In, The Horse Whisperer, Tom Booker, has a gift when it comes to what he calls "gentling" horses. In one telling scene, a traumatized horse, frightened by a ringing cell phone, gallops off into the far end of a large pasture. Booker walks into the pasture and sits down, where he waits for what appears to be hours. Drawn by curiosity the horse inches closer and closer finally allowing itself be touched by the "whisperer" who leads it back to the safety of its stall. Like that horse, there are a lot of people who need a gentle touch and voice. Life and people have handed them situations which have spooked them and caused them to run off seeking a “safe” place. Yet in reality the only “safety” can be found in God whose love is constant.
There is a desire in our world for God’s voice. Many have come to believe that the real answer to the questions facing our world is spiritual. And there are a lot of people and programs who claim to be able to put us in contact with this voice.
A few months ago “Cleo” would use her tarot cards to answer the spiritual questions you had. The “Celestine Prophesy” promises to have us see the aura’s of others and to join one another on a spiritual journey. What’s more it’s set forth in a loosely biblical basis. The Science Fiction channel’s “Crossing Over” is a show in which people make contact with their dead relatives through a medium. Tie such “popular” manifestations into the rest of the hodge-podge of reincarnation, new-age meditation, the use of herbs for “spiritual” insight, Gaia religion and other forms of witchcraft and sorcery and it’s no wonder our culture wants to say that no one way could possibly be the only way.
I think our world would be surprised to understand just how easy it is to “hear” God’s voice and how difficult it is to “listen” to God’s voice. If you don’t know it they aren’t the same. We hear a lot of things each day. Some of it impacts us at a level we’re not aware of. Other things we ignore. Some cause us to go beyond hearing to listening. Listening takes place when we pay attention too, focus on, take to heart and apply what we’re hearing to our lives. It is sad but too many of us “hear” God and too few “listen” to God. As Nancy Corbett quotes Eugenia Price as saying “The voice of God is always speaking to us, and always trying to get our attention. But His voice is a ‘still small voice,’ and we must at least slow down in order to listen.”
How does God speak to us? There are at least three ways this happens. He speaks to us in our everyday life. Life-situations, hassles circumstances, the movies and news casts all may well contain God’s voice. Likewise the chance conversation overheard in line at the store or the magazine or book we’re reading may contain God’s voice.
God still speaks in dreams and visions. He allows us to see what he is trying to say to us. We encounter a reality that quickens our souls and when we awake we know that what we’ve been dreaming has more to do with God than the spicy food we ate before bedtime.
God still speaks in an audible voice. I’m not talking about the self-talk of guilt, regret or pride nor am I talking about our conscious. I’m talking about a voice that often comes to us and confronts us about something that has to happen in our lives if we’re going to be Christ’s person.
It’s been my experience that God’s voice is a voice that challenges and changes us. Paul hears and listens to Jesus on the road to Damascus but the fact that Jesus speaks to Paul isn’t a testimony to Paul’s great spiritual astuteness or power. It’s a testimony to the hardness of Paul’s heart. He’d heard the gospel before and rejected it. He knew who Jesus was but considered it a non issue.
God’s audible voice comes to those who have come to a place where God has to do something earth shattering to get their attention. Dreams and vision may well include those insights we gain into our lives through what we’ve dreamt. But they also include the pictures that God gives us of the situation in our life and the world during times of prayer and meditation. In the common every-day living our life God is much more likely to speak to us. Those ah-ha moments when we know we’ve seen or heard something important are very often God given words to us.
But the problem isn’t with God’s speaking it’s with our listening. This month’s Charisma magazine has a very interesting article about a church which purposely listens to non-believers have to say about Jesus, the church etc. The author writes that for pastors to listen to the criticisms of these unchurched it difficult. He says, “Listening is hard work and we must resolve to stop talking and stop controlling.” Let me suggest that this is partly the problem when it comes to us being able to listen to God. We too often can’t keep quiet and what’s worse, we insist on controlling God.
