It’s always an interesting conversation one gets into when someone says, “God would never say that”, or “If it’s this or that, it must be God.” Recently my wife and I dedicated our son Darius and I felt it important for his dedication to recite all the miracles the almighty has done for me, and all of the different ways he has revealed his character to us. So that when he grows up, he can hear from others the things that happened to us, and which God it is that we serve. I mentioned things like, God is spirit, and he is love, light, life to name a few. How can one judge effectively when words or voices suggest for us to do one thing and not another? The simple and typical answer is, “He would never tell us to do something contrary to his character.” Which is true, however, how deep do we know his character? How high have we set his standards in our minds? How close or far are the boundaries we have set for him to communicate to us?

The reason I bring this up is, in my experience, there is very little, if anything that God cannot say to us or ask us to do. When I think about it, God has asked me to do some considerably ridiculous things in my life, believe it or not, for a season, he asked me to stop praying to him, and as a result I did a 7 day fast where I fasted food and speech, afterward to have learned what it means to ‘pray’ instead of reciting words or ‘prayer recipes’.

Another time he asked me to stop reading my bible. Fancy that, certainly strange for the almighty to ask me to stop reading the one book that is supposed to help instruct me about him and his ways, yet without a doubt, he asked me to stop reading my bible for a season.

Another time, he asked me to stop attending the church I was going to. The dogmatic believer would immediately point out that “God doesn’t endorse lone rangers.” Suggesting that if anything told you to stop attending church it must certainly be the devil or the enemy. However, without a doubt, he did, and for very good reasons.

Another time, I was asked to stop calling Jesus, Jesus. That pretty much puts the icing on the cake, not only did he say, stop going to church, stop reading your bible, stop praying to me like that, now don’t call me that anymore.
I could simply point out that for all intensive purposes it would be blatantly simple to scream out in protest and say; “Only the devil could tell someone those things! God would never say that!”

I mean really, doesn’t the devil want to get people to ignore the bible completely? Any attempts to pull a person away from it are a surefire characteristic of the devil, at least, one would think. What about stop going to church? Isn’t that one of the goals of the devil also? To scatter the sheep, take them away from the shepherds, and get them alone so he can devour them? I mean it can’t get any better than getting a person to stop calling on the name Jesus, the same name that all spirits and powers are in submission to right? Heck, if the devil could convince me that I wasn’t to call him Jesus anymore, that’ s about the final straw wouldn’t you say?

But the real matter of fact is there was wisdom in each of those requests, and it was the almighty that made those requests to me by his spirit. See how quickly we can judge narrow-mindedly and call what is from God, the devil!
How you say? How can you know for sure?

I reply, “Would you ever let God talk to you that way? Would you even give him a moment of your time to listen, perhaps consider his wisdom?”
Look what he asked some of the prophets to do!

Take Isaiah for example, one of my favorites. The almighty asked Isaiah to walk around naked for 3 years. Not to mention, naked, preaching still, likely prophesying as well.

What is your first instinct when you think to see some naked guy with a big beard yelling at people about a coming war, enslavement, lots of death and destruction?

I think it’s pretty easy to say, most and just about all would laugh, shake our heads and/or just completely avoid all contact with him. It’s easy to write someone off like that, how can we even relate? It begs the question, “Can God really ask someone to do that?” Verily he did, and he can again whenever he wants to. See here:

Isa 20:2 at that time יהוה spoke by Isaiah the son of Amotz, saying, “Go, and loosen the sackcloth from off your waist, and take your shoes from off your feet.” He did so, walking naked and barefoot.
Isa 20:3 יהוה said, “As my servant Isaiah has walked naked and barefoot three years for a sign and a wonder concerning Egypt and concerning Kush,
Isa 20:4 so the king of Ashur will lead away the captives of Egypt and the exiles of Kush, young and old, naked and barefoot, and with buttocks uncovered, to the shame of Egypt.

