Lessons I Learned From The Lord

Lord.

Chapter 1

"Hello, this is the Lord.

Is anyone listening?"

Several years ago I wondered why, as a Christian, I wasn’t hearing God’s voice. After all, I was praying, but it was a one-way prayer. I would wonder what Jeremiah 33:3 meant when it said, Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and show thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest not. I never knew what God had planned for me. I wanted to know God’s will in and for my life. I wondered especially because God says in His Word, My sheep know My voice. I would ask God, I’m your sheep—why don’t I hear your voice? Well, it wasn’t because He wasn’t talking. I just wasn’t listening. It wasn’t until I spent time in prayer communicating with God that I starting hearing. It took time learning that just as I speak to a friend, that’s how I should to talk to God. We can ask Him questions about what we should do in a situation, or how He feels, and He will answer. You see, many times we’re fast-food Christians, and we pray by listing our needs like we’re ordering food at a fast-food restaurant. When we’re done ordering, we wait in silence to hear something profound when we haven’t even asked God a question for Him to respond to. At times we don’t even wait for an answer! Many times we have so much clutter in our minds that we don’t have room for anything else. We sometimes just need to take out the clutter and focus on the Lord.

God created Adam and Eve so that He could have man to commune with. He would walk and talk with them in the garden. They lost that fellowship by sin. Sometimes it’s sin that actually causes us to shut God out because we really don’t want to hear from Him. Adam and Eve did the same thing when they hid from God after eating the forbidden fruit. We’re afraid He will convict us of our sin. But even those Christians walking in obedience sometimes are not hearing due to lack of knowledge, just being busy, rattling off prayers quickly, or not spending the time to get to know Him. Some don’t even realize or expect that He will talk to us. God wants us to ask Him things. Yes we can come before Him and ask for things, but He also wants us to ask Him about things. Once you start doing this, He starts revealing Himself to you and you start learning about Him, His ways, His heart, and His goodness. God created man to be able to talk to Him, but the majority of people don’t think this is possible or even normal to be able to have conversations with God. We are happy when we have a friend to talk to. God is happy to have friends to talk to also. People need communication. That’s why solitary confinement in prison is punishment. God needs communication with His people, too. But many have put Him in solitary confinement simply because they think that God does not or will not speak to them. Some were never told that He does. They think that hearing from God is a great mystery. This is wrong thinking that is passed down from generation to generation. It starts with one person’s wrong thinking and is passed on to others until the misconception becomes more popular and is accepted as truth. It continues to spread and becomes bigger and more accepted as more and more people believe it. It’s like a snowball going downhill, picking up more snow as it travels. Belief systems get started that way. Once established, traditions are hard to break. If people don’t know that they can have conversations with God it won’t even enter their minds to try to speak to Him expecting to hear Him answer. God longs to speak to His children, but many don’t know that they can communicate with Him. He wants His children to know Him in a personal way. Prayer is not one-sided. Prayer is often thought of as lifting up our needs and then that’s that. People will talk to God, but don’t wait for Him to respond and talk to them. They don’t even give God a chance to speak. It’s as though they were talking to a wall, and because they don’t wait to hear from God, they think that’s the way it is. How would we feel if we were with a friend who talked continually and we didn’t get a chance to say a word? How would we feel if this happened all the time when we were with this person? How would we feel if we were not even expected to respond? It would not be a fulfilling relationship. There would be no give and take of conversation. It would only be a speech. God listens to speeches, but He wants more. He wants relationship. He wants fellowship. He wants people to know how He feels and what He thinks. He wants them to know Him.

Sometimes God gives me an analogy to help me to understand what He’s telling me. He showed me telegraph wires and explained that telegraph wires carry words and messages to people. He said that He has an open telegraph wire—an open line to His people. They can talk to Him at all times. All they have to do is call upon Him, and He will answer. (See Jeremiah 33:3.) This is because of relationship. When we have a close relationship with someone, we can call them anytime—day or night—and they will answer. We cannot do this with an acquaintance, but we can with a close friend. Jesus wants that close friendship with everyone, but so many only talk to Him on Sunday. How can they know Him by spending only an hour a week with Him? And even then, their minds are on other things. But God’s telegraph lines are always open—it’s their receivers that are dead. They have turned them off. They don’t believe God will converse with them. But God wants us to turn our receivers on, start talking to Him and see if He won’t answer! He will talk to us—it’s not unusual. To think otherwise is to believe a lie.

