Hearing God: The Voice

Hearing God: The Voice

(John 10:1-6)

10:30 am, Sun, Sept 29, 2013 Windsor UBC, J G White

Call to your dog, and it may well come to you, gladly. Call you cat, and it may just stare and walk away. Stories are told of old, retired, circus elephants, reunited with a former trainer. They recognize the old master's voice, and on command, will do the old routine of tricks, after many, many years. An elephant never forgets, we are told.

Hebrew prophets of old spoke this way:

The ox knows its owner, and the donkey its master's crib; but Israel does not know, my people do not understand.  Is. 1:3

Even the stork in the heavens knows its times; and the turtledove, swallow, and crane observe the time of their coming; but my people do not know the ordinance of the Lord.  Jeremiah 8:7

Isaiah and Jeremiah spoke these words of the Lord in the 8^th and 7^th centuries, B.C., when the Hebrew people were a nation about to fall to the Babylonian empire. They warned: God's own people don't even know their God anymore!

It could be scary to have a Jeremiah or Isaiah arise in our midst today. The warnings could be just as fierce. The story of God's own people forgetting God's own voice is oft repeated in history. And some today would warn that many Christians are weak when it comes to knowing the Master's voice.

We just heard some of Jesus' own words, rather gentle words, about knowing His voice. He is the Shepherd of sheep who know His voice and can be called out, and led. Almost seems ironic that Jesus' pastoral figure of speech is not even understood, and He has to go on to say more to make it clear!

This Jesus can yet be our Good Shepherd, though His voice comes by the Holy Spirit, and the record we have in the Bible. We who are redeemed by Christ, are filled with the Spirit, the presence of God with our spirits. Anointed is one of the Bible words for this. The first letter of John says: As for you, the anointing that you received from him abides in you, and so you do not need anyone to teach you. But as his anointing teaches you about all things, and is true and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, abide in him. 1 John 2:27

Abide in Him. Stay with Him. Do not forget or let the fellowship fade.

When it does fade, it is time for renewal, reunion, re-acquaintance, relearning the Master's Voice. Some believers have not been well-taught about the Voice in the first place.

One of the classic lessons about knowing the will of God for your life, or for any particular moment, is to use the Three Lights, three things to guide the way: circumstances, impressions of the Spirit, and the Bible.

What happens and is happening gives us definite clues about God's plan and path for us. But, of course, not everything that happens is what God wants. I'm not a fan of the cliche, “If the Lord want's that to happen, He'll make it happen.” That's sort of true, but we could easily say this about something the Evil One wants to happen; then, when it occurs, it's the devil's work. Ephesians 2:2 warns of the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience. Next Sunday morning we'll walk with Jesus through His own desert temptations with the Accuser.

Along with sensing God in our circumstances, are the impressions of guidance or truths from the Spirit of God. I shall never forget a dear lady from Cumberland county who told her story of being assured of salvation and the presence of God. She remembered an old TV commercial for Mr. Clean, who waved a wand and everything went sparkling and bright from floor to counter-top to cupboards and windows. She said she felt like that one day in her own body, from her toes sweeping up to her head: the thrilling cleansing and beautiful presence of the Spirit of God.

And along with circumstances and our spiritual moments is the witness of the Bible. Dallas Willard wrote: “It cannot be stressed too much that the permanent address at which the word of God may be found is the Bible.” (Hearing God, p. 183)

But recognizing His voice is not simply a matter of matching these three up. This is not enough. We recognize a message is His voice because we are familiar with His voice.

We can suppose that sheep know the shepherd by getting to know the sound of his voice, the attitude and way he speaks, and what the guidance actually is. So it is with the Good Shepherd. There can be said to be these three factors in the Voice of God: the Quality, the Spirit, and the Content of what we are being told.

A main Quality in God's voice is the weight of authority. What God speaks is clearly and simply right and true and strong.

Jesus spoke as one with authority. This was the comment of the people who heard Him teaching.

The plain authority of an idea that comes to us can help us know it is of God. Many of our own ideas and thoughts are less secure, and more sneaky in their quality. E. Stanley Jones wisely wrote: Perhaps the rough distinction is this: The voice of the subconscious argues with you, tries to convince you; but the inner voice of God does not argue, does not try to convince you. It just speaks, and it is self-authenticating. It has the feel of the voice of God within it. (A Song of Ascents, 1979, p. 190)

So the old cartoon of a little devil on one shoulder, and a little angel on the other, whispering into your ears, is not quite right. The still small voice has a simple authority, He is not competitive with us or cajoling us.

