Let me share with you a few things on how to discern the voice of God better in your life.
If you're taking notes write this down. Number one. Get into God's Word to hear God's voice.
Get into God's Word to get into God's voice. In Matthew 4:4 Jesus says, "But He answered and said,
'It is written man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth
of God.'" In other words, if you want to hear God's voice, study God's Word. In other words,
when we become familiar with God's Word we will become familiar with His voice
because in 2 Timothy 3:16 it says "For the Word of God is inspired by God." It's breath. God breath,
released His breath. It's breathed by God. The meaning, that means that this is not just poetry,
history. This is not just chronicles. This is not just psalms. These are not just history books.
This is actually the Word of God. That's why it's fresh. That's why it's called the bread. That's
why it's called the voice of God. That's why it's called the seed of God. That's why it's called the
sword of God. That's why all of these things, the hammer, the oil, the light. Why? Because the Word
of God, it's different than any book. Actually the Word of God is there, and so as you studied the
Word of God you will know the voice of God. So let me ask you a question. When you hear something,
when you feel a leading. What does the Bible say? That's the question you have to ask:
What does the Bible say? Like the person that you want to marry and you like, "Oh God is telling me
to marry this person." Okay, what does the Bible say? Because the Bible makes it very clear,
you should marry someone in the Lord. So whatever you hear, whatever visions, dreams,
angelic visitations, impressions. Whatever you get. If it does not line up with the Bible,
you have to throw it away. Completely. You can't go and change the Bible to fit the voices in your
head. You have to allow the Bible, the Word of God to regulate and to pretty much create this filter
by which you filter everything in your life. The Word of God contains the voice of God. If you want
to hear what God says, you have to know what God said. You have to know what God written in His
Word, what Jesus says it is written. You have to know what is written. Study the Word of God,
memorize the Word of God, read the Bible regularly, read the Bible systematically,
read the Bible slowly. Let the Bible read you. Read the Bible with the marker, read the Bible
with pen, but most importantly read it with the Holy Spirit. Because He wrote the Bible and He is
the best teacher and He can help you to understand the Bible. As you study the Bible, as you read the
Bible, you'll be familiar with God's ways, you'll be familiar with His voice, you'll be familiar
with His mind and you will be familiar with His heart. So that's the first thing. The second
way to know God's voice is, the Spirit of God communicates God's voice. So
not only we have the Word of God, the holy Scriptures. We also have the Spirit of God,
the Holy Spirit who speaks to us. Jesus says that He will be another comforter,
He will be another advocate and He will teach you the things that I told you.
He will guide you into truth. So the Holy Spirit will continue to guide us into truth.
Now the Holy Spirit doesn't add extra revelations that are not in the written Word of God, but the
Holy Spirit illuminates those revelations that are in the Word of God. He makes them alive. The Holy
Spirit causes the reading of God's Word to come alive and the difference between that is logos and
rhema. Logos is the written Word and then rhema is the Word that is quickened. The written Word
becomes quicken, but the Holy Spirit doesn't just quicken the Word of God and speaks to us through
the Word of God. The Holy Spirit can also speak through the following: impressions, promptings,
suggestions. He brings things into remembrance that you studied, remembered somebody has said,
imaginations or pictures and you can sometimes hear even an audible voice. In Habakkuk 2:1 it
says, "I will stand my watch and I will set myself on the rampard, and watch to see what
He will say to me, and what I will answer when I am corrected." So he says, I will position myself
and I will watch to see what He says. It's interesting, you would think the correct
wording will be, " I will watch to hear what He shows me or I will hear what He says." He says, "I
will watch to see what He says." That means that the Holy Spirit sometimes will speak in pictures.
The Holy Spirit will speak in impressions. The Holy Spirit will speak in suggestions.
The Holy Spirit will speak through your inner man. That's why the Bible says in Romans 8:16,
it says, "The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God."
