Listening to the Holy Spirit
by Troy S.
Today on my airport hotel treadmill run, I was thinking about Balam’s Donkey and how God will send angels/messengers in a variety of ways. Sometimes it may be a donkey blocking your path or maybe working through the acts of strangers.
I was reflecting on the previous day with a sense of irony, on our way back from the San Cristobal tram we ran into a couple we’d met on our Santiago flight. They told us they’d almost fallen prey to a bait and switch taxi scam, but luckily their credit card flagged and prevented it. The scam converts the charge from say $40 to around $700, which is easy to fall for given the Chilean exchange rate is roughly 1000 and they use a decimal instead of a comma. Anyways we decided not to catch the taxi we were planning on taking but went with an Uber instead. Was this Message number 1?
The Uber driver could hardly speak any English, but she was concerned about our safety at the Mercado Fish Market. Apparently, it is a haven for pickpockets. Message 2?
After walking down one street while we were trying to get our bearings and find a grocery store, this nice woman who spoke great English warned us about having our cell phone out in the open. She suggested quite firmly that we’d be better off if we walked a couple more blocks to an area safer for tourists. Apparently, she carries two cell phones (One old phone for downtown, and her normal phone). Wow! Not sure I’ve ever had to be warned about sketchy areas. Message 3!
Just like Balam, our eyes started to wake up to the fact that maybe God was trying to tell us something. I guess we were a little slow and needed things to be painfully clear much like Balam. (At least we didn’t have any donkeys talk to us!) In each case, we decided to follow the advice we’d been given.
God sends Angels/Messages in many forms; we just need to be open to see how God is actively working in our lives and answering prayers. The question we discussed that evening: Why are we more receptive to seeing this when we are on vacation? Vacations have a way of opening our senses and minds. How often in our daily lives are we running on autopilot, and maybe when we break up routines it makes us more aware?
In this space, we will be sharing stories by individuals in our congregation. They are based on their personal experiences and understandings. Some will be short, some will be a bit longer. Some will be about struggles, some will be about simple joys. But they will all be reminders of how we encounter God as we go about our daily lives.
Previous God Sightings:
March 2026
August 2025
May 2025
March 2025