Thursday, October 29, 2015

To Hear God We Must Know God


I hope you have enjoyed this month of stories about people hearing God. One of the main things I learned is in order to hear God we have to know God. We need to know who He is, how He acts, what His characteristics are in order to know what He sounds like.
         The first time God spoke about Himself in the Bible was when He showed His glory and goodness to Moses. He tells Moses, and us, what He is like. In Exodus 34:6,7, God describes Himself as compassionate, gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, and forgiving. When we are praying and listening for God to speak to us, and we hear those characteristics we can know it is God.
         In the New Testament, Jesus told his disciples if they saw Him, then they saw God the Father, because they were the same. What is Jesus like? It is His Spirit that lives inside us, if we are His followers. His spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness and self-control.  When we hear a voice that sounds like that, we can know it is God speaking.
         If we hear a voice in our spirit that makes us feel bad about ourselves, that is not God’s voice. The Bible says it is the enemy who accuses us, condemns us and makes us feel guilty. The enemy’s voice will make us feel bad about ourselves.
         God does not condemn us or make us feel guilty. He will correct us, but in a way that we still feel good about ourselves. We will be thankful for the correction. It will be a positive in our life. He will speak the truth to you in a way that will set you free.
         What we know of God, how we perceive Him and what we think about Him determines how and if we hear Him. To hear God, we must understand who He is and what He is like.



If you would like to read some great stories of people who have heard God speak to them, click on one of the links below. This is Day 29 in a series about Hearing God. It is part of a writing challenge at www.write31days.com. When you finish reading here, please hop over to that site for many great topics and blogs.


 

8 comments:

  1. I got behind three days but kept going. So I get to continue past the 31st! Woohoo! It has started the flow of writing again for my third book, The Power of Hope for Caregivers. I'm so happy we post in the survivors group around the same time. You're a treasure! Keep writing!!!!

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    1. I'm glad you are going to keep going Karen. It does seem like several of us post at the same time, which is great. I look forward to reading yours as well.

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  2. To hear God , we have to know Him. Amen. God speaks beautiful words of truth that are just for us. I pray we all may open our hearts to His words and know Him even better as we accept His truths. Beautiful!

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  3. Such beautiful encouragement. Sometimes I forget that hearing God requires knowing Him. Thank you.

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    1. It is a basic concept, but I think we sometimes blow past it. He wants us to know Him.

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  4. Amen! This: "He will speak the truth to you in a way that will set you free." So much truth!

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