A language of confirmation
I’ve always felt strangely uncomfortable when someone states, with bold presumption, that the Lord told them to do something, to go somewhere or to believe or not to believe something. My discomfort lies not with the fact that someone feels that the Lord has guided them somehow, but to say that the Lord ‘told me’ or ‘the Lord said’, implies that He communicated almost audibly, in no uncertain terms - the same way as we would to each other. It does not factor in that we are human, flawed and fallible and perhaps what we thought we heard, came from ourselves and not from God. We know that the Lord spoke to a fortunate few who lived in Biblical times. Moses heard the voice of God coming from within a burning bush, Saul heard Him through a light on the road to Damascus. There are so many more examples. I love the story of how God spoke to Joshua, the son of Nun. After Moses died, the Lord instructed him in no uncertain terms regarding the future of the Israelites. The Lord tel...