Another aspect of God's voice to us is the spirit of what is said. It's been called “a spirit of exalted peacefulness and confidence, of joy, of sweet reasonableness and of goodwill.” (Willard, p. 177)

After Christ taught about being the Shepherd and the Gate of the sheep, John 10 describes the response. Many of them were saying, "He has a demon and is out of his mind. Why listen to him?" Others were saying, "These are not the words of one who has a demon. Can a demon open the eyes of the blind?" John 10:20-21

The wisdom we gain is from the Lord, and of this wisdom James says: the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of partiality or hypocrisy. James 3:17. This is the feel, the spirit of what God says to guide us. The still small voice is all of these things.

Thirdly, along with the quality of authority in the Voice, and the spirit of peace and mercy, is the actual Content. What we are being told by God. Now, we will be told amazing things, but the Holy Spirit's voice will speak things that are true and right, for God is true and right. What God tells you or me or us will jive with what the Bible tells us about who God is and what the Kingdom is like.

Charles Stanley comments: “God’s voice will never tell us to engage in any activity or relationship that is inconsistent with the Holy Scriptures.” (How to Listen to God, 1985, p.51)

So, let's think about a case study. Can we discover a vision statement to be a word from the Lord?

Windsor Baptist will be an intergenerational community of Christ followers. We will continue to be, not a building, not an organized society, not a series of religious events… we will continue to be a people, a church family, a faith community within the larger area.

I believe this is consistent with what scripture teaches us about God’s Kingdom and God’s people on earth. I’m just now reading Andy Stanley’s book, Deep & Wide. He speaks at length about the New Testament fellowship. The word that gets translated “church” in the New Testament means gathering of people, and might just as well be translated as gathering.

Look at how many of the epistles / letter greet the churches as gatherings:  When Paul, or others, send their greetings, they say, “greet the church/gathering in their house.”  It’s at the end of Romans (16:5), of 1 Corinthians (16:9), Colossians (4:15), and the start of Philippians (1:2).  Romans 8:29 tells us: those whom [God] foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn within a large family.  Galatians 6:10 actually has the phrase “the family of faith.”  And we want to be a complete family. An intergenerational community of Christ followers.

...With an intentional focus on youth and young families, by 2017. This narrows our focus, as we believe we need to do.

We think about this; we react with our feelings about its meaning. We talk with others about it. Something you say out loud, or someone says to you may stand out as from the Lord.

I hope we do regular praying about this: our conversation with the Lord. In that inner thinking with Him, and the silence of our questions before the Lord, we may hear a still small assurance of this vision, or some message to correct it. He may speak silently thru something we see in our community: an impactful glimpse of need out there that God impresses upon us.

And we may even search the scriptures about this vision statement. This too is needed. The Holy Spirit will use chapters and verses to speak into our Church vision this fall:

Recite them to your children and talk about them when you are home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you rise. Deuteronomy 6:7

Train children in the right way, and when old, they will not stray. Proverbs 22:6

Jesus said, Go into all the world and proclaim the good news to the whole creation. Mark 16:15

Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household. Acts 16:31

In all these activities, we listen for the voice of the Spirit: human talk and activity, the still small voice, the Bible. We tune in to the messages we get that have the quality, and spirit, and content that sound like Him. We want to recognize the Master's voice in our thoughts about this vision for Windsor Baptist. And we want everyone to be confident about the Shepherd's voice in every situation.

Of course, we can err, we can be led astray. Next week is really part two about The Voice. What is not The Voice? Even quotations from the Bible can be from other than our God.

It takes time, I'm sure, for a lamb to get to know the voice of the Shepherd. But staying near the other sheep who already know the voice is a big help. Let's stick together, as we develop our listening skills for God. Let's help each other as we grow to walk with the Lord.

Hearing God: How God Speaks Today

Hearing God: How God Speaks Today

(1 Kings 19:11-13)

10:30 am, Sun, Sept 22, 2013 Windsor UBC, J G White

Thirty years ago, Guideposts magazine told the story of an ordinary housewife, Virginia Lively, who started to weep, and continued to weep for four days.

