Introduction:
I. Last Sunday we spoke of the need to “Cultivate a Heart to Hear God”
A. If, and we believe God does speak; as His sheep, we should be able to hear Him.
B. If, and we believe God does speak; we should be able to discern what He has said.
II. The premise of last Sunday’s message was that we need to cultivate a heart of openness, willingness and obedience to what God is saying, and then we will hear God speak.
III. This Sunday we continue with the idea that God indeed does want us to hear from Him, and we will explore some means that God uses today to convey His message to us.
IV. I would ask you to open you Bibles to Job, chapter 33, and look at verse 14.
A. If you use the NASB, the verse states, “Indeed God speaks once, or twice, yet no one notices it.”
B. If you are using the NIV, the verse states, “For God does speak—now one way, now another— though man may not perceive it.”
C. If you are reading from the King James you see, “For God speaketh once, yea twice, yet man perceiveth it not.
D. And although I don’t use it often, the Living Bible says, “God does speak, sometimes one way and sometimes another, even though people may not understand it.”
E. Now here is the main point that each of these translators is attempting to make.
1. God does speak to man,
a. God answers His prayers.
b. God gives direction.
c. I believe God even gives reasoning for what He is doing in our lives, BUT
2. Man often misses the voice of God.
3. For whatever reason, we often don’t hear when God speaks.
F. As Jesus was relating the parable of the soils, Luke 4, verse 8 says that Jesus was calling out, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”
1. In that case Jesus, God was speaking directly to man,
2. And yet, most could not perceive what He was saying.
V. The writer of Hebrews opens his letter with, “ In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, 2 but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom he made the universe.” (Vs. 1-2, NASB)
VI. If we are going to “Answer The Call”, when God speaks, we must know how He chooses to speak.
God Speaks Through The Bible
I. The Bible is God’s number one way of communicating with us.
A. Now this may seem obvious to some of us, but I would be willing to bet that even in our crowd, at least several of us ignore this method of God’s speaking to us.
B. Second Timothy 3, verse 16 says, “All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness”
II. I believe it would be fair to say that part of the purpose of this life is to prepare us for eternity.
A. But God has not left us here to figure it out on our own.
B. He has given us a manual of instruction that is beneficial to teach us, correct us and train us to move closer to righteousness, to be more like Him and His son.
C. We wonder why God is not speaking to us, but how many of us ignore what God is saying in the Bible, except for 30 minutes or so on Sundays; when we feel like going.
III. Think about this for a moment,
A. We bought Anna a new computer as a graduation present, and to get her ready for college.
B. Now I have been using computers, on one level or another for close to 25 years.
1. My first computer was an Atari that had a tape system to store information.
2. Just like most of you, I now have several computers available to me.
3. I consider myself pretty well verses in how they work.
C. But when Anna’s new Dell arrived, the first thing I looked for was the instruction manual, which by the way it didn’t have.
1. I wanted to know how this thing worked.
2. I didn’t want to mess it up.
IV. And yet, just like many of you, I will often make decisions about life, even major decisions without consulting God’s manual for life.
V. So OK, I should be spending more time in the Bible, but where do I start?
A. First - Get a translation that you are comfortable with.
1. I personally like the New American Standard, but some say the reading is a bit stiff.
2. If you are new to this, you may prefer the New International Version, or the The Message, or even The Living Translation.
3. The important thing is that you are comfortable with the wording.
B. Second - Don’t try to read the whole thing at once.
1. There are “One Year Bibles” available.
2. Are you an internet nut, then go to - www.bibleinayear.org
a. You can chose from 8 different translations, and three different reading schedules.
b. They will e-mail you each day with a reading.
C. Third - Set a time and place that is good for you.
1. You may need to go to the bedroom to get away from the kids, or spouse
2. Maybe you can set in your favorite chair, right after Jeopardy; your children might even want to know what you are doing every day.
D. Whatever you need, and whatever you do, the important thing is to begin the process.
VI. As you spend time reading, you will be amazed at when something your read that day will be useful to your immediate circumstance.
God Speaks Through Teachers
In 1 Thessalonians 2:13 Paul writes - “And for this reason we also constantly thank God that when you received from us the word of God’s message, you accepted it not as the word of men, but for what it really is, the word of God, which also performs its work in you who believe.”
I. Have you ever sat in a worship service, and felt as if God was speaking directly to you?
A. Have you ever listened to a message or bible study, and even as the pastor or teacher was teaching to an entire audience, you felt as if that message had been prepared especially for you?
B. In all likelihood, that was God speaking through that teacher, with you in mind.
1. Maybe it was a message of encouragement, that you needed right at that time.
2. Maybe it was even a message of admonishment, but at it’s core, it was God speaking through someone else right to your heart.
II. It is pretty amazing and humbling for me to think that God can use me to speak a special message to someone.
A. What might be even more amazing to some of you is that God not only uses the “ordained” preacher, but he will sometimes use you.
1. 1 Cor. 2:13 Paul writes - “This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words.”
