Communion with God in Real Life

We're going to talk about what it means to commune with God tonight, what it means to really be in touch with God, but in real life. Two weeks ago, if you were here for this particular series on the life of Abraham, I preached a message called walking with God in real life. And I'm not going to repeat that tonight. This is a different chapter, different message altogether, but it does complement what I said two weeks ago. Two weeks ago, I talked about the fact that walking with God is not some kind of dreamy lifestyle that comes out of endless hours by a mountain stream or in a forest somewhere, being alone with God. But in reality, walking with God is in the nuts and bolts and difficulties and struggles of everyday life, learning what it means to live in his presence and to go through life knowing that he is with us, so forth. To balance that out a little bit, I want to make sure that we understand that that doesn't mean that we need no time alone with God because we do need time alone with God. Walking with God in real life and the hustle and bustle of everyday life doesn't mean that since we live in an age of hustle and bustle we can expect or we cannot expect times of quietness and solitude with God. In fact, that may be more important than ever. It may be more important than ever in our lives to make sure we get some time with God. We do live in a hyperactive age. We do live in a time that thrives on big events and speed and noise and movement and we all deal with that throughout the week. So communion with God is not easy to come by. Come in solitude with God, time and prayer and in the Word often gets lost in the shuffle of our busy lives leading to a very shallow spiritual life, a very shallow Christian life. So what do we do about that? I believe that we must recapture the urgency of communion with God to understand what that means, the urgency of it, the need for it. I believe that also we need to be more creative and finding time to do that with the kind of lifestyles that we live and I think that we need to understand that communion with God extends beyond special quiet times of solitude with God. In short, we need to understand what communion with God is like in real life, in the midst of real life struggles and tensions. Well, Abraham's experience in Genesis chapter 17 serves as a model for us, if what it means to commune with God in the midst of real life. What communion with God really does mean. In these 27 verses, there are at least four evidences of Abraham's communion with God. And what he does to commune with God, the way it's described in this chapter, really does serve as a model for us. And so let's see what God tells us in this chapter. The first meaning of communion with God in real life is living faithfully day to day. Look at verses 1 and 2. When Abraham was 99 years old, the Lord appeared to him and said, I am God Almighty. Walk before me and be blameless. I will confirm my covenant between me and you and will greatly increase your numbers. Now what has happened here is that there is a 13 year valley between times that God spoke to him. A 13 year valley. If you look back at the last verse in chapter 16, it says, Abraham was 86 years old when Heygar bore him ischmeal. The very next thing that said, first verse of chapter 17, when Abraham was 99 years old. There is a lot of time between that much space in my Bible. In the last part of 16, first part of 17, there is a lot of time. 13 years. That's a 13 year valley between peaks. Now once you understand my terminology here, when I use the term peak, a mountain peak, I'm talking about a real mountain top experience where God spoke to Abraham or appeared to Abraham and communed with him. There is no written record of that happening now for 13 years. Now just think about what that means. Even with great men of Bible times, there were long gaps of time where God did not appear to them, where they did not have these great spiritual peaks in their lives. They did not have those necessarily daily, they did not have those even weekly or monthly. And in this experience, there seems to be a period of 13 years. Now I'm not at all saying that we should go 13 years between quiet times or times of devotional time with God. I'm not saying that at all. But I'm talking about real mountain top experiences where God really seems to break through, where God really seems to touch your heart, speak to your heart, move you in a different direction in your life, not even the giants of faith and the Bible experience that on a regular weekly basis. So why should we expect to? But I would have you notice that when God does show up, when God does speak in an unmistakable way, nothing has changed in 13 years. That's very important to see. Nothing has changed. God has not changed. Verse 1, He introduces Himself as I am God Almighty. The God who is powerful, the God who is mighty, who has all power, all might, nothing has changed about who God is. Secondly, nothing has changed about His requirements. His requirements are still the same. He tells Abraham, walk before me. It's an interesting expression. Walk before me. Now, that means exactly what it sounds like. It means that as you walk every