| I am not exaggerating
when I say many Christians are threatened by the idea that God speaks to
us here and now. Why is that? They go along thinking they have God tucked
securely into their theology, believing they hold the key to knowing Him
in their doctrine, and it unnerves them to hear reports that God is
speaking to people they know at work, at church, or right next door. They
are comfortable learning about God’s existence and His attributes, but
show me a theological seminary anywhere with a class teaching students how
to hear God speak. Wouldn’t such a class be controversial! Objectors
would rage against such subjectivity. So, no such classes are offered.
This omission affects sermons and teaching in our churches; it results in
the perception that God is "up there somewhere", not here with
us now.
It is normal for God to speak to
His people. When you’re in trouble; it is normal for you to expect God
to send His messengers to help you. He sustains you. It is normal for God
to comfort your heart and speak to you so definitely that you can stand in
the middle of trial and tribulation and boldly proclaim what God gives you
to say, or do what He empowers you to do. The entirety of Scripture
witnesses to this. Think of Elijah, David, Nathan, Ezra, Jeremiah, Hosea,
Isaiah… Think of how God arranged for Philip to meet up with the
Ethiopian eunuch. Think of Priscilla and Aquila enlightening Apollos.
Think of John in exile on Patmos. God speaks to and through His people.
There are some people who are
afraid to open themselves to the spiritual dominions; the very mention of
words like meditation and tuning in to the unseen alarms them. The Bible
does have plenty to say to any who fear evil. Fear should not motivate
what you do or don’t do. Whenever people in the Bible are approached by
an angel, they have to be told first not to be afraid. It is natural to
fear the supernatural. But, the Holy Spirit indwells us; He’s already on
board. How are we to commune with Him?
The church is not made up of
people who maintain archives on the subject of God; the Church is the
living Body of Christ. The true Church is made up of members who maintain
an ongoing, personal walk with Christ. They are empowered by His divine
eternal energy step by step, hour by hour. Unless we know the vital voice
of God in our spirits, unless we have that filling Bible-fed fellowship
with Him by His Spirit, we are nothing. Unless we are dispensers of His
love and grace, we are empty vessels.
When we gather together and share
how God has impressed our hearts, we should find that what He has said to
us is in keeping with what others have learned. There are four gospel
accounts: Matthew’s, Mark’s, Luke’s and John’s, but there is only
one gospel. Why four versions? Because together they make the whole. That’s
why we should not forsake the assembling of ourselves together. When we
worship Him in Spirit and Truth, everything fits together. It is by His
functioning love in us for one another that we know, and others see, we
are of Him.
WHO are we
listening to?
If we have a friend who is a historian studying George Washington, we may
be very interested in the facts he unearths about one of our founding
fathers, but, if that same friend comes to us and says, "while I was
talking to George this morning," we will immediately be concerned for
him. George Washington is dead.
Jesus is alive.
God the
Original Communicator
There are two essential truths in the Bible that are never explained. They
are always assumed. The first is the eternal existence of God; the second
is the fact that God speaks. There is an unbroken chain of communication
between God and His people all through the Bible, but it is never
discussed or proven, it just is. All that exists arose out of the womb of
nothingness and the Voice of God. At the end of creation God created man
in His own image. Whatever else that means, it means God made man able to
talk and God, in the very beginning, introduces Himself as the
Voice-Maker, the Communicator. He, the Original Communicator reaches out
to the lesser communicator, Man.
Do you ever stop and ask
yourself, "Who am I?" Most people question existence; but few
marvel that they have the means to question it: speech. Go back to the
events in the Garden of Eden and see this is what we’re made for: to
communicate with God. When God made man, the first thing they did was
talk; they had a conversation together. After man sinned, when God came to
Adam and Eve, they still understood what He said and they were still able
to reply. Even when the fall took place, this aspect of the relationship
between God and man remained. Throughout the Bible those spoken to by God
evidence not just a passive feeling, but a response. Sometimes their
response is joy. Sometimes it is anger. When God spoke to the murderer
Cain, Cain was resentful. That was his response. When God spoke to Moses,
He met with resistance. There are people who argue with God. He is real;
we are real. However you look at it, the Bible doesn’t describe people
experiencing mere ethereal thoughts; what is going on is solid, authentic
communication between Creator and creature.
