Hearing the Voice of God

In my line of work, my teaching ministry is largely limited to men who have little or no knowledge that a personal relationship with God is even possible, much less likely for them. One question that invariably is on the minds of those men is how one hears the voice of God. It is often phrased something like, "You mean you actually hear God speaking to you?" It is almost never asked in a belligerent manner. The man asking sincerely wants to know if it is possible to hear God speaking. The short answer is an unqualified, "Yes."

When one has been around as long as I have, if he is paying any attention at all, he learns things. One of the things I have learned is that God does indeed speak to His people, clearly and distinctly at times. Sometimes He even speaks so clearly and distinctly that one wonders if this time he actually heard an audible voice. God more often speaks to our spirits than to our ears. I will never forget something I heard the late John Wimber say at a conference when referring to a specific experience he had. "I think God spoke to me in an audible voice. My theology allows for that, but I am a little short on experience."

My personal experience is much the same as John Wimber's. I can recall a few times when God's voice was so clear that I wondered if I had heard an audible voice. One time I even looked around to confirm there was no one there who could have said what I heard. There was no one there, but I am still not going to affirm that I know I heard an audible voice. It may as well have been because, in my mind, I heard words. In case you are wondering, those words were later confirmed by another person as being true.

That brings us to a basic, physiology lesson. We do not hear sounds with our ears anyway. We hear them with our mind, which is part of our soul. Sounds enter our ears and cause our eardrums to vibrate. Those vibrations in the air are first converted to mechanical vibrations in the bones of the middle ear, hydraulic vibrations in the inner ear, and finally to electrical impulses in the auditory nerve. All that to hear a simple sound. Sounds mean nothing unless they are translated. That translation occurs in the brain, the physical part of the mind. So, again, we hear audible sounds with our soul.

There is another way to get information to our soul. God does not work around our ears, so to speak, when He wants to communicate something to us. He can speak it into the other part of our being, our spirit. From there the physiology is much more simple than that described above. There is no physiology. God speaks into our spirit and the impression, the thought, the idea, the concept, or possibly even the words, are sent directly to our soul. Throw your science out the window on that one. It is not quantifiable. It cannot be demonstrated by research or experiment. It is not an hypothesis, theory, or law. Well, not in the scientific sense anyway. Let's call it a law of the Kingdom of God. (Someone ought to make a list of Kingdom Laws sometime. Any volunteers for that assignment? Maybe it has already been done and we have not heard about it.) You know, like the Law of Death, and the Law of the Spirit of Life from Romans 8. Spiritual hearing is a Law of the Kingdom of God.

That is probably not all that helpful for those of you who think you have never heard God speak to you. Think of it this way. I have been told many times I have a distinctive voice. Were I to call you on the phone right now, would you recognize my voice? Your answer would have to be "No" if we had never talked before or if we had talked only infrequently. However, were you to talk to me on anything like a regular basis, you would immediately recognize my voice. The difference is familiarity. If you are familiar with me, you recognize my voice. The more familiar one is with the voice of God, the easier it is to recognize it.

When asked what the voice of God sounds like, I often tell the men in my classes that, while they are in my classes the Holy Spirit will most often speak to them in a voice that sounds very much like mine. That is only partially tongue in cheek. Sometimes because of what I say, and sometimes in spite of what I say, they do hear God's voice. It sounds possibly evasive to some, but the truth is that when you hear God's voice, you will know it. The more you hear it, the better you will recognize it. Jesus said His sheep hear His voice. If we follow Him, we will hear His voice. (John 10:27)

But what does His voice sound like? I doubt it sounds the same to any two people. We each hear God individually. There is one thing to keep in mind that is supremely important. Whatever God says to you will always agree with the Word of God, the Bible, always. The Bible is God's entire revelation to mankind on this earth. Should you hear something you are not quite sure about, go back to the Bible and see what is says on the subject. If you cannot find anything that seems quite right, consult with someone who is further along in his or her walk with God than you are.

There is one other thing you have to do if you really want to hear the voice of God. It is possibly the most difficult thing for most of us to do. Are you ready? Be quiet! God speaks a lot more than most of us listen. There is no way to know how often we have missed a word from God because we were being too noisy, or listening to the wrong things, or the wrong people. (Make your own list.) Talking to God is only half of praying, or praising, or worshiping. You would not consider it fellowship if you did all the talking while the person you were talking to did nothing but listen. Prayer and worship are the vertical equivalent of fellowship. Perhaps that makes a little more sense. Hearing the voice of God is not magical, mystical, or even difficult. It is a Christian discipline we all need. Please allow me to exhort you that if you have not, are not, or are not often hearing the voice of God, ask Him to help you. He wants you to hear His voice.