day of your life, Abraham, as you walk through life, as you take your steps through each day, do it in an awareness of my presence. Walk as though I am watching your every step. Walk before me. Like, I am the audience that you're walking in front of because I am. I am watching every step. 13 years have passed since God has spoken to Him, at least as far as the record is concerned. But nothing has changed. He is to walk every day as though God is watching Him because God is. And then He says, and be blameless. Be blameless. Live a lifestyle of moral, purity, and faithfulness. Be blameless, Abraham. So God's requirements have not changed. God Himself has not changed. God's requirements have not changed. God's promises have not changed, either. Verse two, I will confirm my covenant between me and you. We'll greatly increase your numbers. So nothing has changed even though it's been 13 years between mountain peaks of God appearing to Him when God does appear. Nothing has changed. God's not changed. His requirements haven't changed. His promises haven't changed. Nothing has changed in 13 years. Now what does that tell us? Well, I believe it gives us some clues as to how we can make it between mountain peaks. Because we all have mountain peaks in our lives, great experiences with the Lord, times when we know God is really at work, when He is really speaking, when He is really moving, and then there are valleys. Are there not? There are valleys between those mountain peaks and all of us experience them. And sometimes those valleys stretch on for a long time between mountain peaks. No one stays on the top of the mountain spiritually all the time. Like Abraham, there are a lot of ordinary days. There was a lot of ordinary living in those 13 years. There's a lot of ordinary days between mountain peaks. I mean between times when God really moves in a very direct and marvelous way in your life or really breaks through in a special way. Let's face it, nobody has fantastic times of Bible reading and prayer every day. Nobody has times every day in their lives where we see great blessings of God, where God is obviously at work and what has happened to you that day cannot be explained any other way than God. Now I understand, I understand theologically that that's true every day we live. I understand that God is in control of everything that happens to us, but I'm talking about these real mountain top experiences. These real peak times in our lives when we just can see a miraculous outworking of God's hand in our lives. Nobody experiences that every day. Nobody comes to every church service and has the message really hit you in the heart and you go home with a super blessing or a life changing decision. Nobody has that every church service. Be honest, nobody, including me. In fact some of you will walk out of church services and you shake your head and you'll say, man, that was a real dud. Be honest. I do the same thing. There are times when I walk out and shake my head, that was a real dud. You know what a dud is, don't you? I like fireworks. A dud is one of those fireworks that something happens and it doesn't have any, there's no color, there's no shooting stuff going on. It just is one of those white flashes of light and it's loud. It's very loud. There's no color and there's no beauty to it and really nothing to it. That's a dud. And I've preached a few of those and I know it when I do, there may be a lot of noise but not much to it and not very pretty. And not every church service is going to be one of those times when we were just thrilled to death with what God's doing in our hearts. And there are times in our lives and there are times in church's lives where we go through valleys and sometimes those valleys seem to last a long time and those are difficult times. What do we do during those times? Here's what we tend to do. We tend to kind of let things slip, we tend to kind of let up a little bit spiritually and think it's not as important for us to keep on living faithfully for God during those times because I think we kind of figure, you know, God is not really at work right now. He's probably not really even watching me. He's busy somewhere else. He is not. He is just as keenly observing your life and superintending every step of your life during those long valley times as he is on the mountain peaks. Thirteen years have gone by for Abraham. And when God does finally break in another mountain top experience happens. Nothing has changed. God is still the same. God's requirements for him are still the same. I've been expecting you every day of these thirteen years Abraham to walk before me and live a blameless life and he expects the same for us too. So we must understand there are really no times when God is unconcerned or is not at work in our lives. Even if we're in what we may think is a valley, a long valley between mountain peaks, there is no time in our lives when God is not at work. And he is always, every day, expecting us to live faithfully day to day to day to day to day. That is what communion with God is like in real life. In real life. Remember, it's not always great spiritual experiences and mountain top times with God. There's going to be a lot of just