On the morning of the fourth day, alone in her living room, there was a sudden hum and crackle in the air.  She saw a ball of white light through a window, spraying showers of multicolored light in its wake and approaching her with amazing speed.  Then it was right there, beside her, and as she looked at it she saw a face.

‘He is perfect,’ was her first thought.  His forehead was high.  His eyes were large, but she could not fix their colour any more than she could the colour of the sea.  His features were lost in the overwhelming impression of life brimming over with power and freedom.  

Instantly she knew this was Jesus.  She saw his utter lack of condemnation, that nothing she had ever done or ever would do could alter the absolute caring or the unconditional love in his eyes.

According to Virginia’s testimony, Jesus was present with her in this way for three months, and then His presence began to fade.  When she last saw Him, He said to her, “I will always be with you.”  (December 1982)  Invisible, quiet, but still with her.

Amid our experience and the stories we know, it is important to have a handle on how God speaks with us now.  We just remembered the famed moment with Elijah the Hebrew Prophet, in the mountains, hearing from God not in the great wind, or earthquake, or fire, but in a still small voice.  

It is the ways humans conversed with the Lord in the past that still go on today.  We have no reason to doubt this.  It is often the extraordinary, miraculous stories that stay with us, eh?  Yet there is also a lot of ‘ordinary’ hearing from God: in scripture, and in our Christian lives.

A survey of events in the Old and New Testaments illustrates the many ways people experience God speaking.  Like the experience of Ms. Lively, there can be a phenomenon and a voice.  Abraham with the fire that consumed his sacrifices in Genesis 15, while making a covenant together.  Moses hearing instruction when he stopped long enough to investigate a bush that was on fire but not burning up, Exodus 3.  Ezekiel’s vision of the wheels and things in the sky.  Jesus’ baptism in Matthew 3, with the Spirit descending like a bird, a dove.  Later, in Acts 9, Saul the persecutor of believers seeing a bright light and hearing from Jesus.  

Akin to this are the times an angel or other supernatural messenger visits someone.  Aside from all the Old Testament events, we might think in the New of the angel visits to the parents of John the Baptizer, and Jesus, and then the shepherds when Christ was born.  

Then, there are dreams and visions.  Dreams we think of happening in sleep, and often needing explanation.  They are like those the patriarch Joseph interpreted for the Pharaoh and others in Egypt, or that Daniel interpreted for Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar, or such as Paul saw in Acts 16, leading him to travel to Macedonia.  

Visions usually seem more direct, and happen in our waking moments, such as with Peter in Acts 10 when he saw the collection of non-kosher food and was told to eat.  

A simple, audible voice, is a communication from the Lord many people long for, at special moments, to make the way certain.  We read in scripture of things like young Samuel learning to answer the Lord, calling him in the night; 1 Samuel 3.  The boy thought it was simply the voice of his master in the Temple, not the Lord God almighty.  

All these voices from the Lord are the more special, rare moments.  From day to day, there can be much more hearing from God in other ways.  One is the human voice.  Some other person speaks, and you detect that it is also a message direct from the Lord.  Moses had been told by his Lord, “Now go, and I will be with your mouth and teach you what you are to speak.”  The children of Israel heard many a time the Lord’s word from Moses’ mouth, and his Brother Aaron’s.  

A flood was on its way, forcing everyone to evacuate. The police rowed up to the most pious woman in town and said, "Ma'am, you have to leave this house! People are dying out here!"

     The woman replied, "No, I'm not leaving. God has always helped me before, and He will do it again."

     So as the water started to rise, she went to the second story of her house. Another boat came by, and the captain yelled, "Ma'am, you have to get on this boat or you're going to drown!"

     The woman replied again, "No, God helped me before, and He will do it again."

     The water rose even higher. This time she went to the top of the roof, where a helicopter came and hovered overhead. The pilot called into his loudspeaker, "Please climb aboard, ma'am. You are going to drown!"

     The women sniffed and again replied, "God is going to save me!"

     But the water rose higher, and soon she drowned to death. She went to Heaven, and there she asked God, "Why didn't you save me, O Lord?"

     And God replied, "I did help--I sent you two boats and a helicopter!"

