"He's Still Working on Me"

BIBLE READING: Isaiah 64. 8          

“He’s still workin’ on me to make me what I ought to be.  It took Him just a week to make the moon and stars, the sun and the earth and Jupiter and Mars.  How loving and patient He must be.  ‘Cause He’s still workin’ on me.

There really ought to be a sign upon my heart: ‘Don’t judge me yet.  There’s an unfinished part.’  But I’ll be better just according to His plan, fashioned by the Master’s loving hand.

In the mirror of His word, reflections that I see, make me wonder why He never gave up on me.  But He loves me as I am and helps me when I pray.  Remember He’s the potter.  I’m the clay.”

It’s an unfortunate thing that in life, the human thing to do is to not listen to God unless we are in a troubling, difficult, or painful situation.  Jonah didn’t listen to God until he nearly caused himself and others to perish in a shipwreck (Jonah 1:4-16), and spent 3 days and 3 nights in the belly of a fish (Jonah 1:17).  It was then that he said, “I cried out to the Lord because of my affliction…” (Jonah 2:2).  C.S. Lewis said, “God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.”  I can’t imagine that you have ever walked around for a 24-hour period and only talked on a megaphone, (if you get the idea to, I would really like to watch) but I don’t think it would go very well.  The amount of upset people and threat of bodily harm deter us from doing this.  How much easier is it to listen to someone who is whispering, or speaking normally?  How much easier is it to listen to God that way?  Jonah could have avoided a lot of pain by listening to God when He spoke normally than waiting for his affliction and hearing God shout at him.