Tune In!
My dear brothers, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry. . . . Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this . . . he will be blessed in what he does.
James 1:19, 22–25 NIV
Revelation is a means of communication. It means “to make known” or “to unveil.” Revelation requires a “revealer,” who in this case is God, and it also requires a “hearer.” God’s hearers were the chosen prophets and apostles who recorded God’s revelation in the pages of the Bible. Thus it is a line of communication, at one end of which is God, and at the other end, man.
When I was a boy, radio was just coming of age. We would gather around a crude homemade set and twist the three tuning dials in an effort to establish contact with the transmitter. Often all the sound that came out of the amplifier was the squeak and squawk of static, but we knew that somewhere out there was the unseen transmitter and if contact was established and the dials were in adjustment, we could hear a voice loud and clear. After a long time of laborious tuning, the far distant voice would suddenly break through and a smile of triumph would illuminate the faces of all in the room. At last we were tuned in!
In the revelation that God established between Himself and us, we can find a new life and a new dimension of living, but we must “tune in.” There are higher levels of living to which we have never attained. There is peace, satisfaction, and joy that we have never experienced. God is trying to break through to us. The heavens are calling. God is speaking! Let man hear.
Our Father and our God, I know You are always transmitting. Your will and desire for my life to me through Your Word and Your people. Please help me tune in to You anew every morning and to stay on Your wavelength all my life. Through the power of Jesus Christ. Amen.
Billy Graham, Unto the Hills: A Daily Devotional (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2010).