La Obediencia Que Te Devuelve La Paz | El Dîa a Dîa

Good morning, welcome back to this time of reflection. My name is Victor Martínez Pastor of Crossroads en Español and the reality is that I have not recorded one of these videos for a long time. I was a little stuck in the book of Joshua, chapter 9, and I have reflected a lot about this material. And in large part I found myself a little stuck because I found myself in a situation similar to what we are going to read. And I was living the consequences of living, what I would say today, disobedience. And I want to share with you some of the actions that I have taken and I want to invite you to take action as well. In the book of Joshua, chapter 9, we see how the Israelites led by Joshua come from a place of many victories and many celebrations. And they find themselves in this situation in which this group of people was afraid to die at the hands of the Israelites. They have heard the stories, in fact we know it because they share it with the Israelites. And they decide to deceive Joshua and his people by pretending to be poor people with great need. And Joshua and the people of Israel with great compassion decide to take action and decide to support these people. Despite the fact that this was against the mandate that God had given them. And we see what happens. At the end, after several days, we see how they realize that these people had deceived them, despite the fact that Joshua had basically extended the grace. And although there were some consequences for them in the long run, they did not die because Joshua made the promise that they would not kill them. However, and this is a story for another time. We see how God had given him clear instructions that he did not want to see basically survivors on earth. From what we can understand and study in the Bible, many times today we can see that God is not calling us to have this type of killing or cleansing. Unfortunately, we sometimes misinterpret the character of God. But at that time this was part of the divine plan. Joshua ends up being obedient. And here comes the application for all of us. It is possible that God has spoken to some of us by telling us to do something. In fact, sometimes we spend so much time praying and asking God to do something or to speak to us and reveal something to us. And when he does, we do not take the action that he is inviting us to. And I don't want that to happen to you. I recently felt a lot of conviction that one of the telegraphic roles that I assume in the community, in an organization that does very good work to help people on the streets, people who are recovering from addiction, things that are really very important, very good.

However, after several months, almost a year, I felt that God was putting in my heart that this was not the place or space where he wanted me. That he wanted me to focus specifically on supporting our Latin community, especially during these times that we live in today. However, because I thought I was doing a good job, where I thought I was having a greater influence in the city where I live, I thought I should continue doing it. But every time I interacted with the organization or asked for something, I felt a very, very deep level of stress. And the more time I spent with God, and I'm reading this chapter and I didn't know how to react to it, I realize that I am like Josué in this situation, where God had already established that this was not the place where he wanted me to be, where he was giving me a lot of signals, where he wanted me to make the decision that corresponded to his obedience. But I didn't do it. I didn't do it because I was basically afraid of looking bad in front of a group of people. And this is what happened to Josué. Out of fear of looking bad, because he didn't see himself as a leader who lacked compassion, he decided to make this decision. Something that seemed to be good, however, was against what God was doing. And sometimes we can find ourselves in situations where we want to do things that are good, that seem to please God. However, we have not consulted him, or if we have consulted him and listened to him, we have not been obedient to him. So this is my invitation to you today. If you ask God to give you wisdom, to give you direction, and he gives it to you, respond with obedience. Not doing it can not only bring consequences for you and for other people, but you will feel the burden of the decision or the lack of decision when being disobedient. And what I want most for you is that you can experience the peace that comes when we fully trust that God and their plans are better than ours.

So if this identifies you, I invite you to read the chapter 9 of Joshua. Read this story and reflect on where in your life you may be operating or making decisions that go against what God would like you to do, where you feel a stress that you can't shake, and if so, maybe God is inviting you to a place of repentance and obedience. I hope to see you soon in the next reflection.