The thing that isn’t mentioned here is the commanding presence the prophets held. His words had come true for years, and often what he had to say was about impending doom! People, cities were often terrified of the prophets like him!
So, how can we relate that to us in our day? Imagine a formal authoritative spokesperson that heralds to a country. Take that person; make him naked all of a sudden and running about saying that God told him to talk about doom and coming battle and slavery. THAT is a hard pill to swallow. It would he hard enough even if he wasn’t naked!

That is just one of many! Take Ezekiel for another.

He asked Isaiah to be naked for three years, and he asked Ezekiel to lie on side for a year, and also, to cook his meals over human feces. Just take a moment and consider that sight. Again, Ezekiel was not a pushover, in my opinion; he sets the standard for fire and brimstone preaching. His mission was to speak to a people over and over again, when the almighty even told him that they wouldn’t listen at all. If Ezekiel refused, all of their blood was to be on his hands. His resolve was harder than iron. He was very likely a scary person to see and behold. He reminds me of Gandalf the Gray in Lord of the Rings, the first one, where he says to Bilbo, “Don’t take me for some cheap conjurer of tricks!” and has a frightening deep and loud voice and darkness enveloping him. Ezekiel reminds me of one of those guys.

Eze 4:4 “And lie on your left side, and you shall put the crookedness of the house of Yisra’ĕl on it. As many days as you lie on it, you shall bear their crookedness.
Eze 4:5 “For I Myself have laid on you the years of their crookedness, according to the number of the days, three hundred and ninety days. And you shall bear the crookedness of the house of Yisra’ĕl.
Eze 4:6 “And when you have completed them, you shall lie again on your right side and shall bear the crookedness of the house of Yehuḏah forty days, a day for a year. I have laid on you a day for a year.
And
Eze 4:12 “And eat it as a barley cake. And bake it, before their eyes, on human dung.”

So picture him, lying on the ground, 6 months go by and he’s still there, telling people that the almighty told him to do this for YOU none the less while cooking some food over his own dung. I mean, we are looking at the perfect example of “Can God ever say that to someone?” So ask yourself once more; “How well do I know his character? Would I even consider letting him speak to me about anything even near what he asked these two?” The cry of our hearts should be, “I need to know you more!”

I saved perhaps the best for last, Hosea.

It’s not hard to show certain things about Gods character, apparent things like; he hates unrighteousness, and loves righteousness. He hates adultery, stealing, lying, among several other things. He doesn’t like it when people make a lifestyle of sleeping around, called whoredom, or for some readers, fornication.

Ezekiel was asked to lie on his side for a long time and cook with dung, Isaiah was asked to walk around naked for three years. Hosea on the other hand, was asked to find and marry a public whore, have children with her, allow her to continue with her prostitute lifestyle while the almighty asks him to never budge and always be faithful. I think for many that would definitely, without a doubt, cross the line. Some may be able to handle that lifestyle, but in referring to what God can and cannot say, it should be utterly impossible for him to ask anyone to marry a prostitute and carryon as Hosea did.

Hos 1:2 The beginning of the word of יהוה with Hoshĕa. And יהוה said to Hoshĕa, “Go, take yourself a woman of whoring and children of whoring, for the land has utterly whored away from יהוה.”

Picture that coming to you. One day like a fire in your bones, you feel and hear in your mind and heart that you need to go and find a wife of a prostitute and start a family with her, and continually let her leave and go have illegitimate children with other men, whom mock and laugh at you all over town. Then to hear the almighty say, stay with her, love her wholeheartedly, and don’t ever leave.

“Would God say that?”

“ Can he ask me to do hard things I would not have imagined?”

“ Is my concept of God so shallow that I can’t even consider him to be the same God that I thought I knew well?”

These are real and serious questions we need to ask ourselves. Don’t wait for a conversation to come up where someone says, God can or can’t say something. Ask yourself now, these are the reasons we have the testimonies of these brave and diligent prophets.

Mat 10:41 “He who receives a prophet in the name of a prophet shall receive a prophet’s reward. And he who receives a righteous one in the name of a righteous one shall receive a righteous one’s reward.

Say it:

“I NEED TO KNOW YOU MORE!”

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