Does
God actually talk to us? Is it an audible voice, an inner voice, an impression
or feeling or thought in our mind? How can we hear God's voice?
We
start by developing a physical "closet" in which to meet with God:
Under the tree in the garden, a path where we are walking or jogging all alone,
a chair in our home where we are uninterrupted, the spare bedroom, the attic or
basement, or an actual closet space in our home.
We
go there with our journal and nothing else. No Bible, music, TV or radio. Just
a chair and some breathing room without any distractions. We spend time here
for thirty minutes to an hour any time during every day and we journal whatever
comes to our mind.
At
first, it may be lists of things we need to do. Go ahead and jot these ideas in
the journal. When we write them down, we clear them from our mind and quiet
those "voices" in our head.
Then
we may think of Bible verses, a movie clip, a conversation or some event we had
in the past; jot it down in the journal. Again it clears our mind of this inner
clutter.
Write
down concerns or problems as a prayer to the Lord. Then we spend some time
praising God for who He is and what He already did in our life. We think of His
goodness and grace, and we overflow with gratitude toward Him.
Next
is the hard part, which gets easier with practice… LISTENING. With a cleared
mind, we listen with our inner, spiritual ear in our spirit to any words the
Holy Spirit may whisper to us (1 King 19:12).
We
heed and obey His directives and enjoy His comfort and encouragement every
moment of every day of our life (Galatians 5:25). We live with His praises on
our lips and His peace in our heart, and we eventually learn to pray without
ceasing throughout the day (1 Thessalonians 5:17).
Prayer:
Father
God, teach us to walk by Your Spirit step-by-step. We may falter as we mature
from crawling to walking and then running, but we are soon sprinting through
life by the direction of Your Spirit, in obedience to Your Word and under the
guidance of Your peace.
Help
us to yield our life to You, to walk away from the deeds of the flesh
(Galatians 5:15-25) and to allow Your peace, which transcends human reasoning,
to guide our hearts through Christ Jesus (Philippians 4:7). Fill us with Your
fruit and wisdom; and teach us to do only Your will in every circumstance
(Galatians 5:22-23; Ephesians 2:10).
Thought
for the Day:
We
encourage others by offering to pray for them, showing them love even when they
are unloving toward us and sharing a testimony of God's love - sometimes
without even using words.
