Getting Directions From God

Author: Pastor John Smith, Jr.
December 03, 2020
Every week is one of “those” weeks for me! I am bombarded every single day and sometimes it seems like every single minute with issues  need to be solved in my life or the life of others. I really am amazed that some pethatople actually want to know what I believe the will of the Lord is in any given situation. As a pastor or spiritual leader I have determined that I need to be careful when individuals are looking for God to speak a clear pathway to them concerning the will of God for various aspects of their lives. Today, as I was contemplating this great responsibility that the Lord has allowed to bless me with, I thought about the “Urim and Thummim” that was utilized in the Old Testament to inform leaders what the will of God was concerning a certain issue.
Now, there is much conjecture concerning the “Urim and Thummim.” Opinions are so vast concerning them and very little is stated about them in the Christian Scriptures that we need to be careful not to insert man’s wisdom into a “God-thing.” The Urim and Thummim were some type of stone or stick that was placed (really it was hidden from view} in the breastplate of the High Priest of the nation of Israel. Whenever a leader of Israel had a question concerning a corporate dilemma (did you catch it that I said a corporate dilemma) they could come and stand before the High Priest and his garment and ask a yes or no question and wait for God to answer through what I believe were stones. You see, there were twelve stones already affixed to the High Priest garment and each stone had one of the names of one of the tribes of Israel engraved on them, along with the names of the Patriarchs; Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. These stones also had the word “tribe” engraved on them in order for the stones to contain the entire Hebrew alphabet. As far as I can determine, whenever there was a corporate dilemma or question one of the leaders of Israel would come before the High Priest and ask one question at a time. The answer to the question asked would be provided one of two ways; 1) if it was a yes or no question, the Urim would light up if the answer was “No” and the Thummim would light up if the answer was “Yes,” 2) if the answer required more than a simple yes or no the “Urim and Thummim would give off some type of light essence that would cause various sequential letters of the Hebrew alphabet to light up, so that, the High Priest could write down the answer to the question that the Lord had spelled out in detail. One surprising thing that I noticed is that God did not always answer questions that were put before Him, such as, in the case of Saul, in 1 Samuel 28:6 when the Philistines were approaching the place where Saul was staying, the Bible says that the Lord chose not to answer Saul through dreams, Urim, or prophets. After God would not answer him, Saul went and visited the witch to conjour up an evil spirit of Samuel the prophet for an answer to the questions that he had. God punished Saul for this abomination. In many other places in Scripture God readily answer questions utilizing “the Urim and the Thummim.”
Now, let’s get bring some light onto what is going on in my head right now! As I have already stated I was contemplating how to receive a specific answer for specific questions that I have or others have that seek my advice and this caused me to reflect on the Urim and Thummim. I discovered several key things concerning the Urim and the Thummim; 1) Only leaders of the corporate body could ask questions, such as Priests and Kings, 2) Most of the time God would answer the questions posed to the Urim and the Thummim, 3) Sometimes God chose not to answer the questions posed to the Urim and the Thummim, 3) All of the questions posed to the Urim and the Thummim have ramifications for national Israel, the corporate body, 4) God chose not to allow everyday people to approach the Urim and the Thummim, so therefore, the average individual could not receive a direct revelation from God concerning their present dilemma.
This information was intriguing because I also realized that after the deportation of national Israel into Babylonian captivity the Urim and Thummim is only mentioned one more time in the Old Testament. They were mentioned concerning the method by which Ezra, the priest, determined if someone was of the tribe of Levi and were thus allowed to perform the duties of a priest. Moreover, the absence of the Urim and Thummim throughout the rest of Scripture presented me with a personal dilemma. What if I don’t need a corporate word from God about a dilemma that the community is facing but I need a personal revelation concerning what I am facing, how do I get it! I mean no one has any more Urim and Thummim (no one even knows what it truly looks like). We no longer have a High Priest in Israel (they have been gone since 70 A.D.) So, has God abandoned us and refusing to guide HIs children? Absolutely not! I remember reading in the Scripture about events surrounding the death of Christ and how an Angel was sent to the Temple and he stood in front of the curtain that separated the Holy Place from the Holy of Holies and the angel cut the curtain into two separate pieces signifying that the historical role of the Jewish High Priest was no longer required because Jesus has become the High Priest forever, after the order of Melchizedek. Now, it also gave us a visual of what the Apostle Paul declared about the believer being able to approach the throne of God boldly in Romans 5. 
This was an interesting study for me because it helped reinforce in me that I do not need any external thing like the Urim and the Thummim to alert me to the will of God because Jesus said that when He left that He would send us another comforter (the same kind as He) who would guide us into all truth. So, since the Holy Spirit lives in me, I have an internal witness to answer every question that I have!  Let me leave you with this quote from 1 John 2:27, “But the anointing which ye have received of him abideth in you, and ye need not that any man teach you: but as the same anointing teacheth you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie, and even as it hath taught you, ye shall abide in him.” ALL I NEED IS THE SPIRIT OF GOD THAT CHRIST SENT TO BE MY COMFORTER TO GUIDE ME INTO ALL TRUTH AND THE WILL OF GOD FOR MY LIFE! 

BACK