From the very first page of the Scriptures, we learn that our God is a God who speaks. God’s speech sets him apart from false idol gods who have a mouth but cannot speak.
Psalms 115:3-7
Our God is in heaven; he does whatever pleases him. But their idols are silver and gold, made by human hands. They have mouths, but cannot speak, eyes, but cannot see. They have ears, but cannot hear, noses, but cannot smell. They have hands, but cannot feel, feet, but cannot walk, nor can they utter a sound with their throats.
The responsibility of God’s people is to listen to their speaking God. Listening to God is a mark of righteous character and covenant faithfulness.
The Bible starts with a speaking God. Everyday something happened when God spoke. The shapeless, hopeless, dark earth became live, beautiful and fruitful even the Holy God could say, it was good! When someone responds to God in faith and in obedience supernatural things would happen! Truly a transformation takes place!
A. SOME PRINCIPLES OF HEARING FROM GOD
Listening involves both hearing and doing God’s word.
When my friend says, “You don’t listen!” he usually means, “You don’t pay attention!” When I say to my son, “You don’t listen!” I usually mean, “You don’t obey!” God wants us to carefully pay attention so that we can fully obey. Listening is synonymous with obedience in Jeremiah: “I spoke to you in your prosperity, but you said, ‘I will not listen.’ This has been your way from your youth, that you have not obeyed my voice” (Jer. 22:21).
Listening to God’s true voice is essential in a world where many false voices are speaking.
“Thus says the Lord of hosts: “Do not listen to the words of the prophets who prophesy to you, filling you with vain hopes. They speak visions of their own minds, not from the mouth of the Lord” (Jer. 23:16).
Every day, we are flooded with media that contains false messages, often delivered in the name of the Lord. Those who are not in tune to God’s voice are more likely to be tossed to and fro by deceptive doctrines.
It is impossible to listen to God when our hearts are unclean.
“Behold, their ears are uncircumcised, they cannot listen; behold, the word of the Lord is to them an object of scorn; they take no pleasure in it” (Jer. 6:10).
An uncircumcised heart cannot listen. Circumcision is used as a symbol for a clean heart: “Circumcise yourselves to the LORD; remove the foreskin of your hearts” (Jer. 4:4). We listen to what we love. We may need to work harder to listen (disciplined or dutiful obedience), but we need our hearts to be changed and our wills to be melted so that listening to God’s Word comes more naturally and more easily (delightful obedience).
Isaiah 42:19
“Who is blind but my servant, and deaf like the messenger I send? Who is blind like the one in covenant with me, blind like the servant of the LORD?”
If we do not listen to God, God will not listen to us.
Jeremiah impugns God’s people for failing to listen, then records God’s message to them: “Therefore, thus says the Lord, Behold, I am bringing disaster upon them that they cannot escape. Though they cry to me, I will not listen to them” (Jer. 11:11).
God even tells Jeremiah, “do not pray for this people, or lift up a cry or prayer on their behalf, for I will not listen when they call to me in the time of their trouble” (Jer. 11:14).
Isaiah 1:15
“When you spread out your hands in prayer, I hide my eyes from you;
even when you offer many prayers, I am not listening. Your hands are full of blood!”
Refusing to listen to God is the worst kind of stubbornness.
God says, “every one of you follows his stubborn, evil will, refusing to listen to me” (Jer. 16:12).
“Yet they did not listen or incline their ear, but stiffened their neck, that they might not hear and receive instruction” (Jer. 17:23). God grieves, “They have turned to me their back and not their face. And though I have taught them persistently, they have not listened to receive instruction” (Jer. 32:33).
Ephesians 4:18-19
“They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts. Having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity, and they are full of greed”
God is surprisingly patient with those who do not listen.
“You have neither listened nor inclined your ears to hear, although the Lord persistently sent to you all his servants the prophets” (Jer. 25:3-4).
Jeremiah told the people, “For twenty-three years, from the thirteenth year of Josiah the son of Amon, king of Judah, to this day, the word of the Lord has come to me, and I have spoken persistently to you, but you have not listened” (Jer. 25:3).
God’s judgment came after twenty-three years of persistently speaking to stubborn children who refused to listen. It is dangerous to test the patience of God, but I am thankful for his patience. God is patient with those who do not listen, but his patience eventually runs out. Refusing to listen to God is the worst kind of stubbornness and the ultimate foolishness, since it ends in our own harm: certain judgment by the hand of the Almighty.
It is believed that before the earth was destroyed, God allowed Noah to preach around 120 years for people to repent.
God eventually judges those who refuse to listen.
There comes a day when God’s patience runs out. The results are disastrous:
“Therefore, thus says the Lord, the God of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold, I am bringing upon Judah and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem all the disaster that I have pronounced against them, because I have spoken to them and they have not listened, I have called to them and they have not answered” (Jer. 35:17).
Israel was taken to Babylon captivity for 70 years because they haven’t listened to God
Jeremiah 25:9-13
“I am going to send for all the tribes of the north, says the Lord, even for King Nebuchadrezzar of Babylon, my servant, and I will bring them against this land and its inhabitants and against all these nations around; I will utterly destroy them and make them an object of horror and of hissing and an everlasting disgrace.[a] And I will banish from them the sound of mirth and the sound of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, the sound of the millstones and the light of the lamp. This whole land shall become a ruin and a waste, and these nations shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years. Then after seventy years are completed, I will punish the king of Babylon and that nation, the land of the Chaldeans, for their iniquity, says the Lord, making the land an everlasting waste”.
