Where's My Billboard?

There's a verse in Psalms that in the Living Bible reads, "Lord, tell me what to do and make it plain." Don't you just wish God would do that? I mean, how much easier would life be if God just wrote on our bathroom mirror every day in detail what He wants us to do? Most of us Christians really desire God's will for our lives, but most of the time, we wander around in the dark bumping into things, hoping eventually to bump into God's perfect plan.That can't be what we're supposed to do, is it?
As I pondered this question driving home tonight, I turned the radio down and began to pray. There are a lot of unanswered questions in my life right now, and what I really need is some divine guidance. I got some, but not in the way I wanted.

"Sure," I felt God say to me, "I could very easily give you daily marching orders, but you don't seem to check in with headquarters on a daily basis and stick around long enough to get them."

"Huh? Well, I pray every day," I answered.

"Oh, that laundry list of sick folks, your needs, and so on? When do I get to talk?

"Um....ok, I see your point."

I've always been a little jealous and a whole lot mystified by those prayer warriors who can spend hours in prayer. Seems whenever I stop to pray, my eyes get heavy, my mind wanders, I get a strange itch, or the phone rings, or...well, you get the picture. Rarely have I spent more than a few minutes in prayer, unless I was in the middle of a crisis or something. It's easy to bare your soul when you're at your wit's end. When things are rolling along fairly peacefully, I have a tendency to set the cruise control.

Decision-making, however, is a whole different story. I'm not particularly good at making the big decisions. I am no fan of major change. I don't mind changing things inside and out, as long as underneath me stays stable. God had to almost knock me in the head to get me to see that moving to Jacksonville was what He wanted me to do. I asked Him to just make the decision for me and close any other options, and whatever door opened, I would walk through it, no questions asked. And He did exactly that. While I'm sure He appreciated my willingness to obey, I don't know if that's how He would have me handle all my decisions.

I've always believed that God gives us a great deal of latitude in making decisions, and that there can often be several good choices we can choose from that God will bless. I'm just not very good at making them. So what I got today was maybe I need to hang out with Him more often, and talk things over. That means including time to listen.