There have been times that God has asked me to do “crazy” things.

Many times I did not know God had asked until after the fact. I get why that happened. If I had actually known what God was up to I have to say, honestly, I would either have refused or messed up. The cost would have been paralyzing.

So rescuing a family from the religion which was killing them, or leaving a community that was killing me, or releasing opportunities for someone in my own family, or escaping a burden that would have been greater than my skill set could accomplish, are some of the reasons I discerned when it was over.

But the price was, at times, almost unbearable: to lose hundreds of thousands of dollars, my career, a circle of people I connected with or a ministry at which I excelled. Well, that would be too much – if I had known beforehand.

Job suffered unbelievably. Joseph spent years in prison though innocent. Jeremiah was kidnapped to a foreign country. Abraham and Sarah had to leave their own country and comfort to go who knew where. Nathan had to confront King David and tell him he was rotten. Amos had to leave the farm and denounce his cousins. Paul had to override his entire upbringing to carry Good News to Gentiles.

So is something weird going on in your life? Maybe God is working something out.

Did God ask you to do something which made no sense? Maybe God knows something you don’t.

It’s one thing to say we have faith, but quite another thing to trust God in the practice of that faith, instead of relying on logic.

Edgar Page Stites (1836-1921)

Simply trusting ev’ry day,
Trusting through a stormy way;
Even when our faith is small,
Trusting Jesus, that is all.

Trusting as the moments fly,
Trusting as the days go by;
Trusting Him whate’er befall,
Trusting Jesus, that is all.
Edgar Page Stites, 1876

“Then Samuel said, ‘Is the Lord as delighted with burnt offerings and sacrifices as he would be with your obedience? To follow instructions is better than to sacrifice. To obey is better than sacrificing the fat of rams’ ” (1 Samuel 15:22 God’s Word Translation©).

DISCLAIMER: Do NOT interpret what I say here as open season! If you claim God is telling you to murder someone, gossip someone into oblivion, force someone to submit to your absolute authority, build a worship centre monument to human achievement, commit adultery, abuse children…then the voice you hear is hardly to be assigned to Jesus. God calls us to do good, whatever the personal cost, not gain personal advantage or to sin without abandon. Do I need to list Bible verses to show this clearly?