THE VOICE OF GOD

In the beginning of God’s creation of the world, we are told, The father breathes man into existence.  “then the lord god formed a man from the dust of the ground into his nostrils the breath of life and man became a living SOUL.“ Genesis 2:7

Man is created spirit, soul and body! 

The LORD automatically equips our DNA to hear, see and perceive spiritually from Him. He has provided each one of us with a physical and spiritual sense. Hallelujah!

When I was a small child, I was told I had a 6th-sense or what I believe the world dems as ESP.  I could guess the numbers of fingers my mom would hold up behind her back when trying to select one of my sisters or I for a special activity or snack. My sisters would get so mad because I would guess how many fingers she was holding up correctly, every single time. 

But, as a Christian, we know that the Holy Spirit was guiding me.

Our gut-feelings or 6th sense is simply a way of saying we are spiritually aware - - -we are receiving from our Heavenly Father. 

And as we grow from child to adult … our senses get stronger and our rational mind & physical senses begin taking in all the world perceptions.  As our intellect builds, it becomes stronger making our soul our strength while our spirit is neglected and becomes weak.

Many believers continue on this spiritual road unaware that their rational mind or soul in the driver's seat, not their spirit. 

However, we serve a gracious God, Don’t We?

He provides little glimpses of His Communication to draw us to Him even in our wilderness.

AND because our spirit was created in God's image and designed to hear... allowing us to hearing our creator even when our soul is driving!

So let’s talk about how to strengthen our spirit to hear his voice: God speaks in multiple ways and He speaks to each of us in a way that we can understand. 

I am verbal person, so of course I hear by words given to me in my mind. But my husband he’s a nature guy, so for him to hear from God we gotta get outside. God knows this, so a couple times a year he makes a way for us to get in the woods. When we are all out in the woods, my  husband’s spirit is fed!  He is spirit becomes full by God’s landscape.  

Another way to hear God speaks is through His Word when we read it. I'll be reading a verse and some of the words will stand out on the page. I have heard people say that they words lift up and float, but for me I can’t get passed them. I will continue reading, but His Spirit will nudge me and I will have to go back to the verse in which God trying to speak to me about.

Other ways He speaks is through other voices, for instance… He will use a sermon, a Friend. A Youtube video, a podcast or tv program or even lyrics to a song you are listening too.  

He can give vision, pictures or dreams.

Pslam 14:2 The Lord looks down from heaven upon the sons of men to see if any understand, if any seek God. 

God is always drawing us!

He can speak through our personal emotions especially through the presence of peace. 

If you have unrest or no peace then he speaking to you about a matter you should take care of.  He has given you unrest  —- meaning you need to do something in order to enter His Rest or peace. 

In my case, unrest, would come when I would wanted to say something and my heart rate would go up. A fast heart rate does not indicate God’s voice. I would immediately enter his unrest after speaking something spoken from my soul not through the spirit of God. 

We have a wonderful God, he even sends little warnings through our physical body not to speak… hold your tongue. It took a  a long time to learn this for myself. 

Eventually, I learned what I see he wants me to pray, not speak!  We learned about this a few weeks ago, as we are all called to be Burden Bearers.

If we see something in others to pray about it and we can avoid being out of God’s will!  Praise God! I would pray something like, “Lord I lift them up to you.”

God will also speak using circumstances like he did with Jonah in the whale or through the donkey in Numbers 22. He opened the donkey’s mouth to speak because Balaam could not see the angel of the Lord standing in the road, but the donkey could. It took a donkey speaking to get this fellow to listen.  

How often has this happened to us?  

Has God sent you a donkey? God can send someone to speak to us to shed some light?

And other times, God’s voice is completely spontaneous. We will be going along and a word bubbles up and usually unfamiliar phrase comes to mind. I have learned to stop and write it down and then do some research because almost always it’s something I am foreign too, but is very beneficial. I have received huge growth in my walk by pay attention to his quiet voice.

So ….our hearts and minds cannot be cluttered. We all live in a such hurried busy world that our lives are filled with many many things.  Our thoughts are literally racing like a freight train so what we need to put these distractions down. 

I like to say, “Jesus I lay everything at you feet.” 

Taming our minds and emotions — will take practice.

May I suggest, the best way in which to do this …  is to carve out some quiet time and space in your day. This can be hard, but it must be a priority.  

God is awesome but He will not take your left-overs.  

In fact, He tells us this in Malachi 1:1. God says he loves Jacob, but hates Esau. 

Jacob gave God his very best! So what does God do for Esau? He says, I will make his mountains a wasteland meaning he will not hear the voice of God and he will be fed to the jackals.   

So when we are in the wilderness unable to hear God’s voice… could it be we heaven’t given God enough?  

