The Internal Compass Series

Hearing God’s Voice – 1

The Internal Compass

Deuteronomy 8:3

“Man shall not live by bread alone; but man lives by every word that proceeds from the mouth of the Lord.”

I have been saying for a few weeks now that we were going to start a series on “Hearing God’s Voice.” I have been so excited to share this series because I believe it is essential in every child of God’s life to be able to hear from God and to know when God is speaking to us.

Before the compass was ever discovered, wanderers could only look around and set their course by the physical markings around them. They had no idea that there was an internal force, the earth’s magnetic field, which influenced a small piece of iron. Now, the compass is utilized every day by an internal force, a force that cannot be seen by the natural eye, yet deep in the earth, God has made it so that man can tell where he is going.

Inside every believer, there is a compass, an internal force, placed by God Himself, waiting to be discovered and used for His glory. My prayer over the next few weeks is that we are able to learn how to discover this compass. When we learn to utilize and trust this valuable resource, we will find that we can better navigate the stormy seas and cloudy skies of life.

➢ Whom shall I marry?

➢ What will I do with my life?

➢ Do I take this job?

➢ Should I invest my money in this opportunity?

Life is a never-ending cycle of decisions that can alter the entire direction of our destinies. How freeing it would be if we had access to an internal compass that would fix the direction of our lives to head in the right directions with right decisions. Without this compass, we are left to look around and set our course by the markings of our physical world. Without this compass, we make our decisions based on our emotions and hunches and the voices of others that are trying to influence our decisions.

What if we could learn to rely on the compass set in place by our Creator? What if we could discern the voice of God in our lives? God desires to speak into our life, if only we would learn to recognize His voice. By the power of the Holy Spirit, God has given you all you need to set a course for your life that will lead you to the right people, the right places, and the right plan in order to accomplish His perfect will in our lives.

I. THE VOICE OF GOD

In Genesis, God said, “Let there be,” and there was! The heavens, the earth, the land, and the seas were all spoken into existence by the voice of God. The we read in

Genesis 1:26, “God said, ‘Let us made man in our image according to our likeness.”

Genesis 2:7, “And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.”

Because man was made in the image of God, man was different from the rest of creation. Man became a self-determining being. In other words, man had a voice in how his life would turn out. He was made in the image of God. Man was not a God himself, but he could speak like God, and Godlike force was in his voice because God had, “breathed into his nostrils the breath of life.” God breathed His voice into Adam.

Adam and Eve were not alone in the garden. Satan slithered in and immediately went to work driving a wedge to separate man and woman from the voice of God. Notice his approach:

Genesis 3:1, “Now the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, ‘Has God indeed said?’”

Satan knew that if he was going to defeat the human race, he had to separate man from the voice of God. Satan continues by saying:

Genesis 3:5, “In the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God.”

Doesn’t that sound strange to you? We just read that man was created in the likeness of God. They were already like God!

I gave you this basic Bible story to give you a sneak peek into the strategy of the enemy in your life. Satan will do whatever he can to get you to listen to his voice instead of the voice of God and that is what this series is about. He would like nothing better than to suggest the direction of your life. He will tell you that you have to be someone else, someone other than who God wants you to be. Why else would he suggest to Eve that she could “be like God,” He was implying that Eve was not already made in the image and likeness of God. Maybe this is why so many people spend their whole lives trying to impress others by being something that they are not. Their lives are filled with frustration and regret. We need to start understanding that God made us in His image. You don’t have to be somebody you are not, you are already what God wants.