Most of us have more stories of the Spirit speaking thrugh human voices than of spiritual dreams, angels, or supernatural happenings.  And don’t forget that ofttimes God can speak through the written words of another person.  

One of my few dramatic moments was 22 years ago when I was trying to decide upon my calling to be a pastor.  I was on the quest for a while, and the final straw that convinced me, that instantly made me feel sure, was a devotional reading for the day, December 2.  

Many of us have a sort of vision of the kind of person God wants us to be.  We must be true to that vision, whatever it is, and we must try to live up to it, by living the way we believe we should live…  But many a person fails to fulfill that promise and God’s disappointments must be many.

It was in the simple words of that author that I heard God saying to Jeffrey George White: My vision for you is sure; not to take this path would be a disappointment.  

The story of Elijah on mount Horeb, in a time of personal crisis, points us to an even more subtle, and potentially more common, hearing from God.  The so-called Still Small Voice.  The records of the Old Testament bear witness to many a moment of dramatic fire - and the Lord is there.  Or wind and storm - and the Lord is there.  Or an earthquake - and the Lord is in it.  In 1 Kings 19, Elijah responds to the quietness, not the dramatic eruptions - and this is his turning point.  From fear and fleeing, to turning back and returning, anointing new kings, and even taking on a disciple, Elisha, who would follow in his footsteps.

The still small voice, the inner voice, may indeed be the prime way to hear from our Lord.  In our own mind, our inner thoughts, we can learn to hear our God speak.  Knowing what thoughts are from the Lord and what are not - this is the training of the disciple.  This is our spiritual journey, our walk with the Lord; and learning how to recognize His voice we will explore in the next two weeks.  

I believe it really is the way of Jesus, to hear from God every day, moment by moment, in our inner thoughts and awareness. Our prayerful attention to God opens the door.  We do not need miracles to hear from the Master.

E. Stanley Jones wrote

God cannot guide you in any way that is not Christ-like.  Jesus was supreme sanity.  He went off into no visions, no dreams.  He got His guidance through prayer as you and I do.  I do not say that God may not guide through a vision or dream; but if He does, it will be very seldom, and it will because He cannot get hold of our normal processes to guide them.  For God is found most clearly and beneficially in the normal rather than in the abnormal.  And Jesus is the Normal, for He is the Norm.  (p. 283,The Way, 1946)

We can learn the ordinary, daily voice of the Shepherd, the Spirit, our God.  We seek His voice day by day.  We look for it everywhere.  Seek the Lord, while He may be found, says Isaiah 55, call upon Him while He is near.  Walking with Him, more of His thoughts become our thoughts.  Not all, of course; our union with the Lord is incomplete and tiny.  His thoughts are not our thoughts, Isaiah says.  But as Job 26:14 beautifully puts it, while meditating upon God’s Creation: These are indeed but the outskirts of His ways; and how small a whisper do we hear of him!  

How small a whisper do we hear of Him; yet the still small voice will be so often enough. Last week’s hymn could be ours again today.

I ask no dream, no prophet ecstasies;

No sudden rending of the veil of clay;

No angel visitant, no op’ning skies;

But take the dimness of my soul away.

The simple way, the still small voice, the inner thought that comes from your Lord is the daily, usual way to hear from God.  Next time I want us to delve into how we recognize the inner voice, among our own thoughts and feelings and distractions.  How the sheep get to know the Shepherd’s voice.  

Hearing God: Is God Silent?

Hearing God: Is God Silent?

(Exodus 33:7-11; Acts 16:6-10)

10:30 am, Sun, Sept 15, 2013 Windsor UBC, J G White

In the mail last week I got my latest edition of Saltscapes magazine, and there was an article about the 1967 UFO incident in Shag Harbour.  Shag Harbour - area from which our Tidal Impact team came to us last month - this hamlet even has a little UFO museum today.  

Have you ever seen a UFO?  Do you believe earth has been visited by aliens?

Have you ever heard God speak to you, with a clear message?  And yet, for many, even many Christians, to hear messages from the Lord regularly would be considered weird, odd, unreal.  Decades ago, comedienne Lily Tomlin asked, “Why is it that when we speak to God we are said to be praying, but when God speaks to us we are said to be schizophrenic?”

There is a Paradox in Prayer: we are expecting answers, asking for answers, but not expecting or almost ever hearing a voice.  

