Listening For The Footsteps Of God

Listening For The Footsteps Of God

Toward evening they heard the LORD God walking about in the garden. –Genesis 3:8

My college roommate, Stacy, married an Arkansas Razorbacks fan, and they have season tickets that put them at every football game in the fall. Recently some new season ticket holders were seated next to them. Mark, an attorney, introduced himself to Stacy and after some brief conversation asked her what she does. She told him she is a high school Bible teacher. “What is your favorite verse in the Bible?” he asked her. The question caught her a bit off guard, but she told him her favorite verse is Genesis 3:8. “I’m not up on what the Bible says,” he said. “What does that verse say?”

“It is when Adam and Eve heard God walking with them in the Garden in the cool of the day,” Stacy explained. “It’s about God pursuing man, and if he hadn’t done that, man would have stayed in the Garden and stayed in his sin.”

“Well, I hope God is still pursuing me,” Mark responded.

And she replied, “Why do you think he sat you beside a Bible teacher at a Razorbacks football game?”

Can you see it, from the first pages of Scripture through the last—the relentless pursuit of God wanting to walk with us? Can you see it from the earliest days of your life until today, the relentless pursuit of God wanting to walk with you through whatever you face, no matter how dark or difficult? So many people see the Bible as a book of moral teaching used to shore up our good behavior. But the Bible, from beginning to end, is a story of God extending himself, lowering himself, sacrificing himself, so that you and I can know and experience the fulfillment of a relationship with him, the satisfaction and safety of his very presence. It is God telling us over and over again that he wants to be with us. The final words of Jesus before he ascended were the promise, “I am with you always, even to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20). And his final words in Revelation are, “Yes, I am coming soon!” (Revelation 22:20).

Do you hear the footsteps of God in your life? Will you let him walk with you, or will you run and hide? Won’t you slow down and enjoy his presence with you?

God, I have heard your footsteps pursuing me throughout my life. And here in this dark place, I feel you beside me, walking with me.

DIGGING DEEPER