Chapter 19 follows on the heels of two great successes for Elijah. He allows the drought to be broken which had been on the land and even more important he’d confronted the prophet’s of the Queen’s deity and destroyed them on Mt. Carmel. Yet the queen doesn’t change her heart or mind. Instead she promises that Elijah will be just as dead as those prophets. Face with this promise Elijah runs south. He heads out into the desert away from Jezebel’s influence and after time alone, exhausted and depressed, he moves on to Mt. Sinai and shelters himself in a cave. Once there a wind, earthquake and fire come upon the mountain with no sign of God but when the “gentle whisper” NIV comes Elijah hides his head.
It is in the coming of this “still small voice” that Elijah is able to “listen” to God. Did you hear how God had spoken to him repeatedly throughout his journey? Two times (vv. 5 & 7) an angel of the Lord speaks to Elijah and tells him to “get up and eat”. What’s more in verse 9 it says. “the Word of the Lord came to him” What does this mean? It means God spoke to him and we have the question recorded for us. “What are you doing here, Elijah?” Then right after Elijah’s answer God commands Elijah to “go out and stand on the mountain…”
Elijah hears God but he’s not listening. How do I know? It’s really quite simple. When Elijah finally listens to God’s still small voice he “went out and stood at the mouth of the cave.” Apparently God’s voice that told him to stand on the mountain wasn’t obeyed. Why? Because he didn’t listen he only heard.
Elijah had distractions in his life that had to be overcome if he was to listen to God. He had the issue of pride in thinking that “he alone” was left. He may well have expected God to always communicate in the marvelous fire and brimstone tactics he’d seen a few days before. He had to be brought to a place where he was able to listen, his fear and other immediate concerns had to be addressed.
When it comes to us there may well be similar types of distractions that need to be faced. Oswald Chambers writes, “Rush is wrong everytime; there is plenty of time to worship God.” Perhaps we’ve come to a place where we’ve become adrenaline junkies. We don’t feel we’re getting anything done unless it’s just at the last minute. If we’re not busy every minute, if we’re not entertained by something or someone then our life is somehow shallow and not as good as it could be. Another major obstacle to listening to God is sin. I don’t know why it is but there seems to be some sort of viewpoint among believers in our nation that sin doesn’t really matter to God. It’s almost as if we think that we can keep on doing the same old sins over and over again and God will just turn a blind eye to it and still bless us, answer our prayers and be close to us. If you believe this I feel sorry for you because it’s not true.
There’s a story I imagine it’s apocryphal about a young man who was applying for a job as a telegraph operator. He came in to the interview and took a seat among the others who were waiting. The man who would be doing the interviewing was busy and so they waited while all the while the busy office was filled with the sound of telegraphs and the like.
Suddenly this latecomer rose and walked into the man’s office. The others were surprised but it turned to shock when the man came out and announced that they could go home because he was hiring the young man who had boldly entered his office When the others demanded an explanation the employer responded, "I’m sorry, but all the time you’ve been sitting here, the telegraph has been ticking out the following message in Morse code: `If you understand this message, then come right in. The job is yours.’ None of you heard it or understood it. This young man did. So the job is his."
We will be able to listen to God’s voice when we make room for it. We will be able to listen to God’s voice when we become willing to be changed, when we are willing to have our life turned upside down. We will be able to listen to Christ when we make time for Jesus in our life.
Set aside 15 minutes each morning to pray. Instead of asking for anything simply pray, “Jesus what do you want me to do, say, and be today?” Then with a piece of paper nearby jot down things that may come to mind. Some of it will be clutter that you haven’t been able to get out of your mind but others things will be direction from the Lord. Here’s a hint that helps me. If it sounds hard, or it’s something I don’t like to or want to do it’s usually from God. Did you notice how this redefines what we usually think of as “prayer”? We’re not talking but listening for God’s voice.
The second part of this is the difficult part. We do what we’ve heard God say to us. Try this for the next week and see if it doesn’t make a difference in your life.