Plenty
Imparted
Now, what did God say? We have plenty preserved of what God said to Adam
and Eve and their descendants; many of His exact words are written for us,
but much God imparted to those in scripture isn’t quoted. In Genesis it
says Enoch walked with God. You remember Enoch had a child he named
Methuselah? Well, that name suggests God spoke to Enoch when they were
walking together, because Methuselah means, "when he is dead it shall
come." The name pointed to the fact that when Methuselah should die,
the flood would come. So, God must have imparted enough to Enoch for him
to give his son such a name. And sure enough, Methuselah, who lived the
longest life of any man ever recorded, did die right before the flood
came.
Have you ever wondered how Noah
received the plans for the ark? Somehow God gave him the blueprints. Now
that is communication: to receive the exact dimensions of a vessel which
had never been built before, that would be able to withstand the extent of
the flood described in the Bible. That’s amazing!
Is the method
of transmittal mystical?
Abraham was no mystic. These people God speaks to in scripture are not
going around abstracted from their environment. These are just ordinary
people. The Bible is down to earth; it speaks to us where we live. Abraham
was a business man, a very successful one. Abraham couldn’t have done
what I’m doing here; he was no teacher. He was a nomadic rancher. He
moved along the regular trade routes of the Middle East. Yet God chose to
speak to Abram out of all the people in his day; He spoke to him first back in
Ur of the Chaldeans. God told him He would lead him to another land; He
told him he would have a child; He told him that through that descendant
all the families of the earth would be blessed. Abraham ordered his life
around that inner voice of God. God entered into covenant with Abraham.
You can’t enter into covenant with an idea or a thought. You enter into
covenant with a person.
Jacob is the last person you’d
classify as a mystic. Would you buy a used car from him? Not Jacob, the
cheat, the twister. But Jacob was a man with a craving for God in his
heart that wouldn’t be put down. When God came to Jacob first in a
dream, Jacob wrestled with Him. Jacob’s lengthy life centered on the
speaking voice of God.
God spoke to Jacob’s son,
Joseph, in dreams. What would you do if your sixteen-year-old came down to
breakfast and said, I had a dream last night and all you guys were bowing
down to me. That is what happened in Jacob’s family; God spoke to that
sixteen-year-old through dreams and continued to so communicate all
through Joseph’s life that when he stood before Pharaoh, Pharaoh
extolled, "there is no man like this in whom dwells the Spirit of
God." Joseph had the ear to hear the voice of God.
Moses the prince, the Godseeker,
committed murder and ran off into the Sinai desert. There, as Moses the
shepherd, he led what appeared to be a wasted life in the wilderness,
until the voice of God came to him. God interacted with Moses right there
on the job. God spoke to Moses from a burning bush. What happened to Moses
could parallel you vacuuming your house and suddenly your vacuum cleaner
bursts into flames right before you. Flames on your floor, but not
spreading, and from the midst of them comes the voice of God. With the
Voice of God directing Moses, the plagues of Egypt were delivered. When
God gives you instructions He expects you to pay attention. Moses had to
have complete confidence in God to stand before Pharaoh and tell him the
frogs were coming. You better know for sure what God says before making
such claims.
Do you remember little Samuel?
There was no word from God in the land at the time Samuel was a child. The
priest Eli was an old backslider, a tired old man who had let his children
get out of control. The tabernacle was a mess; the goings on there were
more like a mafia ring than a priesthood. Then, Samuel was given by his
mother to the tabernacle to serve the LORD. And one night when he was
falling asleep he heard someone calling his name. He jumped up and ran to
the high priest and asked, did you call me? That tired old man, the
backslider, remembered something about how God speaks. He told Samuel, go
back and when you hear that voice again, say, "Speak Lord, your
servant hears." And that’s how Samuel began an incredible career of
listening to the voice of God and being a navigator for the nation of
Israel through those terrible days. In Samuel 9 it says that God whispered
in Samuel’s ear. As Samuel matured, God whispered and Samuel heard Him.
