How cool is it when God discloses His thoughts within us while we’re studying scripture or simply taking a walk? It's often thrilling and sometimes quite intimate.

These impressions come from God as guidance for difficult decisions, answers to unravel puzzling questions, or keys to opening promises to advance our walk in the Spirit.

After that first buzz and glow, people can’t wait to tell somebody about it. Some take that ‘key’ and use it for a theme to write an entire book. Some may use it as the topic for a sermonette, or even a blog post. After a while they just take that key and throw it in the closet, thinking that someday it might even open something.

That sense of having actually heard from God through His abiding Spirit was once exhilarating. But now, that key to the Kingdom’s treasures lay in a closet with a hundred other keys - tokens of once having received a special message, some time ago.

Consider that those keys and impressions are tokens, or promises, of new adventures to explore. Remember the first time you went to a roller rink? When you saw that cutie across the floor? And she saw you. A you kept checking back. And one time you caught her smiling at you. Yeah, she was looking right at you, and smiling. And her friends were giggling. Oh, were you wrecked! You couldn’t sleep all night. Your friends grew nauseated at your blabbing on and on about how pretty she was, and how good she could skate, and how you skated passed her and your arms touched. You were pathetic.

Time passed. You looked for her the next time you went skating, and the next, and the next. But you never found her again. You decided to be glad for the memory of her smile and to hold onto the feeling it gave you, though you realized your grip was weakening.

At times you wonder what might have been. “Why didn’t I ask her name?” Why didn’t I skate with her?

You left that skating rink believing you had a grand experience. But all you had was an invitation. The smile was the mysterious, scary, compelling enticement to encounter a person - with boundless opportunity for friendship, delight, intimacy and life-long communion. For exploring the astounding wonders of the mind and heart of one you count irresistible. If the mere smile of her face set you flying in your dreams, what of the touch of her hand? The brushing of her cheek?

Sometimes we hear whispers from the Everlasting One. It may be an insight, a revelation, or a key. Or nothing much at all. Perhaps, it’s only a smile.