ordinary, daily, hard living. But God still expects us to live faithfully for him in those times. I love the story about Jan Patarewski, the Polish classical pianist. He was in a town here in the United States many years ago and was going to give a concert. And a mother took her young son to that concert. He was just beginning to take piano lessons and she figured if he could see a great classical pianist, it would probably inspire him to really want to practice, you know, and work hard and learn how to play the piano well. So she's going to take him to this concert and they're sitting there before the concert starts. If you've ever been to a classical concert, you know, that even the orchestra will come out on stage and they'll begin to warm up and it sounds very discordant and everything kind of is going on like that. And people are sitting and talking and she was talking to a neighbor, a friend beside them and didn't notice her little son had left his seat beside her. She turned around, he was not there and she began to look around and lo and behold to her shock and amazement he had wandered up stage and the draw of that piano on stage under the flood lights and seeing that empty piano stool just drew him on stage and he had wandered up there and taken his place and he started playing chopsticks with the two fingers, you know, chopsticks. Well people's attention was quickly riveted to the stage and people were, oh, oh, that's terrible. Who is that little boy? Somebody get that boy off the stage. He shouldn't be up there. Patiruski began to hear just off stage some of the commotion. He looked out and immediately sized up what was happening and he walked out on stage very quickly and a few people nodded their heads like, okay, somebody's going to take care of this and get this little kid off of there. Patiruski is going to start his concert but he didn't do that. Patiruski walked up behind the little boy and reached around with his hands and started playing a counter melody to chopsticks. The little boy kind of froze and Patiruski whispered in his ear, go ahead son, you're doing a wonderful job. Go ahead, just keep playing. And as the little boy plunked out chopsticks, Patiruski woven counter melodies and harmonies that just thrilled the audience. When it was done everybody rose to their feet and applauded both Patiruski and the little boy. And when I think of that story, I often think of God in those valley times of our lives when we find ourselves kind of playing chopsticks in life, just the mundane stuff. I think of God wrapping his arms around us and playing on those very simple themes of our lives, a counter melody that will make our lives something special for him. And when we want to give up and quit, he says, don't quit, don't quit. I'm at work with you. I'm at work behind the scenes. We're going to make something beautiful out of your life. Just keep playing, don't give up, don't quit. And there are lots of times when we just like to quit. And God says, keep living faithfully day to day. Well that's one thing Abraham did in this valley time of his life. But there's something else that communion with God in real life means, secondly it means listening to God's speak. And the next few verses, God speaks and Abraham listens. It's very interesting here in chapter 15, God and Abraham kind of went back and forth. Remember that talking back and forth? But in this scene, God speaks, Abraham listens. From verses three all the way through verse 16. And if you have a Bible like mine that breaks it down into paragraphs, there are three paragraphs here which means there are basically three trains of thought, three basic themes that God is getting across to Abram in these three separate paragraphs. So these are the three things as God speaks and Abram listens. And by the way, Abram is on his face. Look at verse three, Abram fell face down and God said to him, so Abram doesn't talk this whole time. He is on his face before God and God speaks. Three things God says to him. First one is, I'm going to renew my covenant with you. First three verses three through eight. Abram fell face down and God said to him, as for me, this is my covenant with you, you will be the father of many nations. No longer will you be called Abram. Your father or your name will be Abraham before I have made you a father of many nations. I will make you very fruitful. I will make nations of you and kings will come from you. I will establish my covenant as an everlasting covenant between me and you and your descendants after you for the generations to come to be your God and the God of your descendants after you. The whole land of Canaan where you are now an alien, I will give as an everlasting possession to you and your descendants after you and I will be their God. So the first thing he says to him, I'm going to renew my covenant with you. This land will be yours. This covenant will be yours. It is an everlasting covenant. The land will be an everlasting possession. I'm going to change your name to show that I'm renewing my covenant. Your name is going to be changed from exalted father to father of many because you're going to have many descendants. So he's renewing the basics of this covenant with him. It's