There were those holding
conscious fellowship with God even in the dark age before the coming of
Jesus. Simeon. The Holy Spirit had told Simeon he would not die before he
saw the Holy One. Joseph, the betrothed of Mary, was capable of receiving
God’s word in dreams. Even the Gentile wise men, who came from outside
of the people of God, knew God had spoken; they believed the prophecies
which pointed them to the star.
Hebrews 1:1-3 God,
who at various times and in various ways spoke
in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken
to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through
whom also He made the worlds, who being the brightness of His glory
and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word
of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the
right hand of the Majesty on high, having become so much better than
the angels, as He has by inheritance obtained a more excellent name
than they.
John the Baptist, like the moon
setting, made way for Jesus, the Dayspring. Jesus rose like the Sunrise.
Before Him the prophets had come conveying in part the message of God to
His people. God had spoken through them so the people knew to expect their
Messiah. But when Jesus came, it wasn’t that He finally had the whole
message they had prophesied partially. HE WAS the whole message. HE IS the
final word from God.
The truth is not just facts God
wants conveyed. The Truth is a person. Jesus is the Truth. God’s voice,
God’s Word, God’s Truth are all summed up in the LORD Jesus Christ. In
all that He is, all that He says, all that He did, in His finished work,
you have the final Word from God. There’s nothing left to be said.
Everything from the beginning correlates into Jesus. He is the message
they all were given. This means our creed, our doctrine, our theology, are
only shadows. Jesus is the reality.
How did they
know God was speaking to them?
Jesus said His sheep know His voice. The early Christians burst on the
world announcing that the Final Word from God had been given in Jesus
Christ. They lived in a functioning communication with Him. Jesus was
alive among them, in them, speaking to them. By His Spirit He led them and
directed them in the furtherance of His Kingdom. Take Ananias in Damascus.
The LORD told Ananias, go to the house of Judas on Straight Street and you’ll
find there Saul of Tarsus. You don’t find in that story that Ananias was
astonished he was being spoken to by the LORD. Jesus is alive; what else
should he expect? But he was astonished at what the LORD said. It was the
content of what He said that shocked Ananias, not hearing Him. Think about
that a moment. Here is Ananias living in New Testament times after Jesus’
resurrection and ascension. He is spoken to by God, the occasion is
mentioned in Acts, but we aren’t told how Ananias heard Him. We just
know he did hear and responded. He did what God told him to do. Through
the obedience of Ananias, Saul learned what God had in store for him, and
through Paul’s response, we are given a plumb line to measure what we
believe the LORD is saying to us.
Then, we have the incident when
God revealed something almost inconceivable to Peter. Peter was a good
orthodox Jew; he’d been taught he shouldn’t associate with gentiles.
God came in while Peter was praying in the Holy Spirit, and through a
combination of a vision and direct communication, He told Peter to go to
the house of a gentile. The voice of the LORD swept away all of Peter’s
prejudices and propelled him to the house of Cornelius.
The book of Acts is packed with
occasions when God gave instructions to His people. At a critical board
meeting in Jerusalem, after much dispute, the elders and deacons were
brought to peace by the Holy Spirit and it’s written into their church
minutes. The church in Jerusalem wrote to the "brethren
who are Gentiles" saying, "for
it seemed good to the Holy Spirit, and to us, to lay upon you no greater
burden than these necessary things…" Because of His
Presence among them they made a decision which affected the course of
history for the Christian church. The Holy Spirit was chairman of their
board. That’s how they operated; I’m just reporting.
The Holy Spirit was so clear to
them that when they wanted to go to Ephesus, He said, "No." So,
they turned around to go to Bithynia. He forbade them to. Then when they
landed in Troas, He came to them in a dream and changed their heading. God
was the vital directive influence in their lives. When Paul was in Corinth
in the pits of depression, the LORD came and stood in his bedroom and
said, "Paul don’t give up, keep on
preaching; I have many people in this city." And He
comforted him and strengthened him with the fact that even though he hadn’t
preached there yet, God had already chosen many people to listen to the
Word and believe. He encouraged Paul by coming to him and talking to him
personally.