For all our lives we have been singing that the Lord tells us things and shows us the way.

Saviour, Like a Shepherd Lead Us

All the Way My Saviour Leads Me

He Leadeth Me

Lead On, O King Eternal

Jesus, Saviour, Pilot Me

Trust and Obey

Speak to Me, Lord, that I May Speak

And He Walks with Me, and He Talks with Me

What a Friend We Have in Jesus

Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah

But in the day-to-day lives of many, this close friendship with the Father, or Son, or Spirit, is very quiet; the talk is usually one-sided.  We may not want to admit it.

Scripture itself, the story of God’s people, expresses these moments.  Psalm 22, which Jesus quoted from the cross, begins:

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

Why are you so far from helping me,

from the words of my groaning?  

O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer;

and by night, but find no rest. (22:1-2)

In extreme circumstances God can seem afar off.  But from day to day many believers could admit that their Lord is silent 99.44 percent of their lives.  But: God cannot be silent?

In this Year of Listening, it seems right to have a sermon series on Hearing God: how to listen to the Spirit.  I take some cues from the late Dallas Willard, American philosopher, Christian writer, Baptist.  

When Dallas was a young assistant pastor, in the church of his in-laws, one Sunday dinner was startling for him.  The meal was over, but folks lingered, savouring the last tidbits and reflecting on the morning service.  The Senior Pastor’s sermon has focused - with excited energy - on their upcoming building project of a new sanctuary.  The Pastor spoke of his vision for the church’s increased ministry.  He indicated how strongly he felt God’s guidance in the way the congregation was going, and he testified that God has spoken to him about thing that should be done.  (Willard, Hearing God, p. 16)

At the dinner table, Dallas’ wife’s grandmother seemed deep in thought.  She was a woman of unshakable faith and complete devotion.  Finally, she quietly said, “I wonder why God never speaks to me like that.”  (Ibid, p. 16)

That simple comment came like a bolt out of the blue to the young assistant pastor, Dallas, and forever changed his attitude toward glib talk about God’s speaking to us our about divine guidance. (Ibid, p. 17)

Perhaps many people truly think that some people - only some special Christians - get much of this God speaking to them.  I notice that, usually in a joking way, there is the expectation that pastors know God better others do!  

But I’ve also mentioned before the community turkey dinner Sharon and I attended a few years ago.  On the other side of me sat a woman I’d never met before.  After introducing ourselves, she asked, quite seriously, without ridicule, “Do you think you know God better than I do?”  No was my answer.  How hard it is to judge someone else’s relationship with the Lord, not to mention a complete stranger!

Alison read that great, descriptive scene from Exodus 33 of how Moses had conversation with the LORD.  This is just after Moses came down the mountain with the ten commandments, saw the uproar of everyone worshipping a golden statue, and threw down and smashed the stone tablets.  The people are rebuked by Moses, and the word of the Lord to them is that God will no longer go with them!  

Then we hear about how humble Moses would meet with God.  He went out to a special place, and spoke with God ‘face to face,’ as a with friend.  He seems to be the only one doing this, and yet, in the purpose of time, all believers are to have this kind of relationship with the holy God.  

Personal Divine communication not for special spiritual people; it is for all disciples of the Master. Years ago, Dallas Willard wrote an article for Christianity Today, asking: is Discipleship “for Super-Christians Only?”  No, of course not.  Today we ask, “Is Hearing from God for Super-Christians only?”  Again, the answer is No.  

In the biblical story of God’s people, the relationships deepen and grow.  Remember the beautiful promise in Jeremiah 31:34?  No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, "Know the Lord," for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the Lord; for I will forgive their iniquity, and remember their sin no more.

In the time of the Messiah, we hear Him, Jesus, say to his disciples,  “I have called you friends.”

In our lives of faith, we can be growing in our relationship and communication with the Holy Spirit year by year.  New ways, new language, deeper fellowship is possible.  

I am learning to use a cell phone right now, with my own mobile number…  So too I can learn that hearing from God is also for me.  Also for you. And we keep learning how.