the first thing he says to him. Second thing he says to him in verses 9 through 14 is Abram I'm going to establish a sign of this covenant. Look at verse 9. Then God said to Abraham, as for you, you must keep my covenant, you and your descendants after you for the generations to come. This is my covenant with you and your descendants after you, the covenant you're to keep. Every male among you shall be circumcised. You are to undergo circumcision and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and you. For the generations to come, every male among you who is eight days old must be circumcised, including those born in your household or bought with money from a foreigner, those who are not your own offspring. Whether born in your household or bought with your money, they must be circumcised. My covenant in your flesh is to be an everlasting covenant. Any uncircumcised male who has not been circumcised in the flesh will be cut off from his people. He has broken my covenant. God introduces to Abraham the sign of the Abrahamic covenant. This is very important. God details exactly why, how this is to be done, who should undergo circumcision? Every male, no exceptions. Whether they are born Jewish or not. Whether they've come into your household as aliens. It doesn't matter. Every person associated with my covenant, every male shall have the sign of this covenant. Second thing God tells him. By the way, did you know that God has given us a sign of the covenant that we have with him, the new covenant? It's the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives. The Holy Spirit is God's mark on our lives that we are His people. Look at these verses. Paul says it in Ephesians chapter 1, verse 13. He says, and you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed you were marked in Him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit, guaranteeing iron heredans until the redemption of those who are God's possession to the praise of His glory. So God has given us the Holy Spirit as the mark of His covenant with us, the seal of His covenant with us. And He repeats that again in Ephesians chapter 4, verse 30. He says, do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. God's mark of ownership on us is the presence of the Holy Spirit. He is the seal, and New Testament times, a seal was a mark of ownership and security. It was a seal usually found in a ring that an authority figure a king would have, and the seal of that person would be impressed on wet wax and seal the document. The Holy Spirit is God's seal on our lives. The Holy Spirit is God's mark of ownership on us. So God has given us a sign of His covenant as well, just like He did Abraham. So God renews the covenant, God introduces the sign of the covenant, and then in verses 15 and 16, the second thing, the third thing, rather that God says to Him, is that I'm going to promise once again a son through Sarah. Verse 15, God also said to Abraham, as for Sarah, your wife, you are no longer to call her Sarah. Her name will be Sarah. I will bless her, and will surely give you a son by her. I will bless her so that she will be the mother of nations. Kings of people will come from her. Wow, what a grand blessing. What a broad scope of blessing upon this woman. She will be a mother of many nations, and so her name has changed from Sarah, which means my princess to Sarah, which means princess, indicating just a princess of many nations, princess across the board of many nations, because she will be the mother of many nations. So God has spoken, Abraham has listened in these verses. Now did you know God is still speaking today. The question is, who's listening? Are you listening? In this passage God speaks, Abraham listens. God is still speaking today. Are you listening? That's the question we need to ask. Are you listening? Now God speaks primarily through His Word, as the primary means that God speaks to us. And so I would ask you, are you carving out time to listen? To listen to God's Word? Are you carving out time publicly? You're here on Sunday night. You're carving out more time than most people are to listen to God's Word publicly. But are you also carving out time spiritually to listen to God's speaking? He wants to speak to us through His Word. Are we listening? Are we carving out time to speak with Him? I love Eugene Peterson's title of his book that he wrote a few years ago. I think it's maybe one of the best titles of any book I've ever seen. The title of his book was, A Long Obedience in the Same Direction. And the subtitle was, Discipleship in an Instant Society. This is what he says in that book. This is probably the most famous quote out of that book. He says, we assume that if something can be done at all, it can be done quickly and efficiently. Our attention spans have been conditioned by 32nd commercials. There is little enthusiasm, great statement. There is little enthusiasm for the patient acquisition of virtue. Little inclination to sign up for a long apprenticeship in what earlier generations of Christians called holiness. A long obedience in the same direction. What he's talking about is a commitment to giving the time that it takes to grow in holiness and godly character over a long