gave me a stern instruction on my behavior regarding my husband. Matt is a wonderful teacher, but he is not a pastor or preacher.  He just loves God and loves to teach about God. He has two classes to teach on Sunday, a Sunday School class and an evening Bible study class.

When he took these classes, my Friend and my God gave me a command. He told me I was not to argue with Matt the day of or the day before he was to teach.  It did not matter if it was an ‘important’ thing to argue over or not. So, no picking fights on Saturday or Sunday. Okay, I can do that.

The wisdom behind this was that the one single thing that could affect how Matt taught others, was me. If I stirred up emotions in him before he was to teach, Matt might become distracted which could affect his teaching.

With the recent passing of Preacher Greg, Matt was asked to fill in on Wednesday nights.  Always glad to teach just about as much as I am glad to hear him, Matt agreed.

The thing about God is….now I only have Monday, Thursday, and Friday available to me if I want to pick a fight with my husband.  If this pattern keeps up, I won’t be able to pick a fight with Matt at all, which is probably God’s point.

So, you see what I mean about picking up on nuances? God is like that, you know.

Secondly, about my work on Pursuing Purity:  A Bible Study for Women, I recently taught on the dangers of flattery (see Lesson Three:  Purity in the Obvious – Flirting, Flattery, and Foolishness.)  It was a great lesson. Everyone seemed to enjoy it. Read the class notes HERE.

Then, when I was wishing one of the class members a Happy Birthday by saying “Happy Birthday to the sweetest face in the choir, a faithful friend, a kind and generous person, the best Church secretary, and most importantly a hero of the faith to me.”

Now all of that is true and genuine and came directly from my heart. This woman is a true gem.  But, in response to this comment, she says thank-you-very-much but is that flattery?  When I read that, I broke out in laughter and, with my sinful heart in tow, began to defend my comment.

Of course, the definition of flattery is excessive and insincere praise given to prompt another to act as you would want them to act. So, my comment wasn’t flattery, but it was another nuance.

In that response, God showed me that some one in my class heard what God had to say about flattery. I felt good about that.  But also, began to realize that I should check my compliments to determine if someone might take it as flattery.

God is like that.

The thing about God is …. He is always with me, always showing me stuff, always correcting, and always loving me. How could I ask for anything more?