My wife loves the game show network. This is ok with me until a certain dude’s voice comes through the speakers. A man should not sound like that, it makes me cringe. Really it makes me want to vomit. My response is an alloy made with more sin than grace. Here is likely another man who never had a real father and has likely never had the gospel radically revamp his idea of manhood, and rather than feeling sorrow and compassion I just get angry. The gospel he needs I deny him in my self-righteousness. Nevertheless, for illustration purposes, his voice is irritating; to me.
In contrast I love Morgan Freeman’s voice. He really should be the only one allowed to do TV and radio commercials. If an audio Bible ever comes out with Morgan as the voice, be assured I will buy it.
Still greater is God’s voice, His Word. ‘Greater’ is an adjectival understatement of colossal size. His voice is majestic. It can come to us in awesome thunderous booms (Exodus 19:19), or in the softest whisper (1 Kings 19:12-13). His voice both causes (Psalm 29:3-5) and calms (Mark 4:39) storms. No one talks like our God (Psalm 33:6).
Sadly sin causes us to run from His voice. Adam hides when he hears the sound of the LORD God. The word translated sound here is more often translated voice. It is dense in the Pentateuch, especially Deuteronomy (Deuteronomy 5:25; 8:20; 15:5; 18:16; 26:14; 27:10; 28:1, 2, 15, 45, 62; 30:8, 10). In Deuteronomy we see that the voice of the LORD is something to be obeyed. When Adam hears it he is further disobeying. He does not come forward in broken repentance, he hides. Sin makes us to vomit with fear at His Holy voice, its purity makes us cringe. How evil is the evil that could make me hear such a golden tongue in this way?
But Adam is not allowed to hide; the divine words confront and interrogate him. Yes, they expose his nakedness and his guilt, but keep listening, they also hold out promise. The thunder of judgment turns to a whisper of promise.
God has thundered against the Son, so you might hear the whispers of His eternal love for you.
No Other Boast 
Awesome. I loved the lesson last night. Good comments from the D-Team, too.
I always thought God might sound a little like James Earl Jones.
Morgan Freeman is cool though. I remember when he was on “The Electric Company” when I was a wee lad. It was sort of a “Sesame Street” knock-off; we’re talking 1973 or so. Yea, I’m pretty old.
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There is nothing quite like some good ol’ Morgan Freeman in Shawshank. 🙂
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Sometimes after learning texts like this one I am stunned into silence by God’s “thundering against the Son” so I could hear whispers of His love. It was so on Wednesday night. I’m stunned that He would even love me, but to go to such great lengths that I would know it?…To quote Shawn McDonald: “What a beautiful God.”
Thanks Josh
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“God has thundered against the Son, so you might hear the whispers of His eternal love for you.”
Wow! How great is that? =)
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Mmm. Just re-read this. Great stuff.
Moving from the voice of God to the word of God, I’ve been feeling convicted lately about just how little I know Scripture. The problem is, I know more than most of my college colleagues at my church here in Waco. Everyone in my small group knows this. One of the girls even calls me a “walking Bible.” Honestly, most of this is being good with a concordance. But this has nursed within me a subtle, underlying, subconscious, only-recently-admitted, DEADLY pride in the smidgen I know.
I saw something on a blog (DesiringGod blog, maybe?) that brought the minuscule proportion of my knowledge to the whole into light.
If someone were hand me a fake Bible that had six verses added to each chapter of Zechariah, would I notice?
Not at all.
Since then, I have been making a grace-driven effort to increase my knowledge (and the translation of that knowledge into the depths of my being) of Scripture. I’ve decided for my current devotional set to, instead of going through a New Testament book that I’ve read before but don’t know well, to go through all the minor prophets. I’m desperately praying that this comes only from a desire to know God, without the addition of a desire to impress my friends.
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