period of time. It does not happen instantly. Christian growth is not popping in the microwave and 30 seconds later you're just as hot as can be for the Lord. It's been happening that way. Christian growth is, as Eugene Peterson says, a long obedience in the same direction. Just keep plotting along. And he's right when he says that we don't have much stomach for that anymore. We want everything done quickly. We want quick fixes. We want to read the latest book that's got the three keys to doing just what we need to do spiritually and life will never be the same for us. It doesn't work that way. You say, well, John, I am always on the move. I am pushed to get things done. I face deadlines every day of my life. I am always involved in something. How do you expect me to carve out that kind of time to grow in Christ likeness? I would suggest in the culture that we live in maybe we need to be more creative in using the time that we have. Maybe we need to listen to CDs and tapes of the Bible or on your MP3 or your iPod or whatever you may have. I don't even know enough about those to make sure I got the names right. But if you have some of those, maybe you need to take the time to listen to those instruments to be able to help you. Maybe on your way to work? Maybe that's the time when you will be able to focus on some time with God to hear his word. Maybe you need to pray as you walk. I got two emails this week from two different individuals. One of them said, as I was having my devotions while I was on the treadmill this morning and that thought hit me. What a great use of time. What a great use of time. I was thinking something that is in the normal ordinary course of life that you would think is kind of let's get to it. Let's get this done. But using that time to have devotions. Another one that I just got today, someone wrote me an email about, said I was up at 330 this morning thankful that I had a little baby to feed a bottle to. And as I was thinking about that, I was also praying. And he mentioned some things he was praying about. And I thought, what a great use of time. I mean, if you got to be up at 330 in the morning, why not pray while you're doing that? So maybe we need to be more creative with the way we use the time that we do have, even while we're doing something else. Maybe we need to cut the TV off a little earlier in the evening. Maybe we need to go to bed earlier and get up earlier. Maybe we need to use our noon meal time more wisely if that's possible for you to spend a little time with God. Maybe we need to say no to some of the commitments that we've over committed ourselves to, even some good things that we committed ourselves to. And maybe in those creative ways, we can make time carve out time in busy schedules to listen to God speak. God is speaking. Are you listening? So communion with God in real life means that we just live faithfully day to day. It means that we listen to God speak. But thirdly, it means struggling for understanding of God's purposes. Struggling for understanding of God's purposes. Look at verse 17. Abraham is struggling here, I believe. Verse 17 says, Abraham fell face down. He laughed and said to himself, will a son be born to a man a hundred years old? Will Sarah bear a child's age of 90? Abraham said to God, if only Ishmael might live under your blessing, then God said, yes, but your wife Sarah will bear you a son and you will call him Isaac. I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him. And as for Ishmael, I have heard you. I will surely bless him. I will make him fruitful and will greatly increase his numbers. He will be the father of twelve rulers and I will make him into a great nation. But my covenant I will establish with Isaac whom Sarah will bear to you by this time next year. Now, let's talk a little bit about Abraham's struggle. God has just finished renewing this covenant with him, reaffirming his covenant with him that he will have a son and Abraham laughs. He laughs. You would too. Can you imagine Sarah's 90 years old? Can you imagine having a toddler at 92? Can you imagine being 108 when he graduates from high school and attack on 10 years all this for Abraham? Can you imagine being 112 when he graduates from college? You'd laugh too if this happened to you. And why did Abraham laugh? Some people like to say that Abraham was laughing out of joy. That he was so joyful that God was being so good to him and he was just praising the Lord. Oh, Lord, how wonderful this is. I don't think so. I think Abraham was struggling. And I'm not just thinking that because I know how I would feel. I think the text indicates that. You see, Abraham is struggling to figure out how this is going to take place and that's the context in which he laughs. He offers God another suggestion or another solution. After he laughs, and this is inwardly, he laughs, the Bible says, because he said to himself, will a son be born to a man 100 years old and will Sarah bear a childhood age of 90? And then he offers God another alternative. If only Ishmael might live under your blessing. In other words, Lord, surely, that's the way you're going to do this. The Ishmael, right? I don't think he's laughing out of great faith here. I think