My friends and I are getting God’s nudges. Nudges are Spirit-prompts. “I want you to slow down and spend time with Me.” “I want to do something new in and through you.” “Stop and notice and talk to that person.” “Go across the street and love your neighbors.” “Listen to my revelation as I write through you.” Listening, hearing, responding, and obeying God’s Spirit can and will become a way-of-life the more you say “NO” to people and say “YES” to God.
God nudged the Apostle Paul to write these words in Galatians 1:6-7, “I am shocked that you are turning away so soon from God, who in His love and mercy called you to share the eternal life He gives through Christ. You are already following a different way that pretends to be the Good News but is not the Good News at all. You are being fooled by those who twist and change the truth concerning Christ.” Paul got nudged, but he refused to budge. “Obviously, I’m not trying to be a people pleaser! No, I am trying to please God. If I were still trying to please people, I would not be Christ’s servant” (Galatians 1:10).
As Paul spent more and more time with Jesus, he went through a radical transformation of desire. Paul developed such an intimate and obedient relationship with Jesus that he only went where Jesus prompted him to go, and he only said what Jesus prompted him to say. When fake Christians spied on Paul and tried to get him to exchange his freedom in Christ for conformity and slavery to religious regulations, Paul refused to budge.
Paul declared, “But we refused to listen to them for a single moment. We wanted to preserve the truth of the Good News for you” (Galatians 2:5).
As we are gradually and systematically being confronted by a growing culture that is hostile to Jesus, truth, and Christianity, will you become increasingly conformed to the image of Christ, or will you be conformed to images of this world? Will you exchange the truth for lies, or will you dig your heels in and preserve the truth and boldly proclaim the truth that sets captives free? Will you please people or will you please God? You can’t do both! The more you care about what people will think and care about you, the less you will respond obediently to the countercultural nudges that the Holy Spirit will give you. You can’t fit in and have what this world offers and live in spiritual freedom. The more you want what everyone else seems to have and do, the less your heart will hear and respond to God’s nudges.
As I get older and younger, I’m having fun listening and responding to the nudging of the Holy Spirit.
The more God captures my attention and helps me to see and hear, the more that I notice the good and the bad all around me. On bad days, I can get preoccupied with all of the bad.
On good days, I get consumed and thrilled with the evidences of God’s goodness all over my life.
As God is changing what I notice, give my attention to, and value, dynamic shifts are occurring. Where I go and who I talk with keeps changing. What I say and how I say it continues to be refined. How I spend my time and money is in a constant flux. What breaks and inspires my heart keeps shifting. God, people, time, communication, relationships, and animals continue to grow in value. Being childlike, crazy, and living-in-the-moment with God and people helps me to connect and teach God’s truth in simple yet profound ways.
Being a growing child of God also means that I’m learning to love what God loves and to hate what God hates. When it comes to nudges and budges, I think I’m becoming more Spirit-driven and more stubborn. I’m striving to say “YES” to the nudges and prompting of the Spirit as I write and as I live. And as this world undergoes a radical overhaul, I’m holding onto the life and teachings of Christ.
My boundaries that define what I say “YES” and say “NO” to won’t likely budge unless the Holy Spirit reconstructs my boundaries. Reconstruction seems to be an never-ending process.
What is God’s Spirit nudging you to do?
When and where do you refuse to budge?