Look again at that scene from Acts 16.  The Apostles, those first missionaries of Jesus, received guidance for travel and ministry from the Holy Spirit.  We read that Paul and Timothy set out traveling.  They were forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia.  How did the Spirit forbid them?  Next they attempted to enter an area called Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus did not allow them.  Again, we may wonder how the men got this divine message.  When they got into the city of Troas, Paul had a vision: there stood a man of Macedonia pleading with him and saying, “Come over to Macedonia and help us.” This convinced the missionaries that God wanted them to go there.  Here we see the method - a dream - but wonder, perhaps at our own dreams: when is one from God, and when is a dream from indigestion?  From imagination?  

I’m confident that Paul and the others had clearly learned to know the Master’s voice, the leading of the Spirit.  In places like 1 Corinthians 12 we can read about the ability to distinguish between spirits, to discern what is of God and what is not.  This is an important spiritual gift to cultivate and receive from God.

Let me remind you of this Good News:  It is a reasonable expectation to hear from the Lord, and to develop a conversational relationship with God.  

Salvation is about a personal relationship with God, because of Jesus Christ, with Jesus Christ.  It is more than relying upon Jesus and His sacrifice by death to deal with our personal sin and mortality.  Salvation is a relationship with God, now, and forever.  It is a personal connection here with the Spirit of Jesus, to use Luke’s phrase.  Or, as John tells us, Christ promised His disciples, before He died, that the Spirit would be with them.  The Holy Spirit… will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you.  (14:26)

We must celebrate the everyday ways we know God speaks.  We can cultivate and learn holy conversation more and more.  It is not more far-fetched than other listening skills we naturally develop.  Not as strange as a UFO.

Brian Brown tells the story of being at the community pool with his family. Kids were screaming, playing, and splashing in the pool, music was playing, the lifeguard whistles were blowing and in the midst of the conversation, his wife shooshes him. He said, "What are you doing?"

"Shoosh, did you hear that?"

"Hear what?" he said.

"Listen!"

And over all of the noise, she had heard their youngest daughter screaming. As she listened to it, she then said, "OK, everything's alright. That's a happy scream."

He said he was blown away that, over all of the other voices, she not only recognized her child's voice but was able to identify what type of scream it was. Why? Because every day she talked with them and in the process learned the sound of their voices.

Maybe that's what it takes for us to understand His voice, that everyday communication and spending time saying to God, "Speak to me."

A parent learning the subtle sounds of her particular child is wonderful, amazing, and natural as can be.  The Spirit will give us super-natural skills to hear and know Himself.

We sang Rev. George Croly’s hymn, Spirit of God, Descend Upon My Heart.  This song prays, in such a personal way, for simple, clear fellowship with the Lord.

I ask no dream, no prophet ecstasies;

No sudden rending of the veil of clay;

No angel visitant, no op’ning skies;

But take the dimness of my soul away. (1854)

It is the taking away of the dimness of our souls that we ask for from the Heavenly Father.  Let us not seek messages from God in dreams and visions, with the visit of a celestial angel, the opening of the heavens.  These things happen: unusually.  But let us seek and learn the simplicity of the Shepherd’s voice, daily, as sheep who can learn this.  

God is not silent.  The ways of speaking and hearing are not purely physical - sound waves on the eardrum or things we can see with our eyes - but if God is personal, there is personal communication.  Two-way communication!

A twelve year old boy became a Christian during revival meetings. The next week at school his friends questioned him about the experience. "Did you see a vision?" asked one friend. "Did you hear God speak?" asked another. The youngster answered “no.” "Well, how did you know you were saved?" they asked. The boy searched for an answer and finally he said, "It’s like when you catch a fish, you can't see the fish, or hear the fish; you just feel him tugging on your line. I just felt God tugging on my heart."

As I said, last week, I went fishing in August. That’s almost as amazing for me as finally getting a cell phone.  I felt the mackerel tugging, and reeled it in.  

This fall, let’s seek our God to become more confident in how the Lord tugs at our hearts, and minds, and bodies.  How we can listen and hear God.  It is not as strange as seeing and believing in a UFO.  And, If I can learn to fish, if I can learn to use a cell phone, I can learn to hear God more.  And so can you.  Next Sunday we’ll check in on How God Speaks Today.

And maybe soon we be singing Chris Tomlin’s hymn, In the Secret...

I want to know You,

I want to hear Your voice

I want to know You more.

I want to touch You,

I want to see Your face

I want to know You more.