How does it
happen?
When God speaks, you know it in your spirit because He speaks in your
spirit. You don’t make it happen; He does. God is the initiator.
There is not an official
mechanical means by which God speaks to every person. Even examining the
Biblical descriptions we have, we find a curious variety of methods.
God spoke through angels, bushes, donkeys, husbands, fleeces, thunder,
wives, prophets, winds, parchments, visions, dreams, and a mysterious
priest named Melchizedek. His voice is both described as a still, small
whisper and like the rushing of many waters. It is interesting to look at
each encounter between God and the person He is speaking to and note that
about the only similarity in these cases is that each person knew he was
being spoken to by God and he heard Him. Most of the books of the prophets
begin with the baffling phrase, the Word of the
LORD came to…. It often tells us where this took place,
and in what year, and to whom it came, but it doesn’t tell us how it
came. It is almost as though there is an unspoken understanding that the
way in which we personally hear God need not be described. The mode by
which He speaks to us isn’t what God wants us to react to; it is what He
says that matters.
There are distinguishing
characteristics about His voice and His words which set them apart from
all others. Several times in the Bible His voice is compared to the sound
of rushing waters. What might that tell us about it? Like rushing waters,
it overwhelms our senses, it drowns out all else, it rivets us.
When God speaks in your heart it
doesn’t matter where your mind has been going; He blocks and overrides
all circuits. You are captivated by His voice speaking to you. He commands
your undivided attention. There is absolute certainty in what He says.
What He says is right. His word has perfect balance and proportion.
Everything He shows us fits together seamlessly. The word He gives us is
complete. Everything He says compliments everything He’s been showing
us. His Presence fills us with well-being.
When does He
speak?
When you are immersed in His Word and in knowledge of Him and are waiting
on Him, He makes Himself known to you. What I’m talking about is His
Presence; not just an emotional experience which suggests He’s around,
but He, Himself, manifesting His Presence. As we abide in Him, He comes
and makes His Presence inexplicably known. God first impresses us with His
Sovereignty. This aspect of the voice of God causes us to drop all that we’re
doing, so we just stand in wonder, in worship, awestruck before Him as He
shows us Who He is: Holy, unbegun, infinite, eternal. By contrast He
reminds us of our creatureness; He awes us into place. Then once we are
ready to hear Him in humility, He comes to us personally. He speaks His
Word of wisdom, of direction, of comfort, of assurance, of strength. We
recognize that all we need comes from Him, not from ourselves or any other
source. He proves He is with us. His Presence speaks to our spirit just as
it did after His resurrection. Although they knew He was gone, they also
knew He was there.
How are we to
listen for Him to speak?
We must have an attitude of childlike openness. Remember little Samuel?
To have functional fellowship
with a living God we must develop the habit of stillness. We can’t hear
God speak when there is a din of noise inside us. He doesn’t speak to
our flesh and our emotions. We must learn to be still and know He is God.
Jesus said, enter into your closet and shut the door. There is a closet
inside of you where you can shut the door while life goes on around you.
And so often, when you shut that door, you get direction about how to
proceed in the midst of what’s going on. You must practice being present
to God. It is very little comfort to know that God is present everywhere
if you are not present to Him where you are. That’s stillness. We are to
wait on Him, worship Him, recognize it is Him we want, not His blessings.
It is Him we want, not the experience of Him speaking. (See our album on Being
Present to God.)
How do we discern the difference
between our own thoughts and His Voice? When we are quiet there are many
thoughts that come; but our task is to hear Him in the midst of those
thoughts. It’s like tuning in a radio to a particular frequency, you
have to ignore the whole mass of static and strange voices coming in, and
zero in on the one you are searching for. He’s speaking, we’re just
not always listening. At work, you puzzle over a problem and then He comes
and you know the answer to it. You only know it because He told you. He
gives you wisdom beyond your own. There are times when you are wallowing
in depression, there seems no way out, but He’s there. Just as He was
with Paul. And He speaks a word and suddenly a peace that passes all
understanding comes over you. Nothing in your circumstances has changed,
but you now have His perspective on them, you are learning like Paul to be
content in whatsoever state you are in.