he's struggling to understand. I think he's got some doubt here. Struggling to understand what's going on. And God's answer to him that I understand your concern for Ishmael, but no, no, no. The promise is going to be fulfilled through your son, Isaac. And I love this. I love this about God. God always has the last laugh. You know what Isaac means? The Hebrew word means laughter. So God says, okay, go ahead and laugh. I'm going to give you a son. I want you to name him laughter. I'm going to have the last laugh, Abraham. So I think Abraham was struggling, not not rejoicing here. I think he was struggling with some doubt to make sense of all this. How can this happen? Can I have a son when I'm 100? Can Sarah have a son when she's 90? Surely Lord, you're talking about Ishmael, right? He's struggling with figuring out what's going on here. Don't feel the pressure as I believe some do. To try to make Abraham look more spiritual than he is or look stronger than he is, I believe he is a man strong in faith. What I take comfort in is that even the strongest people of faith have times when they waver in doubt. And that's what real life is like. Sometimes we set Bible characters up so high that we could never hope to achieve their status. If we're really honest with the text here, I think Abraham is struggling with some doubt and questions of God about how this is going to happen. Here's my point. Do you ever struggle in your faith? And maybe a better way to ask that question is, are you willing to admit that you struggle in your faith sometimes? You're willing to admit that? I believe part of honest communion with God in real life is times when we can't figure out what God is doing. We cannot understand how God is going to do what He has promised to do. And we question, we just don't understand. We may even offer alternatives to God. Surely God, you can't mean this. We don't understand what God is allowing or what He is doing in our lives. You know, in times like that, don't feel like you have to prove something to God. God knows your heart anyway. Don't feel like you have to cover up your doubts and sound better in prayer than you really are in your heart. God knows where your heart is anyway. Just open up and express it to Him. Go ahead and be honest with Him. And by all means, we should not try to impress others with our spirituality by acting like we've got it all together. We have all the answers because none of us do. None of us do. That's just really a false piety. It's not genuine. It's not real. Communion with God in real life is honest enough to say there are times when I don't get it, God. I don't understand what is happening. Now, I'm going to live faithfully day to day, but I don't understand what you're doing in my life or why you're allowing this in my life. All of us go through times like that. Some of us go through long valleys like that where we cannot fully understand what's going on. One of my heroes in the ministry is David Jeremiah. Ever since I first heard him preach back in the early 80s at Grace Seminary, he was still pastoring in Fort Wayne, Indiana at the time. I've just really loved his preaching style and his expository style and very good style of preaching. I've just always enjoyed it. So I got a book by him back in the 80s. It was called Exposing the Myths of Parenthood. What he did was he took some of the common myths of parenthood and just exposed them for being unreal and just untrue and really dealt with what it meant to be a parent from a biblical perspective. And in that book, he opens up his heart and in the very beginning tells the story of a real trial they went through with their oldest daughter, Jan, who was shortly after he had moved to San Diego and had begun pastoring there in San Diego. And he was out making a visit to the hospital one day and he was driving back. You got a phone call from his secretary. He said, you need to get here as quickly as possible. And he said, what's wrong? And she said something with your family, you need to get here quickly. And he got there. And what he found out was that his oldest daughter who was in high school had been caught with several other high school students in their Christian school using cocaine. And he didn't know what to do. It just floored him, devastated him. And he wrote this in a journal which he quotes from in that book. By the way, his daughter, Jan, went off to a military type school for some real strict discipline and training for a year and then went to Word of Life Bible Institute, which also is very strict and has a lot of structure built into the lives of students. And she's doing wonderful now. I think she's involved in his ministry, radio ministry now, but didn't look very good for a while. This is what he wrote in his journal. These last few days, Lord, have been so difficult. Little did I know when I began to speak on stress that I would experience the things which have happened. This whole situation with Jan has totally devastated me. I have been unable to pray for these last three days. Did you get that? I've been unable to pray for the last three days. I don't understand if I have been ashamed to come to you because I feel so responsible or if it's just that the hurt