Jesus is the lamb that allows our access to God.  All we have to do now is sit at His table to eat. We don’t want to be like the people Malachi is speaking to…these folks only offered defiled food at the alter of God.  

Offering here in this verse represents “prayer”.  Throughout the Bible God uses all sorts of hidden words we must dig to decipher. 

I got myself a Strongs Concordance to help translate the words for today. 

In Malachi 1:10 The table of the Lord is contemptible in other words….means despicable offerings 

So how do we properly sit at his table?

Our table today is set through Jesus and all we have to do is pray in complete devotion.

By making our minds still and by praying to the Father through his Son Jesus. 

We can begin to learn how to sit at his table with a pen and notebook and our bible of course!  

To begin I might suggestion you play harp or instrumental music as you learn to quiet your mind. Mine was very noisy & cluttered in the beginning. 

You see if your mind is cluttered so is your heart.

I learned to offer up all my garbage lingering in my mind to Jesus.  

I literally said, “Jesus I lay this….. blah blah blah at your feet.” 

Immediately, my concerns were gone and I could focus.

Some of you are carrying such deep wounding all you can hear is soul speaking. 

I know as I walked this path too. 

To hear The Father’s Voice properly, we must take care of our heart.  In His word, it’s called circumcision. When our hearts are circumcised we can properly serve the Father and Hear Him speak.  

As we begin to hear The Father’s Voice, we are able to discern Him from the other voices and begin to sift & rebuke the voices that do not line up with His Word.

For instance, we read in Mark 4:39 Jesus rebukes the storm. He knew God’s power or voice did not come displayed with loud winds and crashing waves. He said, “ QUIET be STILL”.  There in an instant everything was calm. 

God comes to us in quiet and in calmness. 

So, we know He is heard in a gentle blowing & a gentle whisper. 

How can we settle ourselves to hear?

The best way that I've found is to read scripture. maybe choose a psalm, like 91 or 23 to begin!

As we read scripture - The scriptures open His Spirit realm. 

Our anxious minds are calmed by His Word, Just like Jesus tells us!

As our heart begin to calm, we allow for our minds to concentrate on the meaning of His Word.  His word comes alive. 

The carnal man cannot understand what the Bible says, in fact using our logical mind to perceive the scripture will literally put you to sleep. 

How many fight reading the Bible?

We must have His Spirit to interpret His Word. 

We read this in John 3:6

That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the spirit is spirit!

We must have his Spirit to receive an understanding of His Word.

As I'm sitting reading scripture with my note pad not judging anything I am writing. This is how His Spirit begins to flow through me. 

I don’t worry about misspellings or sentence structure, I just write….  

Eventually, I start hearing God voice. I continue writing, my thoughts are His Thoughts. If some random thought comes into my mind, like go ride your bike, I again, turn my focus on Jesus or the cross to quiet myself to hear His Voice.

In Pslam 46:10 tells us to stop striving let go relax and know that that he is god. 

Be still and know that I am god. 

Sometimes I have a question and will write the question down and then He will direct me to a new verse in His word. I will hear 2 Corinthians 10 or Acts 14 and each time I am convicted. Our convictions are now we grow in God.

Before I knew the books in the Bible he would direct me to the Index of the Bible to pick books for me to read. I would hear start at chapter 7 and along the way I would hear, now stop. The Spirit would direct my writing.  Eventually with practice your journaling becomes a two way journal. You are asking and God is answering. It takes time and effort, but the mysteries within His Word will begin to be revealed.  It’s so exciting and life changing!

As I have shared before, Lots of times, His Voice is spontaneous and His Words that come to mind come when I am busy doing something quiet like knitting or doing dishes without any hesitation or judgment, I quickly write these thoughts down so I don’t forget. Later I will find how the Lord is revealing a wonderful revelation I can practice in my walk with Him.

As we practice Hearing God's Voice, he will leave you a little bread trail of things, so you are encouraged to keep going.   

Hopefully by my sharing, you are inspired to seek the Father more deeply and begin to recognize His Voice when he speaks. After a while realizing He has been speaking to you your whole life.  

As your spirit becomes stronger your soul gets quiet because it is at peace. Our souls are always talking because there is work to be done within our hearts. This can be painful work, but when we take every thought captive and every emotion to the cross of Jesus, it’s a pretty quick process!

And Once we identify His Voice, there is no stopping us.  

With confidence, you are hearing correctly, you can begin to move & operate in His Will and divine favor. 

I hope His voice beckons you today while your moving throughout your day!  AND you will stop and listen.

I pray you hear “ I love you” like I did when I first recognized His voice.  Then you will know because you know it’s Your Father Voice!  It will bring tears to your eyes.  His love will envelop you and you will receive it.  

Jesus loves us so much…. he's so gracious, it truly is beautiful once we come to understand Him.

Many blessings to you Brothers and Sisters

Shalom