A young family man has an addiction to drugs. He has “fallen off the wagon again” (so to speak) and he is at a drug house and in the middle of a 3-day drug binge. A stranger, who is also there, and is doing drugs says to him “Preacher man what are you doing here? You know you are not supposed to be here. You need to go home.” You see God used a sinner to speak to a saint, a child of His own, a believer to help him out of the trap. Once he came down off his high, he remembered that man. This happened more than once, but not the same stranger. It helped him. He felt that God was right there and talked to him to his face in this stranger and that God personally cared for him. This was part of a series of events that led him to come out of that addiction and became drug-free for more than 20 years now.
Did you know that God wants to speak to you, and wants you to hear Him? “How can you hear God speaking to you???” Well, I am so glad you asked. 😊
We show Him we value hearing Him by preparing our hearts to receive Him. Also, when we take the time to slow down enough, remove distractions and prioritize Him in our lives.
What if you are not a believer? Will God speak to someone that is not His own? “not His own” simply means someone that has not accepted Jesus into his/her heart. Someone that does not daily strive to live their lives to represent and obey His word. Yes, He will speak to any heart that is willing or able to hear Him. He will even place upon someone’s heart to pray that you hear Him if you need help hearing.
He wants to speak to us to give us words of warning, words of encouragement, and training or life lessons-equip us for “every good work” 2 Timothy 3:16-17 (NIV) says “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, 17 so that the servant of God[a] may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.”
(Hebrews 4:12 NIV)
There are different ways to hear God. He doesn’t speak the same way to everyone. The message is still for everyone and through His love.
1. God will speak to everyone through His word.
2. God still speaks to His children audibly as He did in the days of the Bible. Although this is not the normal everyday avenue he uses, it does happen. It’s hard for me to imagine what hearing Gods audible voice is like. The best way I could imagine it is, you hear it and feel it at the same time. You feel it in your gut and you hear it with your ears.
3. God speaks through His son, Jesus Christ. (John 14:24 NIV) His entire life was God speaking through Jesus and His teachings. (Psalm 78:1, Proverbs 3:1) God spoke through the prophets that were anointed for that time before He spoke through Jesus “heir of all things and through whom the Universe was made.” (Hebrews1:1-2, NIV) Jesus told stories to give us wisdom
4. God uses nature and His creation to speak to us. Yes, that means He uses animals (donkey-Numbers 22:28) 😊 mhmm He did that 😊, bugs(ants-Proverbs 30:25 NIV), the wind, plants, trees, etc. Deuteronomy 5:24 (NIV) says they heard His voice through the fire to the elders and leaders of the tribe of Moses.
5. God most commonly speaks to us through another believer. It could be someone’s singing, teaching or words of a friend (Romans 12:15 NIV). When we obey God’s word we are His words in action and we are speaking to others with our actions. Let’s make it a point to be aware of our actions so that we speak according to Gods word and not misrepresent Him. (Prayer: Help me, Jesus)
6. God often uses music to speak to us. Sometimes when words have a difficult time breaking through the emotional barrier that is blocking our breakthrough He uses music. He speaks to us through music and dance just as we can speak to Him when we worship and praise Him through music and dance. (David danced, 2 Samuel 16:4 NIV)
7. God speaks to us when we pray. It’s not just about us talking to God to give Him our list of needs, but it is communication both ways to us as well as from us to Him. Once we get our heart focused on Him and are prepared to listen for Him to speak
8. Believe it or not, God speaks to us in the circumstances of our lives. He uses these events to change us, guide us and help us grow spiritually The Holy Spirit may speak to us in a small quiet voice. These events and circumstances help us to conform (or train) our mind to think like His thoughts. (Romans 12:2 NIV)
It is very important to know that you can determine whether God is speaking to you by checking it with the Word of God. If you feel God spoke to you and it does not agree with the Bible, you can rest assured it was NOT God. He will never go against His own word. (2 Timothy 3:16-17 NIV). God will never contradict Himself.
When was the last time you heard from God? How did you feel, knowing that an almighty God chose to speak to you?
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