God has many children, but not all know Him. Many say they are Christians, but they don’t spend time with Him, or talk to Him except in times of need or if they want something. We can believe someone exists, but that doesn’t mean we know him. For example, we can believe that Queen Elizabeth is real and that she exists, but just believing that fact doesn’t mean that we know her personally or that she knows us. We only know of her. Many people who say they are Christians know of God, but they don’t really know Him. They don’t have a personal relationship with Him. It must make God feel cut off from them. They may go to church on Sunday and worship Him and even want to be in His presence, but then Monday it’s back to work as usual, and God is put aside. People think that the only thing that cuts them off from God is unconfessed sin. It is true that sin separates, but it is busyness that prevents a close relationship with God. It’s when people don’t talk to God that makes Him feel cut off from them. It’s when they go about their lives during the week with business as usual, not thinking of Him unless they have a need. People don’t always have to be in a prayer closet or church to connect with Him. All they have to do is talk to Him. They can do this at all times, wherever they are or whatever they are doing. You see, the Sabbath is more for us than for God. It is the day of rest and refreshing. But for God, if we only take the time to be with Him on Sunday and forget about Him the rest of the week, it must feel like when an elderly person has many visitors on Sunday but is alone the rest of the week. If people would just speak to God at all times, whatever they are doing, their lives would be so much better. God wants us to desire Him and crave being with Him. He wants us to need Him, but He wants to be desired even when there is no need.

One day as I was praying, I believe God showed me His heart for His people, and how He desires for them to come to Him and to get to know Him. He showed me that He loves His people—yet He mourns for them, for they do not know Him. His heart aches because He wants to reveal Himself to them. He wants them to draw near to Him. He wants to care for them and protect them and bless them—yet they do not know this. If only they would come to Him—He is real. If only they would know that He is more real than what their senses can touch, or see, or smell, or taste. Why do they go about their business without even a thought of Him? Don’t they know His desires for them? He is the answer, yet they do not seek Him. His heart aches for them. He loves them, yet they do not know. Some do not even know to come and ask His help. He wants so much for His children, yet they do not look to Him. God’s desire is for us to seek Him out, to communicate with Him, to hear His voice, to know His heart.

God speaks to us in many ways. I used to think that I actually needed to hear a thunder-like voice and if I didn’t, it couldn’t be God. Only when I became tuned in did I realize the many ways in which God speaks to us. Many times during prayer I’ll get a revelation, or an understanding of something that I never thought of before. Sometimes I’ll read a verse of Scripture, and although I’ve read it many times before, I will see something in it that will answer something I’ve been praying about and reveal to me what I couldn’t see before. Sometimes it’s a knowing in your spirit, and sometimes God lets you feel His heart, His love, or His sorrow. Sometimes I’ll be awakened at night with words coming into my mind before I’m fully awake, or sometimes it’s a dream. Sometimes He’ll speak a word through someone else, or through a circumstance. God speaks to us in many ways, if we’re attuned to His Spirit. One day in the very beginning when I was just discovering all the different ways God speaks to us, I was doing the dishes when I got a sense that I should turn on the television to TBN. I didn’t respond to this sense right away, however. In fact, I told myself that I would turn it on as soon as I finished the dishes. The urgency got stronger. So I thought, Well, I’ll just finish this ladle. (I was arguing with myself, I thought, as to why I couldn’t do it!) But by then, the feeling became so strong that I gave in to it and turned on TBN. I turned it on just in time to hear a word that I knew was for me! One minute later and it would have been too late—I would have missed it. How many times do we miss out on what God has for us by ignoring the Holy Spirit’s prompting? The more we listen, the more we recognize His voice. The more we get tuned in, the more He reveals Himself to us. God’s Word says that to him who has, more will be given. (See Matthew 25:29.) We need to ask God to reveal Himself to us, and ask Him what He would like to tell or teach us today. I have also found that God will usually confirm what He tells us. This could be a confirmation through Scripture, a word from another, a dream, maybe even a