I WILL LIFT MY VOICE

I WILL LIFT MY VOICE!
Yesterday, as I was perusing all the new posts by my friends on Facebook, I came across a blog by a college acquaintance of mine. His name is Brandon Thomas and he pastors Keystone Church in Keller, TX. In his blog for March 15, he writes about losing his voice on a Saturday night. There is never a great time for a Pastor to lose his voice, but especially not on Saturday night. He lists three truths about losing your voice. “Losing you voice is painful. It hurts! Losing your voice is frustrating. You can’t communicate. Losing your voice in unfair. You begin to lean on others to communicate for you.” It is the time of year when trees are budding, flowers are blooming and pollen is scattering. For those of us who have allergies, this time of year can be a very frustrating time. One day you may be fine, and then you wake up the next day with a sore throat and no voice. For those of us in worship ministry this can be very devastating. Without our voices, we can lose the very tool we use to proclaim His Glory! As Thomas points out in his blog, losing your physical voice is not good, but even more frightening is losing your spiritual voice.

What are some ways that we can lose our voice spiritually? The first way to lose your voice spiritually is to use your physical voice in the wrong way. We read all through the scripture that God does not like a gossip. This is not only because it hurts the person being gossiped about, but it damages the influence of the gossiper. When you gossip, you tend to ruin your reputation and your ability to be trusted. In turn, this can greatly impact your ability to proclaim God’s glory and have people listen to you. Second, you can damage your spiritual voice by not using your physical voice. When given the opportunity to stand up and speak out for what is right, and you refuse to do so, people recognize this and begin to question where you stand on issues. Then when you do speak up for something, you have lost the trust of those listening. Third, direct disobedience to the Lord’s commands can also make you lose you spiritual voice. Whether you want to acknowledge it or not, people are watching you and looking at how you behave. The Lord expects us to live a certain way and treat people a certain way. When we disobey this perfect way, we have a negative impact on those watching. As Thomas states in his blog: “You must protect the voice of your ministry. Otherwise, there WILL be pain. There will be a loss of influence. There will be a loss of opportunity and you will find yourself leaning on others to do God’s talking.”

Your love, O Lord, reaches to the heavens, Your faithfulness to the skies,
Your righteousness is like the mighty mountains, Your justice like the great deep.
O Lord, you preserve both man and beast. How priceless is Your unfailing love!
Psalm 36:5-7a

If His unfailing love is priceless, then our voice which proclaims that truth should be protected!

Aaron Hodges