2. When you get good teaching, the Spirit has words that He can bring to you mind in times of need.
B. God uses us in the relationships that we have to speak His word to others, and that is one reason it is so important for us to be in the Bible on a regular basis, and it is one reason that it is important for us to listen to other teachers on a regular basis.
1. The more we listen to good teaching, the more opportunity God has to speak to us.
2. The more God can speak to us, the more we will have to say to others.
III. So what are some ways that you can get some good teaching more than 30 minutes on Sunday?
A. Listen to the radio
1. It is amazing how much time we spend in our cars.
2. Many of you know that I enjoy good Country music, and truth be told, I also listen to talk radio from time to time.
3. But if you get in my car, probably a good 75% of the time my radio is tuned to WFIL Christian radio.
a. I have made a habit of listening to Pastor Paul Shepherd, and others whose programs are aired on that station.
b. Don’t be fooled, there are some good teachers, especially on the radio, and from time to time it seems like they have prepared a message just for me.
B. Get tapes and CD’s from speakers that you like; you can probably even share them with other people.
C. God will often speak to me through good music.
1. Find some good Christian artists that you enjoy, and listen for the message of the music.
D. Watch some quality television.
1. I watch a good bit of TBN television.
2. I don’t always agree with every speaker they present, and I skip most of their fund raising, but again some of their speakers, even those I have theological differences with will often speak to my heart.
3. Even a speaker you disagree with is probably better than most programs on TV anyway.
God Speaks Through Impressions
I. Attributing impressions or thoughts to God can seem like a scary thing.
A. We see preachers on television saying things like,
1. “I see that person being healed from cancer.”
2. “God just told me that someone was writing a check for a million dollars.”
B. We say, “what if it’s not really from God?”
C. So some of us have gone to the extreme of saying, “God only speaks through the Bible.”
II. But listen to what is written in Job 33, 14 to 18 - 14 “Indeed God speaks once, Or twice, yet no one notices it.15 “In a dream, a vision of the night, when sound sleep falls on men, while they slumber in their beds, 16 Then He opens the ears of men, and seals their instruction, 17 That He may turn man aside from his conduct, and keep man from pride; 18 He keeps back his soul from the pit, and his life from passing over into Sheol.
III. The bible says that,
A. God spoke through a bush,
B. God spoke through a cloud
C. God spoke through a donkey,
D. The bible even says over and over that God spoke through visions.
IV. I can’t tell you how many times I will be working on a passage of scripture for Sunday services, and I just can’t seem to put it together.
A. Then I stop, ask God to help me figure it out, and put it away for the day.
B. It’s even scary, but sometimes, in the middle of the night a thought or point we come to me, and the next day the message goes together great.
C. I can’t explain it, other than I believe God gave me what I needed to put it together.
V. Warning: Always test an impression you believe is from God.
VI. Next Sunday we will look at ways to test what you believe is an impression from God.
VII. But today just let me say that thoughts that are from God, never go against clear teaching of the Bible; therefore, we must know what the bible teaches.
God Speaks Through Pain
I. I don’t many people that enjoy pain.
A. Maybe that is why pain, whether physical or emotional speaks so loudly to us.
B. Now I would be lying if I tried to convince you that I was a perfect child, BUT, I can distinctly remember when I would make a decision to do or not to do some things based in large part on the fact that I had no desire to endure the physical consequences if my parents were to discover I had done some things.
C.
II. In days gone by, our parents would sometimes use pain as a motivator for our behavior.
1. We have all heard of the proverb, “Spare the rod and spoil the child.”
2. Those exact words are not found in the bible, but they are a compilation of several Proverbs including Proverbs 29:15, - “The rod and reproof give wisdom,”
III. If you use the NASB, Proverbs 20:30 reads - Stripes that wound scour away evil, and strokes reach the innermost parts. (NASB)
IV. In the NIV that verse reads like this - Blows and wounds cleanse away evil, and beatings purge the inmost being. (NIV)
V.
And if the interpretation of those seems a bit hazy, the New Living Bible explains it a bit more clearly -“Physical punishment cleanses away evil; such discipline purifies the heart.” (NLB)
VI. Now don’t misunderstand, I am not saying that every painful thing in our lives is God speaking to us.
A. But sometimes it is, and we need to be aware that God can and does use pain in our lives to speak His will to us.
B. Pain gets our attention like nothing else.
VII. We should be open to God love and affirmation, but we also must be open to God’s correction and discipline.
Closing
I. Is God calling to you; has He been trying to get through to you and you just can’t seem to hear Him?
II. Pick up the phone; Answer the Call.
III. Spend regular time in the bible, and hear God speak.
IV. Spend time listening to good bible teachers and preachers, and hear God speak.
V. Don’t ignore impressions and thoughts that God may be giving you, it may be God trying to speaks.
VI. And lastly, don’t just write pain off, it might be God trying to get through to your heart.
VII. Has God been telling you something, “Answer the Call.”
