- How to discern the voice of God.
-Five questions you should ask if you want to know
the voice of God.
Now for starters, God still speaks.
"My sheep hear My voice," Jesus said.
God wants relationship with humanity.
And every relationship involves communication.
We know that there is not only God's voice in this world
there's also the voice of other people.
There is our own voice, our own thoughts,
and also the voice of the devil.
The kind of voice that you hear and you heed
will determine the kind of life you're going to have.
Really, your life is a result of the voices you hear.
The voices you obey.
When God put Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden
He gave him His word. He gave him a commandment.
Now there was not a written word, it was a spoken word;
and Adam knew the voice of God.
And because Adam disobeyed the voice of God,
Adam lost the paradise.
So it's not about just your ability to hear the voice of God,
it's about your ability to be obedient to what God says.
We know that Jesus was in the wilderness and He was tempted
and the devil spoke to Him
yet Jesus did not act on what the devil said
and He overcame the devil and overcame temptation.
So the question is not really to hear
or that as long as you hear the voice of God
then that's where you're Christian life will be successful.
The question is that are you going to be able to follow through
to obey what the voice says?
As well as if you hear the voice of the devil
the voice of your critics, the voice of other people
that is not lining up with what God says.
It's not going to destroy your life
if you're not going to act on it.
But in order to act on the voice of God
in order to obey the voice of God,
we have to be able to hear the voice of God.
And in order to hear the voice of God
we also have to be able to discern
between His voice and all other voices.
Here are the five questions you can ask
to help you discern the voice of God.
God will not speak something that will not line up
with the Bible.
In fact, when Eve was tempted,
what the devil said really contradicted what God said.
Now there was no written Word,
but we as Christians compare everything that we hear
with the written Word of God.
And the serpent said, "You will not die,"
when God says, "You will".
So he contradicted the Bible.
In our terminology, he contradicted the Word of God.
When Jesus was in the wilderness the devil did the same thing.
He says, "Are you truly the Son of God? If you are,"
then even he misquoted the Bible, took it out of context
and brought it to Jesus and Jesus replied back with
"It is written." "It is written."
So when you're trying to discern or combat other voices
your best line of defense, your best tip, your best step,
the best tool that you have to discern the voice of God
is to know the Word of God.
In fact, even if you want to sharpen your sensitivity
to the voice of God
you do that by studying the Word of God.
By reading the Word of God daily.
Meditating on the Word of God.
Confessing the Word of God, and obeying the Word of God.
The written Word of God is your foundation
and it's your filter, it's your paradigm
it's how you discern the voice of God.
Because God's voice will never contradict God's Word.
You feel God is speaking,
is there a confirmation in your spirit?
Now, sometimes people feel like emotionally
that they should do something like that.
Sometimes somebody else suggests something
or there is this like emotional desire to do something
or a picture that a person gets.
And I'm not saying that this might not be God
but if you calm down,
if you lower the distractions in your life,
get into the presence of God through worship,
through meditating on His Word;
What do you feel?
What do you sense?
The inner witness of your spirit,
does it confirm that, or there is no confirmation to that?
Why am I saying inner witness?
Because in Romans-- Romans 8:16 it says:
Sometimes people have these soulish ideas
that are more emotional in nature, that are more mental.
Your spirit is different.
Your spirit is who the Holy Spirit connects to,
communicates to.
In your spirit, you know in your spirit
In your soul, you feel it, you think
but in your spirit you know.
In your spirit you're assured.
And a lot of times when you calm down the noise,
external noise, the noise in your soul
and you calm everything down in the presence of God,
you yield your distractions to God,
you delight yourself in His presence;
you'll be able to hear the confirmation
the inner witness of your spirit a lot more clearly.
Because your spirit bears witness to what the Holy Spirit says.
In Proverbs it says that our spirit is the lamp of the Lord.
So God will light the lamp.
And what the lamp provides is light.
What light provides is illumination.
See, that's what the voice of God is.
It provides direction,
illumination in a particular area of your life.
And the way God contacts you is through your spirit.
That's why it's important to have a close relationship
with the Holy Spirit
and that's why it's important to have moments in your life
where you shut down and mute the noise
so that you can hear His voice
which is confirmed through the inner witness.
Now it's very similar to question number two:
is what does the inner witness say?
Question number three deals with peace.
I really believe that God's voice carries peace with it.
Peace is shalom.
Peace is really God's nature. He is the Prince of peace.
