KNOWING THE VOICE OF GOD

KNOWING THE VOICE OF GOD

Psalms 95:7    ⁷ For he is our God; and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand. To day if ye will hear his voice,

John is saying, the hour or time is coming when even the dead will hear his voice, and those who respond to it will live.

So, if the dead can hear and respond to his voice, surely, we the living can train ourselves to recognize the voice of the Lord.

Since we live in a natural world, we have the tendency to lean toward our five physical senses, which is leaning to our own understanding.

This is the natural worldly things that we focus on and the main reason Satan can manipulate us. This leaning on our own understanding is wrong.

It is time to move ahead and focus on the spiritual things and the spirits way of thinking. This way of thinking will put you over into Gods arena and there you will have Gods protection.

Whether you realize it or not you have two types of spirits speaking into your mind at the same time. One is an evil spirit and the other is the Holy Spirit.

Be very careful as to the voice you are hearing, you might want to say, I don’t hear any voices. You really do, it is your thoughts. Stop and think about this, most people call this their conscious.

Regarding what you hear with your natural ears, what you think you heard might not be what was actually said. There is a lot of difference between something truly stated and a statement of truth.

Someone may tell you something they really believe is true but it is not true, on the other hand someone may have a statement of truth to relay to you.

1 Corinthians 2:12-13   ¹² Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.

¹³ Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.

Before you made Jesus the Lord of your life, you lived by the spirit of the world. After we receive the Holy Spirit we no longer speak the words of mans wisdom, but by the spirit of God through the Holy Spirit. We have the discernment of the true word.

You can’t fight a spiritual war thinking in the natural way. Smell and taste have similar reactions but on another level.

A lot of times the Lord is speaking to us and we miss it because we aren’t listening. Today if you will be still and listen you will hear his voice. It might not be audible but you will hear it in your spiritual ears.

Isaiah 30:21   ²¹ And thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, This is the way, walk ye in it, when ye turn to the right hand, and when ye turn to the left.

The Lord hears our voice and is gracious toward us. As soon as he hears us, he will answer.

Most of the time when we pray, are we praying in line with Gods word. If we have and you don’t hear his voice or the Holy Spirit doesn’t reveal it, possibly we haven’t trained our spiritual ears to receive it.

We keep trying to hear and audible voice with our natural ears and when we do that Satan blocks our hearing from God. Why? Because you are over in his arena, which is the natural world.

You must understand that after you have made Jesus lord of your life, you are of God and have moved into the supernatural arena that God moves in.

We believers will never hear the voice of God using the natural worlds way of trying to receive a word from God.

At this point lets change the focus to the shepherd and the sheep.

John 10:1-5   10 Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber.

² But he that entereth in by the door is the shepherd of the sheep.

³ To him the porter openeth; and the sheep hear his voice: and he calleth his own sheep by name, and leadeth them out.

⁴ And when he putteth forth his own sheep, he goeth before them, and the sheep follow him: for they know his voice.

⁵ And a stranger will they not follow, but will flee from him: for they know not the voice of strangers.

What John is trying to get across is a Shepard will know his sheep and the sheep will know the voice of the Shepard. The sheep will only follow the voice of their Shepard. They will not follow the voice of a stranger.

John 10:16   ¹⁶ And other sheep I have, which are not of this fold: them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold, and one shepherd.

The first sheep were the Jewish people, here he is referring to the gentile people who today are the church. Paul was used by God to plant the gentile church, so there can be only one flock made up of both Jew and gentile.

Lets re-evaluate the word Shepard. Sheep and heard.

A shepherd is a person who herds and takes care of a flock of sheep. Sometimes hundreds. He also fights off wolves and guards the sheep. Isn’t that just what Jesus is to us?

Psalms 23:1   23 The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.

That is why he refers to us as a sheep. He is the perfect example of a shepherd taking care of his sheep.

We are supposed to know his voice, the same way the sheep know their masters voice. Sheep will not follow a stranger because they don’t recognize their voice, they will run away.

If you hear a voice that sounds strange to your mind, do like the sheep do, run, take authority over it. It is not the voice of the Lord.

When you get to the point of listening for and trusting your master, Jesus Christ, the shepherd, you will hear and recognize his voice.

It can take some time to learn until you know how to receive from God. Some believers who are saved, but they just don’t know how or have not has the pleasure of hearing Gods voice.

Revelation 3:20-21   ²⁰ Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.

²¹ To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as I also overcame, and am set down with my Father in his throne.

He is saying, I am standing at the door. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door I will come in and will fellowship with him and he with me.

Jesus is trying to get you to open your spiritual heart so he can get through to you what he wants you to know.

1 Corinthians 2:14   ¹⁴ But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.

Through wisdom and knowledge, you will be granted to sit with me on my throne to hear the voice of God. It has to be received through our spiritual eyes and ears.

Our soul which is made up of our mind, will and emotion feeds on our spirit, which is the real you. It controls our spiritual walk by the Holy Spirit.

The eyes are the camera lens to the well of our soul. Our eyes and ears actually feed our soul.

So how do we start training ourselves to listen for Gods voice and not the voice of Satan and his demonic helpers?

To start let’s go over some basics. God is speaking to you most of the time and so is Satan.

God uses his Holy Spirit to speak to us. Satan uses his demonic spirits. That is why Paul preached so hard about putting on the whole armor of God.

1 John 4:1   4 Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.

Paul knew we would continually be in a spiritual battle until Jesus came back.

The voices, good and evil are going into our minds at all times, some conscious and some sub-conscious.

Sometimes we get an idea whether it be good or bad and we believe we came up with it, but we didn’t. Believe me when I say it either came from Satan or God. If it is good and lines up with the word of God, it came from God. If it is bad it came from Satan.

1 Corinthians 14:33   ³³ For God is not the author of confusion, but of peace, as in all churches of the saints.

God does not like things to be mixed up. He likes harmony, not confusion. Here is how you know who is speaking to you. When God speaks to you it is in a quiet gentle voice through the Holy Spirit. If what the voice says doesn’t line up with the word of God it is not the voice of God.

The greatest honor the Father God has ever conferred upon us is to be in fellowship with him. A relationship without fellowship is like a marriage without love.

Romans 8:8-10   ⁸ So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.

⁹ But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.

¹⁰ And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness.

In the mind of God, you are as perfectly redeemed from the hand of Satan as Jesus was when he rose from the dead.

John 14:17   ¹⁷ Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.

This is why some people want to hear the voice of God. It is impossible when there is a spiritual gap, it separates you and the Holy Spirit who makes hearing from God possible.

You cannot receive from the Holy Spirit if you don’t know Him. You will never know him until you make Jesus the Lord of your life.

If you think you hear something from God don’t act too suddenly. If you are not completely sure it was from God it probably wasn’t.

The way to know God is talking to is its always the truth and it always lines up with the word of God. The discernment of the Holy Spirit will let you know it is of God through your spirit not your natural mind.

Don’t ever try to figure out things for your spiritual life with a natural mindset. Guessing the meaning of the word comes from the natural realm.

It is important to remember that if you are not sure it is God speaking to you it probably isn’t. Ask God to make it clear to you that it is him by speaking to you, revealing it through the Holy Spirit.