God Listens

Jeremiah 29:12 Then you will call upon me and go and pray to me and I will listen.

I love knowing that God listens to me. One of the most comforting and humbling parts of my faith lies in the knowledge that the creator of the world also decided to create me. To know that He cares and hears my thoughts shakes me when I really pause to consider it. Because, if he cares enough for me that he will move mountains and calm storms and heal in response to our conversations, and I multiply that by roughly 3.2 billion other living voices, you must be awestruck that he can not only keep our prayers straight, but that he has plans to prosper us as well. 3.2 billion is a lot to keep under control. I have a hard enough time with my own two children and their big ideas and needs. Thirty in a classroom is often beyond what I can handle as a teacher. But God, he has billions to love, nurture, discipline, and save.

When I was little I remember being confused about how the police use 911. I think I pictured the Mayberry police station – with Fife and the few other workers employed there- and I imagined their phone ringing whenever a kitten got up a tree or a burglar broke into a home. I would wonder what would happen if someone called 911 and there weren't any people there to respond. What if the police man was already helping someone and then someone else needed help? As a kid, I worried about stuff like that all the time. Because at some point, we just have to run out of helpers, right? It isn't mathematically possible to guarantee that a 911 phone call will be answered immediately. If there are enough simultaneous calls, then someone has to wait. Not with God, though. It is part of God's awesomeness that I can't even begin to comprehend how he does it, but somehow he keeps it all straight and offers such undivided attention that I feel like I must be the only one out here talking to him, because I can feel all his attention is on loving me. And yet, others feel this too.

I love the scene in movies when producers want to show a global image by starting with a picture of a house and then zooming out to show the street, the neighborhood, still zooming out – the city, the state, the country, the hemisphere, the globe, and then finally space. It reveals humanity as such a small portion of the world and creates an insignificance. Sometimes along with the zoom out there will be an audio clip of one conversation piled on top of another and another and another until there is a loud buzz of multiple languages, all indecipherable amongst the chaotic noise. In the end, the God's eye view of the buzzing marble makes the viewer feel small and insignificant. I like to be reminded of this – I think it is healthy. But I also think it is all wrong, because if God was truly that distant, then it suggests that he is not truly listening or a part of our plans at all. But He is not a hands off God who flicked the marble into space and let it fall and then sat down on a heavenly curb to watch. We aren't his wind up toys either. I have found in my life that God is ever present and hovering in a way that is more like a sticky, humid air all around than a distant Hubble-like viewer of earth. Humidity can be uncomfortable too, I know. I meant for my analogy to show that having God with you all the time and accepting this image can sometimes be uncomfortable. But I decided long ago I would rather have Him with me always than have to phone in a sudden 911 and worry about getting patched through, past 3.2 billion others needing miracles. Hearing all our prayers, I think, would get annoying. But God doesn't ever ask us for silence. He says to pray continually – like he wants more and more voices to address him. I love this about my God.

This week, though, he showed me that he is always listening, not just to my prayers. I was talking to my husband after reading in Genesis about the tower of Babel. I told him, “One thing I will never understand about God is why he wanted to destroy the tower.” He asked me what I meant and I continued to explain my confusion – about why God would feel threatened by a measly little pyramid. My husband shrugged and we agreed that if God was angered enough to destroy, scatter, and confuse the people for that little tower, then it seemed odd that today we have so many towers that are standing which he hasn't destroyed. Then, Sunday morning my pastor took the podium and jumped right into a sermon on Babel and how God wasn't threatened by the tower, but the tower was a picture of their self idolatry. Perhaps he destroyed the one back then so we could see today all we do must be in gratitude of Him instead of in honor for ourselves. I looked at my husband and we nodded our heads, thankful for answers to questions. What is so amazing about this story is that it was an insignificant, minor detail. We had simply been wondering about God – not praying for insight and answers. And the next morning it was as if God said, “Oh, about that Tower...” and then he filled me in on the back story. I sat through that service feeling like we were chums or BFFs, God and me. We finish each other's thoughts and sentences. And I love that about my God. He is big, but he knows me. He is busy, but he hears me. He is powerful, and he loves me.