How do we tune
in?
If God is going to be heard clearly, we must live in a habitation of
mediation upon His word. We must immerse ourselves in the Scriptures,
basing our thinking upon His Word, filling ourselves with it; letting His
Living Water wash our minds clean of the world’s distortions of reality.
Then, when through His Word He speaks to us, we are in the right state of
mind to receive what He says.
Hebrews 4:12 For
the Word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged
sword and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of
joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts an intentions of the
heart.
Those words describe Jesus’
dealings with us as the Word of God. The first test of whether I’ve
really heard God speak to me is to check what was said against the written
Word. The first two screening questions must be: does this add to the
written Word of God? Does this contradict what He has already said? If it
disagrees with the Scriptures, it is not of Him.
Paul wrote some harsh words to
the Galatians. Galatians 1:8-9 Even if we or an
angel from heaven should speak to you a gospel that is contrary to that
which we have preached, let him be accursed. In verse 9 he
repeats the same thing. Twice over in two verses. When angels come to
visit, we aren’t to drop the Bible and receive them without question.
Rather, we should say, "sit down, angel, let me check what you say
with the scripture." God’s Word is the last word. If what we’re
hearing doesn’t line up with the Word of God, it’s not His Word. There’s
more out there than the Holy Spirit; we dare not walk in this world except
in the Spirit. Without His protection we can get really weird; we can
commit gross sin. Every confused and amateur Christian is in that
condition due to ignorance or disregard of God’s written Word. Listening
to God never means seeking extra-Biblical revelations. If what we hear
really is God speaking in our hearts, it will be encompassed in a
principle already written in the Word of God. He will be showing us a
Biblical principle to apply to our lives today. Jesus was saturated in the
Scripture; he quoted it continually. In this, as in all things, He is our
model.
So does God ever speak outside of
His written Word? Well, if you consider there are countries where no
Bibles are allowed, I would dare say God has ways of speaking to His
people who are in those dark places. They don’t have a Bible. But isn’t
it interesting, that those people who first hear God without the
Scripture, will risk their physical lives to lay hands on a Bible. God
reveals Himself through His Spirit. In the actual experience of hearing
God speak to us, He may speak to us in an inner voice, or while we are
listening to teachers, or He may say something to us deeper or not even
connected with the sermon we are listening to, but although He can speak
to us through circumstances, collectively and individually, anything we
hear which we attribute to Him must be in harmony with His objective and
living Word.
God’s communion with us is
ongoing. Within that on-going-ness there are moments when you don’t know
where to stand or where to turn. As Isaiah says, "you
turn to the right, you turn to the left; you hear this voice behind you
saying, this is the way walk in it." Go on, walk in it. He’s
telling you. This is the Christian walk.
Colossians 3:15 Let
the peace of God rule in your heart.
Finally, there is the
confirmation of His Peace. Whenever God speaks, even if what He is saying
to us is corrective, there will always be His peace with it. The peace of
God acts as an umpire in your heart. This is how we know what we are
hearing is from Him; there is a peace that accompanies it. Maybe there
comes a time when an opportunity opens for you, but you don’t feel right
about taking it. Just stop. Your peace is disturbed. Wait for His peace to
tell you it is OK to go ahead; if you don’t receive it; don’t go. In
walking with Him, in making decisions, keep consulting His umpiring peace.
May the Peace of God umpire your
heart and mind as you continue to learn how to listen to Him. God bless
you with a full knowledge of who you are in Christ.
Click here to read THE OBEDIENCE OF
FAITH
Click here to read OBEDIENCE DEFINED
(Important word study)
Click here to read article on SEEING GOD
Click
here to read about SingleVISION Living
Click here to read The Nature of Prayer
|
How
To Listen To
God's Voice