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A Voice from the Sky

by Jerry Ousley  
3/09/2017 / Christian Living

             The sky is a big place, and that’s an enormous understatement.  When we were young teenagers there was a Sunday afternoon that was perfect for flying kites.  My brother, my cousin, and a friend had come over that afternoon and following dinner we couldn’t wait to get out there and sail those kites up into the air.  At that time my mother worked at a sewing factory that specialized in making shirts and was appropriately nicknamed “The Shirt Factory.”  From time to time she had been allowed to bring home remnants of spools of heavy string used in the process.  These were spools that were near the end and would have been thrown away and so she grabbed them up.

 

            That was good for us because we used those spools of string, tying them together to make one very long kite lead.  We had a great time flying those kites and the wind couldn’t have been more perfect that day.  I kept letting mine out.  When I’d come to the end of the string I’d grab another spool and tie it together and just kept letting it out until my kite was a tiny dot barely visible.  It was the farthest and highest I had ever gotten a kite up before or since, in my life.

 

            It was up so high and out so long that an hour before time to return to church that evening I began to roll it in.  Folks, I’m not exaggerating one little bit here; it took that entire hour to get the kite down out of the sky.  I wrapped string around a spool until my arm hurt.  The pressure was on to get it down before we had to go and if I remember correctly I had the kite in my hand as Dad was starting the car with the family and our guests in the car waiting on me.  I hurriedly put it on the porch and jumped in.  As I said, I’ve never had a kite up that high since but it certainly gave me bragging rights that day and for a whole lot of days afterward (I’m still bragging on it aren’t I?).  

 

            Things fall from the sky; space debris, meteorites, and stuff that comes from the back end of birds.  One thing that rarely comes from the sky is the voice of God.  We talked about how that God spoke directly to the people of Israel before Moses ascended Mount Sinai.  But there are three recorded incidents in the New Testament where God spoke on which I’d like to comment.  First, in Matthew 3, after Jesus was baptized the Bible records that God spoke from the sky and said, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”  We aren’t told the reaction of the people when this happened but there had to be some astonished faces.

 

            Then in Matthew 17:5, after Jesus had been transfigured on the mountain, met with Moses and Elijah, witnessed by the three disciples, Peter, James, and John, we are told that God again spoke from the sky saying, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased, listen to Him.”  It sounds to me that He was directly addressing those disciples who were so overwhelmed with what they had seen that they were basically talking out of their heads.

 

            Finally in John 12 Jesus had been giving instructions and preaching to the people.  He prayed in verse 28 saying, “Father, glorify your name.”  After His prayer we are told that a third time the voice of God came booming from the sky saying, “I have both glorified it and will glorify it again.”  This time we are told some of the reactions of the people.  Some thought an angel had spoke.  Others dismissed it as thunder.  Isn’t it something how we try to explain what we don’t understand?  Instead of simply acknowledging it as an answer from God to Jesus’ prayer they had to come up with something that sounded better – It surely couldn’t have been God!

 

            Today, we rarely hear the actual voice of God.  I’m not sure why that is.  He’s God and I guess when He’s ready to speak He will and no one can stop Him.  If I were in His shoes I’d be a little dumb-struck as to all that’s going on here on planet earth and I’d be speechless myself.  But God isn’t speechless.  He’s got a lot to say and He’s said most of it through the prophets, apostles, and other writers of the Bible.  Perhaps He thinks we ought to believe what’s been written.  Besides, if He spoke again, and He could if He wanted to, they’d come up with some kind of stupid explanation.

 

            God does still speak to us in our hearts.  We need to listen to Him.  If we don’t we’ll be in trouble again.  But if we do it will be just as awesome – even more so – than getting a kite so high in the sky that it takes an hour to get it down.  That can’t even compare to taking a good listen to what God has to say.

Jerry D. Ousley is the author of ?Soul Challenge?, ?Soul Journey?, ?Ordeal?, ?The Spirit Bread Daily Devotional and his first novel ?The Shoe Tree.? Visit our website at spiritbread.com to download these and more completely free of charge.

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