So the Holy Spirit gives these impressions, these promptings, these suggestions, these,
these inner knowings in our spirit. So we see the Bible is the Word of God. We hear the voice of
God through the Bible. And we also hear the voice of God through the Holy Spirit who lives with us,
walks with us and He reveals to us the voice and the will of God through these impressions,
suggestions and through our spirit. Number three. The voice of God is hidden in the wisdom of God.
The voice of God we said number one, we hear the voice of God by understanding the Word of God.
We hear the voice of God by developing a relationship with the Holy Spirit. He speaks
to our inner men. Number three. The voice of God many times is hidden in the wisdom of God.
What I mean by that is this, God will not always speak to you about things that He hides in his
wisdom. For example, you don't always need to know the mind of God if you will know
the heart of God. You don't need to have God tell you should you love your wife, as a husband.
You don't need God to give you conviction about it because the heart of God is revealed in the
Word of God. The heart of God reveals the wisdom of God. The wisdom of God contain God's perfect
will and guidance for your life. I don't need to have God speak to me concerning things,
that they're wise to do. So sometimes the question you should be asking is not. If you don't hear
God's voice you should ask yourself this question: What is the wise thing to do in this situation?
And the wisdom, what is the wisest thing to do in that situation, is really the voice of God in that
situation because God is wise. And the Bible says, "The man who built his house on the rock is the
wise man." The Bible doesn't calls him righteous, the Bible calls him wise man. The Scripture says
that virgins that had extra oil, they're called wise virgins. The whole Book of Proverbs is about
wisdom. And so sometimes when you don't understand it, you're like, "Man I don't feel like,
I don't understand, does God really want me to take a vacation or not?" Well let's pause.
Is this the wise thing for you to do is to take a vacation? Are you burned out? Are you financially
stable? Can you afford to take a vacation? Are you going to lose your job when you take a vacation?
So you don't necessarily have to get an angelic visitation whether you should take
a vacation or not. You can ask yourself a question: Is this the wise thing to do?
Because God's voice many times is hidden in God's wisdom. That's why James tells us ask for wisdom.
James doesn't tell us just ask to hear God more, because there are things in your life God will
not speak to you about. He wants you to have His wisdom. And His wisdom will come from His Spirit.
His wisdom will come from the fear of the Lord and His wisdom will come from turning away from evil.
So many things in our life, you don't need to hear God's voice, you just need to know God's wisdom
and operate. There are people who you ask them, "How many times God speaks to you?"
And you will see almost God like does not speak to them at all it seems like. Not in specifics.
And you're like, "Why are you making all of these really smart decisions?" And you will,
if you look at their life, you will see one thing, is they have the wisdom of God. And why they have
the wisdom of God? Because they have the fear of God. When you walk in the reverence of God,
you will operate in the wisdom of God and you will make right decisions and you will be in line
with God's will. And people from the outside will look at you like, "Oh my goodness. Wow!
God speaks to you all the time." You're like, "No. I just walk in the fear of the Lord and
God just gives me wisdom. I'm not smart but I'm wise." Because you know smart is what you get in
college but wise is what you get from the Holy Spirit when you fear the Lord. And that's why a
lot of people they have this understanding of the love of God but they don't have
reverence for God. They don't have the fear of God and therefore they don't walk in the wisdom
of God, so they constantly keep fishing for a prophetic word from somebody else. When in reality
there's a lot of things in your life you don't need a prophetic word on and you don't need a
word from the Lord on. What you need, is you need to fear the Lord enough that He injects your life
with wisdom, because the wisdom of God contains the voice of God. Come on somebody drop that fire
emoji in the chat if you are receiving what I'm sharing with you right now. What does the Word of
God say? What does the inner witness say? Thirdly, what does the, what does the wisdom of God say?
What is the God-fearing wise person would say or do in this situation? What is God-fearing
wise person would say or do in this situation? And you can take risk and bank on that and
take a decision and you won't fail to miss the will, the ways and the voice of God.