B.WHAT STOP US FROM HEARING GOD?
1. SIN
Isaiah 59:2
“It’s your sins that have cut you off from God. Because of your sins, he has turned away and will not listen anymore”.
If we have any unconfessed sin in our lives, it is a huge hindrance to hearing the voice of God, because God does not abide sin.
Sin is like a terrible infection. If it’s not treated properly it will affect the whole soul like cancer affecting the body.
When Adam sinned only one sin was there, that was disobedience. But when he was cut off from the life of God, that sin grew in him and multiplied in him in different forms and soon he became a slave to the sins and passions of his flesh- before he sinned there were no desires in his flesh contrary to the will of God.
Ever since Adam and Eve sinned, their descendants have to go through the consequences. God so loved them that He wanted them back to Him to enjoy His presence and life. He sent His Word through different persons in different times, He provided His law through Moses, He sent prophets to remind them about the law of God so that they fear Him.
They rejected God’s prophets, they didn’t honour God’s law sufficiently. The power of sin in them was so strong that they could never ever please God. But God still loved them.
The Bible says in John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life”.
When Jesus bore our sins at Calvary, Matthew 27:46 tells us,
"About the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” that is, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
Even King David also cried out, in times of trouble, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are You so far from saving me, so far from my cries of anguish?” (Psalm 22:1 NIV)
If we are having difficulty hearing God’s voice, we need to take an account and see if there is any sin in our lives, remember, God does not abide sin.
“If I had cherished sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened” (Psalm 66:18 – NIV)
Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting. (Psalm 139:23-24 NIV)
2. UNBELIEF (lack of faith)
The cause of the first sin was Eve doubted God.
She didn’t think that what all God said was for their good. She should not have allowed the devil to speak to her (Genesis 3:1-7)
When you have the best, why should you go for the second best or the good. God gives the best which none else can give us. If He said something to you through His Word in the past and if you fulfil the condition- absolutely no doubt- it will come to pass at the right time.
Israel in the wilderness doubted God, that’s the reason they murmured all the time. They were not satisfied because they thought God would never give the best. Many times they thought of going back to Egypt. God rebuked them for their unbelief and their rebellion very often.
They had to wander in the wilderness for 40 years for 40 days of journey- because of their unbelief (Number 14:34)
“For forty years—one year for each of the forty days you explored the land—you will suffer for your sins and know what it is like to have me against you.”
Hebrews 3:19 “So we see that they were unable to enter because of unbelief”
Hebrews 3:12 “Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God”
Hebrews 11:6 “And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him”
James 1:6 “But let him ask in faith, with no doubt, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind”.
Matthew 13:58 “And he did not do many mighty works there, because of their unbelief”.
There are hundreds of verses and commandments in the scriptures to overcome unbelief so that our communication with God is smooth and effective.
When you hear the Word or meditate on the Word and you have the soft voice of the Holy Spirit speaking inside to you to listen- that’s the Lord speaking to you. If you are not a believer, no matter how much you hear or read you will not feel like God speaking to you. That’s because no regeneration happened to you!
Allowing doubt and unbelief into our lives can become a hindrance to hearing God’s voice. If we doubt the truths of God’s word, we need to confess and repent. Ask God for forgiveness and to open our spiritual ears to hear from Him.
3. PRIDE
The sin that threw the arch angel out of heaven was pride.
The Bible clearly says James 4:6 “God opposes the proud and gives grace to the humble”. It’s something like God pushing you away from His presence if you have pride in your heart. The greatest secret of being spiritual is humility!. Not the false humility we see in people- but the genuine humility in the heart that is visible in our motives, intentions, thoughts, speech and actions.
We are called to be dependent upon God, not independent.
Pride is sin, plain and simple. It’s a mindset and attitude that says, “I don’t need God,” “I don’t need to hear from Him,” or “I can do it myself.” As you read Samson’s story in Judges 13-16, we see he clearly had pride. Samson was overconfident and determined he didn’t need help from anyone or anything, including God. He wanted to do things his way, and often took matters into his own hands.
“As has just been said: ‘Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as you did in the rebellion’” (Hebrews 3:15 NIV).
4. DISTRACTIONS/ TOO BUSY
Luke 21:34-36
“Be careful, or your hearts will be weighed down with carousing, drunkenness and the anxieties of life, and that day will close on you suddenly like a trap.
We live in a day and time when life is busy. My to-do list is overflowing with an abundance of items from my personal, professional and ministry life. Society has taught us that “busy” is the new normal. In fact, we can keep ourselves so busy that we don’t have time to spend time with God, let alone wait on God. Now throw in distractions like social media, TV, video games and other similar items and there’s so much noise it’s difficult to tune into God’s frequency.
Matthew 24:37-39
“For just as the days of Noah were, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For in those days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day Noah entered the ark. And they did not understand until the flood came and swept them all away. So shall it be at the coming of the Son of Man. Then two men will be in the field, one taken and one left”.
Being so busy in life- we may tend to become passive rather than active. We go with the flow, taking no warnings seriously, no responsibility either.