is so great, I have been neutralized. You ever felt that way? Like you just have nothing, nothing more to give spiritual. You ever felt that way? He says, Lord, I love my Jan so much. I believed in her and she was not honest with me. How can I recover what has been lost? Lord, help me know what to do. Lord, make me willing to be vulnerable and see what I have done to contribute to this situation. When he goes on to describe some of the prayers that he prayed in that breakthrough time, where he finally, after three days, decided I need to spend some time with God. But for three days, he couldn't even think straight enough to talk to God. You ever been there? If you haven't, you will be sometime. Walking with God, communion with God in real life means there are times when you struggle for understanding of God's purposes and you can't figure it all out. And there will be times when you may go three days or three weeks or three months or three years not understanding what's happening, struggling for understanding of God's purposes. In those times, do what Abraham did. Do what Abraham did. Just be honest with God. God, I got some questions. I need to pour out my heart to you. There's one other thing that we need to see. Communion with God in real life means obeying God's commands. No communion with God is complete without obedience. Prayer, Abraham's done that. Listening to God's speak, Abraham's done that. But there is no real communion with God if there's no obedience, Saul a little bit at this morning. We're not going to take the time to read it, verses 22 through 27, describe that on the same day, that very day twice, that phrase is mentioned, on that very day, Abraham carried out exactly what God told him to do with his family, with his son, with himself, with all the males in his family. He obeyed God. So first thing to learn from that is he obeyed promptly and we should obey promptly. Every same day, no questions, no procrastination, no rationalization, he just did what he knew he was supposed to do. He didn't have all of his questions answered yet. He doesn't understand how it's all going to work with Isaac yet, but he obeys what he knows he's supposed to obey. So obey promptly, secondly obeyed completely. There's a lot of detail given in those verses about what Abraham did and the detail is to show that he obeyed exactly what God told him to do earlier in this chapter. He obeyed completely. He didn't pick and choose. He didn't say I'll do this part, but I'm not sure about that. No, he did exactly what God told him to do. Obeyed completely. So communion with God in real life means even though I may not understand everything God is doing, what I know to do, I will do. I will obey God completely and I will obey him promptly. Whatever I know to do, I'll do. So I hope this evening that you will discover in your life that you will really give some thought to what it means to have communion with God in your real life and where you are and what you're facing. And I hope you'll understand that it means to be creative in finding time to be with him and his word publicly and privately, but communion with God in real life goes far beyond that. And I hope you'll understand and see that it means just to live faithfully day by day regardless of whether or not you're in the valley or on the mountain peaks. And if you've been in a valley for a long time, just keep living faithfully day to day. Remember what God has told you to do? He wants you to live blamelessly and walk before him and if you can't do anything else, just do that. Just focus on what you know to do and obey what you know to do and then be honest where you struggle. Be honest with God about the questions and doubts and struggles that you're facing, things you can't figure out. And my friend, God will honor you for communing with him in the midst of real life. Let's be honest, communion with God, just like walking with God, is not always sitting beside a babbling brook in a beautiful forest and just having these mountaintop experiences with God. It's not what it is. There's a whole lot of hard, real life, but communion with God can take place even in the midst of that. I hope you'll figure that out how it works in your life. Could we pray together? Father, we have our heads bowed now as a sign that we respect you. We reverence you, we are in all before you. Even when we can't fully understand you, we know that you're still God. Even when we have questions we know that you will guide us. Father I pray that especially for those who are in real valley times now and they've maybe not had a mountaintop experience with you for a long time. They kind of let things slip and felt like it's not really worth giving attention to, to spend time with God or to really seek to walk with you. Lord I pray that you would help them tonight to see that when you do show up in a great way in their lives again and they really recognize it. You will say to them, I've been expecting you all along just to live faithfully for me day by day, to be honest with me, to listen to me speak, to obey what you know to do. So help us Lord to do that consistently, faithfully, even in the dark valley days. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.