You want to hear God speak to you … why?

You want to hear God speak to you … why?

In introducing this subject to an audience, I have often asked, “If I told you that God would be speaking today at Noon at the San Clemente train station, how many of you would be there?”  Not surprisingly, every hand in the room is raised.  But, why?

Maybe the question is elementary, Watson … but if you think you want to hear God’s voice, or you want to know that it was God who led you in a dream or a vision – or through a word from another Christ-follower or in some other way … the question is why?  Why do you want to know you have heard from God?  Hmmm … or perhaps you have seen what you think is the hand of God moving in your life, what difference does it make that you can attribute that movement or blessing to God?

Does it make a difference to you because if you heard God speak to you ~

~ it would prove that he does exist?

~ or would hearing his voice validate your faith?

~ or would hearing from God make you feel important?

~ would his leading shut up naysayers in your life? (those who mock your faith)

~ or is there another reason you would like to hear from God?

Nothing wrong with any of those reasons, but I have been thinking about what should be

the most important reason I want to hear from him~

     Because I love him,

and when I love someone,

                I want to be in communion with him,

                   and that includes two-sided communication.

                          Give and take, back and forth . . .

‘Yes, that’s it!’ you say.  ‘Those are the reasons I want to hear from God.’  All good, but we must not forget that God made the first move – he spoke to us first.  Aye, through God’s voice, the heavens and earth came into existence.

And Jesus …what did John, the Gospel writer, call him? The Word.  Accidental?  I don’t think so.  The Bible is the written Word of God and Jesus is the living Word of God.  Jesus Christ is the Word made flesh.

John wrote, “In the beginning the Word already existed.  The Word was with God, and the Word was God.  He existed in the beginning with God.   God created everything through him, and nothing was created except through him.   The Word gave life to everything that was created, and his life brought light to everyone.”¹ 

God has not only given us the written word of God, but in Jesus, God the Father gave us the living Word of God, which is how John refers to Jesus.  As the beloved disciple pens the opening words of his account of the life of Christ, it brings to mind another familiar opening—Genesis 1.1—[perhaps you would look it up in your Bible just now] “In the beginning, God created the Heaven and the Earth”— which connects Jesus the Word to that ‘beginning,’ when God created. More than that, God chose to create through Jesus; we read in Paul’s letter of Colossians, when he wrote, “For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him.”²

And how so—how did Jesus create?  Did he have an erector set?  Did Jesus have a potter’s wheel?  Did he have a gigantic laboratory?  Was he the originator of the first planetarium, in which he concocted the plan of stars, planets and galaxies?  Oh, he was the originator, but the psalmist says, “The LORD merely spoke, and the heavens were created. He breathed the word, and all the stars were born.”³  Jesus Christ was not just there at the beginning, at the time of Creation,

Jesus created ~  by speaking the Creation into existence. 

Speech has been powerfully used by God from the beginning.

And Scripture, the living, breathing words of God?  How did we get them?  Ha, my mind recalls this verse in the King James Version, ‘holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost…’ ⁴ … which includes the words spoken by prophets of God like Samuel, Elijah, Elisha and many others who came to bring messages from God to his people over the duration of the Jewish people’s existence, before Jesus was born. 

The words on the pages of sacred Scripture are from God, and meant to be instruction and words of life as we make our progress in this world—meant for us to devour!  And just as surely as God came in the form of Jesus the Word to communicate love, assurance, faith, forgiveness and life, so too he longs to speak into our hearts and lives today…and he does, if we can but hear it.  God’s words to us, and ours back to him, are the substance of sweet communion.  The reason we want to hear God speak to us ~ we seek him.

Christine

PastorWoman.com