Does God Really Speak to Us?

This week I began Bible study prep for my group this week! I’m so excited because I chose the book from The Gospel Project, The God Who Speaks. Even though I just started, I’m really into it! Even the discussion questions were fire! That’s when I truly knew this study was a winner. These two questions really had me thinking:

1) Does God really speak to us? In what way(s)?

2) Do we live as though God speaks to us? 

All these questions are very important to sit and really think about. To simply answer the first two question: Yes. God does speak to us, in various ways. I don’t know about you, but when I hear someone speaking of how God spoke to them, I imagine them hearing a deep, calm voice in their quiet time answering their prayer or giving them some kind of direction. But just because someone says God told them to do something, doesn’t necessarily mean they heard Him audibly. God can speak to us through the Bible (hello! His Word), through other people, or even through different things we encounter in our day-to-day lives. 

The thing is we don’t always recognize God’s voice. And this can be for different reasons it ultimately comes down to not spending enough time with Him. When you spend enough time with someone, you will be able to recognize their voice. It’s no different with God. The more time you spend reading His Word, the more you’ll know the affirmations, direction, and promises He gives His children. The more quiet time we spend with Him, the more likely we’ll be able to come to a standstill and hear Him. We can’t expect to know what God is going to tell us, if we can’t come to the understanding of what’s from Him and what is not. The importance of this type of discernment is that the enemy will always try to persuade us to do something that is not of Him. He will try to make it look so appealing and sound so attractive that we convince ourselves it’s what God wants for us. But in reality, it’s really not. If we know what God sounds like, we will be able to look out for His voice.

The second question was something that really, really had me thinking. Especially because later in the Bible study, it talked about how there are Christians in the world who think that God backs off once we’re created (look up deism). It even went further to say that even though there are Christians who don’t believe this, they still LIVE like this. As in, God does not speak, which is crazy because it reduces his power so much almost putting him at levels of other “gods”. I think this mentality comes from what I said above, misrecognition or even neglect. We may not be looking in the right places for God’s response. God could very possibly be talking to us, but because we don’t hear the voice we think is Him, we sometimes just conclude He’s being silent. But that’s not the case, God always hears and always responds. It’s up to us to be on the lookout for what He’s saying.  

God is a very real and active God. He hears and listens to us, and gives us a reply. When we begin to spend more time with Him, we begin to be more in tune with what He is saying. Read your Bible, go into that secret place with Him, grow in your relationship and be on the lookout for Him to Show up, every day!

For the word of God is alive and powerful. It is sharper than the sharpest two-edged sword, cutting between soul and spirit, between joint and marrow. It exposes our innermost thoughts and desires (Hebrews 4:12, NLT).

Much love always,

Kumam