When Jesus spoke the storm experienced peace. It was gone.
God's voice carries peace.
Sometimes you know it's not God speaking
when there is absence of peace.
In fact, when there is a presence of tension.
You just can't explain it. You can't put your finger on it.
There's like this thing; you feel it in your gut.
you feel it in your spirit.
There is tension. There is no peace.
And that could be a sign, a red flag that
this is not God speaking. This is not God leading.
In Colossians 3:15 it says: "And let the peace of God
rule in your hearts."
One translation instead of the word "rule" it says,
"be a referee, an umpire"
meaning somebody who calls the shots.
Somebody who settles all of the issues in the heart.
So God is saying, "I will use My peace as the way to confirm
that this is Me."
Is God's Word confirming?
Number two, is there an inner witness?
Is there a sense of peace?
Number four is, is there circumstantial confirmation?
Are circumstances lining up?
Now circumstances alone are not an indication
that this is what God is saying or God is speaking.
Sometimes on the opposite.
You will know that God is leading you and actually circumstances
will not be coming out to support you.
But typically when the Lord is moving,
He begins to line things up for you.
We see with Gideon. When the Lord was moving,
things started to kind of fall into place.
This whole thing with the fleece that he tested God with
you know, asking God for signs.
And then the army gathered together to the point that he had
to even dismiss people.
He goes into the Midianite camp
and then he hears them dreaming
about Gideon coming and attacking them.
And so, we see a lot of times that God is the God of nature.
And He's able to cause things around us to line up
to make it almost like a confirmation, "Hey, I'm in this.
It's Me. I'm leading You. I'm speaking."
For example, the servant of Moses
who's sent to find a bride for Isaac.
You know, the circumstances kind of fell into place.
And he says the angel of the Lord--
"God sent me help. God led me."
He prayed a simple prayer.
"If I ask her to water my camels and me;
that's going to be from God if she agrees."
She agrees and she gives him water, she waters his camels.
Those things fall into place.
That story is like a sign of this is God being involved.
A lot of times you can look at your circumstances
and if you sense a sense of
"hey, things are falling into place".
There is a confirmation through circumstances,
you can go on.
But sometimes it's the opposite. You feel a sense of warfare
concerning the word that you received from God;
and that could also be a sign
and in your spirit you will know the difference.
Do they confirm?
What do the spiritual fathers in your life,
spiritual mothers in your life
what are the prophetic voices in your life
that you are connected with; are they confirming that
or are they seeing a red flag?
Now again, sometimes you can have prophets in your life
who will particularly declare something that
God already communicated to you.
For example, Paul had this clear desire to go to Rome
and preach the gospel there.
And prophets would come and say;
"Whoever's belt this is, they are going to bind him.
"They are going to bind him in Rome
and they are going to put him in jail."
And then they started to tell Paul, "Don't do it. Don't go."
But Paul says, "No. This word is just a confirmation
of something I already have decided."
But it's important as believers that we lean on other believers
in order to discern the voice of God.
If you are a husband and God is speaking to you about something
and you have a Christian wife,
you know, recruit your wife into that.
Ask her to pray about it for the confirmation of that.
If you are a wife and you have a Christian husband
don't just run into something that could change your life
and involves your family without the confirmation
and without the support of people that you trust
especially a person that you are married to.
So that they can be on board
and so that you are not alone going against it.
Now there are instances where God will speak to you
where God will guide you, it will be in line with His Word
it will be in line with your inner witness
and it will be in line with circumstances
but you will not find support in other people.
And that's normal. Like we had one prophet in the Bible
you know, what God told him went contrary
to every prophet that prophesied.
And God truly spoke to him.
It was Prophet Micah.
Other prophets missed it. So don't be intimidated by that.
But still develop relationships with your mentors
with your pastors, with prophets,
with people who truly hear God.
And rely and ask them to also speak into that situation
speak into that.
Almost like bring that word to them and say,
"Hey, this is what I'm hearing from the Lord.
Do you sense a confirmation in that?
What do you feel about it?
Because then what happens is that you walk in covering
and you walk in wisdom,
and sometimes when you miss it they'll be able to catch it.
And so these are just few of my encouragements
on how to discern the voice of God
from your voice and the voice of the enemy
or voice of other people.
What are some tips that you would share with me
how you discern the voice of God the most?
May be out of the ones I shared or out of the ones I missed.
Drop that in the comments below.
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God bless you.