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Discerning the lord’s voice – Part 2

By Austen C. Ukachi
06 January 2019   |   2:27 am
Hearing from God in this New Year is so crucial for every child of God. Our success this New Year would depend on whether we hear the voice of God or not. There are cacophonies of voices out there, so we must listen attentively to know the voice of God from the crowd.

Ukachi

Hearing from God in this New Year is so crucial for every child of God. Our success this New Year would depend on whether we hear the voice of God or not. There are cacophonies of voices out there, so we must listen attentively to know the voice of God from the crowd. Elijah’s encounter with God at Mount Carmel proves that some voices are certainly not of God. At times, God speaks in unlikely ways and at unlikely times. When God appeared to Elijah, strangely, he was not in the fierce wind; the second time he was not in the earthquake and the third time he was not in the fire. However, God later spoke in “a still small voice” (I Kings 19:11-13 NKJV).

In Numbers 12, when Aaron and Miriam questioned the authority of Moses as God’s mouthpiece, God reprimanded them and affirmed that he spoke to Moses face to face (Numbers 12:6-8 NKJV).

As God’s children, the Holy Spirit is given to us to guide us into all truth and into God’s will and paths for us (John 16: 5-15). Hearing his voice takes us to the desired end God has for us. When Peter thought about going to the Gentiles or not, it was the Spirit of God who told him to go to the Gentiles (Acts 10:19-20). During Paul’s missionary journey, the Holy Spirit forbade him from going to Mysia, but through a vision, he was led to go to Philippi, the chief city of Macedonia (Acts 16:8-15).

The Acts of the Apostles is full of examples of how God led His disciples at various times. God speaks to us through dreams, visions, audible and subdued voices, trance, prophecy and through the Spirit in our inner man (Acts 10:1-22). The account in Acts 10 details how God spoke to Cornelius, while he was praying and at the same time spoke to Peter in a trance when he went up to the housetop to pray (Verse 9).

Some Christians believe that God hardly speaks to us through any other means than the Bible. They hinge their argument on Hebrews 1:1. They believe that dreams, visions, trance, prophecy and audible voice, etc. are extra-Biblical methods that are fraught with dangers. But the Scriptures are very clear that God spoke to people in times past through these methods and still speaks through these means today. 

One major way God speaks to us is through His word, the Bible. The Bible is God’s word to us meant to instruct and guide us in the way of truth. The Psalmist says in Psalm 119:105, “Your word is a lamp to guide my feet and a light for my path” ( NLT).

Another major way God speaks to us is through prayer. Prayer is talking to God, but it’s God also speaking to man. Prayer is not a monologue, but a dialogue. In Acts 13:1-3, we notice that as Paul and the other disciples prayed, fasted and worshipped the Lord, He spoke to them and launched Paul out on a missionary journey.

We must train our spiritual senses to hear from God. God speaks to everyone one of us differently. We must know how the Lord speaks to us.The letters written to the Seven Churches in Asia Minor always ended on this refrain, “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.” Our success in 2019 would depend on our ability to discern what the Lord is saying to us and in obeying Him.

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