Can You Hear Me Now? Series

There is a moment in every believer’s life when you sense that something is off. You believe in God. You know the stories. You’ve prayed prayers. You’ve stood in worship. You’ve read your Bible. You’ve walked the Christian path long enough to recognize its contours. And yet — a quiet ache grows in the interior places of your soul. Something feels muted. Distant. Faint. It’s as though you keep reaching for a voice that once felt close but now seems far away. There is faith, but the frequency feels scrambled. You wonder, “Lord, why can’t I hear You the way I used to?”

That question is not new. It’s as old as the prophets, as raw as the psalms, as honest as the disciples who walked beside Jesus and still needed clarity. In a world of competing voices — each louder, sharper, more demanding than the last — discerning God’s voice has become one of the great spiritual battles of our time. The modern soul is overstimulated, overstressed, and overrun with noise. We are connected to everyone and attuned to no one. We have access to more information than any generation before us, but we are starving for wisdom. Our ears are full, but our hearts are empty.

When Jesus said, “My sheep hear My voice,” He wasn’t describing a religious elite. He was describing what normal Christian life looks like. The Christian faith was never meant to be lived at a distance. It was never meant to be a set of doctrines without a living relationship. It was never meant to be a silent march through dry landscapes of obligation. Christianity is not simply believing in God; it is learning to recognize His voice. It is hearing His call in the deepest parts of who you are. It is walking with Him in a way that shapes your instincts, your reactions, your desires, and your decisions.

Something has happened to us. We have become distracted to the point of deafness. Our lives are filled with alerts, updates, vibrations, notifications, reminders, interruptions, and endless streams of content. And while none of those things seem dangerous on their own, together they form a relentless assault on our attention. They train the mind to live in a constant state of fragmentation. They make stillness uncomfortable. Silence feels foreign. Focus feels impossible. And listening — real listening — becomes a lost art.

In the first message — Unfollow Me — we learned that discipleship begins with subtraction. It begins with stepping out of the center of our own universe. It begins with dethroning the self. But unfollowing ourselves only clears the stage.

Now comes the question that shapes the entire direction of the soul: Who or what fills the silence left behind? If we unfollow the wrong voice but never tune into the right One, the old voice will return louder than ever. Self doesn’t like being dethroned. It fights to regain the microphone.

This is why Jesus says, “My sheep hear My voice.” Not “My sheep try to hear My voice.” Not “My sheep hear My voice occasionally.” But “My sheep hear My voice.” The defining characteristic of someone who belongs to Jesus is not perfection. It is not performance. It is not theological precision. It is not biblical brilliance. It is the capacity to hear the Shepherd.

But we must be honest — hearing God is not always easy. There are days when the heavens feel silent. There are nights when prayer feels like speaking into the dark. There are seasons when God seems still while the world spins chaotically around us. And if we’re not careful, that silence becomes discouraging. We begin assuming the problem is Him, when in reality, the problem is usually the noise around us, and sometimes the noise within us.

Hearing the voice of God requires two movements: quieting the world and quieting the self. You can silence your phone and still carry chaos in your soul. You can step into a quiet room and still be overrun by internal static — worries, fears, ambitions, regrets, anxieties, hidden anger, unresolved wounds, unconfessed sin, and the constant hum of self-talk. Even when the world is quiet, the self keeps shouting.

This is why Jesus begins His public ministry in the wilderness. Before He heals, teaches, preaches, or calls disciples, He withdraws. He steps into silence before He steps into ministry. He confronts temptation before He confronts crowds. He listens to the Father before He speaks to the world. Jesus models a life tuned to the Father’s voice — not because He needed clarity, but because we do.

And here lies the deep truth many modern Christians never fully grasp: hearing God is not the reward of spiritual elites — it is the birthright of every believer. But like any birthright, it can be neglected. It can be drowned out. It can be buried beneath layers of noise, busyness, distraction, and self-preoccupation. If the soul is to hear God again, it must relearn the rhythm of quiet. It must relearn the discipline of attention. It must relearn the posture of listening.