"I
am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me. . . . My sheep
listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me" (John 10:14,27).
Tom Fox is a successful financial investment manager who heads up a workplace
ministry in the Twin Cities, Minnesota area. He used to be troubled when he
heard Christians say, "The Lord told me . . . " He certainly had never heard God
speak to him like that. "What is different about those people and me?" he
wondered. In the book of John, Tom had read that Jesus had said that His sheep
hear His voice, but he didn't understand how they could do that. His pursuit to
answer that question began his quest to discover how to hear God's voice
himself.
Today, Tom realizes that God does speak and that we, as His children, can
hear His voice. He has discovered how to hear God's words of guidance in his
daily life, which includes the day-to-day operations of his business, and he is
teaching others how to hear God's voice as well.
A friend of mine told me a story about an experience he had in Israel that
demonstrates how sheep know their shepherd's voice. He and his wife were
visiting some of the famous biblical sites when they saw a group of shepherds
and their flocks. They watched as three different shepherds put their sheep in
the same pen for the night, and they wondered how in the world the shepherds
would separate their sheep the next day, since none of them had any identifying
marks on them.
My friend got up early the next morning to watch the shepherds gather their
sheep. The first shepherd went over to the pen and called out to his sheep. One
by one, his sheep (and only his sheep) filed out to follow him. The same thing
happened with the other two shepherds. My friend said it was amazing to watch
how only the shepherd's sheep followed him while the others remained in the
pen--and all because they recognized his voice. What a picture of Jesus' words
spoken centuries earlier.
Ask God to help you hear the voice of God--even on the job.
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