Growing up in our small country church, I remember being confused about hearing God. I knew God spoke to us in His Word, because my parents and other church members taught me this. But does God speak directly to us? Words taught by the Spirit were a concept foreign to me.
In my early twenties, I got deep into God’s Word. I heard speakers I trusted say, “God said to me.” Not in the way the preachers I grew up listening to. They would say, “God said to me in His Word.”
No, the men I was now listening to talked about God speaking directly to them in their spirit. They had actual conversations with God. I knew it was real, and I knew I wanted that kind of relationship with God.
Fast forward forty years to today. I have conversations with God. He speaks to me in my spirit as I talk about things with Him. Not just spiritual things, but also daily life things.
Words Taught by the Spirit
Does the Holy Spirit teach us? Will He give us words to say through what He is teaching us? Is this really a thing?
According to the Apostle Paul, it really is a thing.
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. (1 Corinthians 2:13 NIV)
Paul is teaching us, through his letter to the church at Corinth, that the Holy Spirit gives us words taught by Him through spiritual truths. The Holy Spirit expresses spiritual truths to us in spiritual words. We use these spiritual words to teach others.
“But wait, Richard, I am not a teacher. I don’t teach a Bible study.” Do you have children? Don’t you teach your children? Do you have friends? Do you ever share spiritual truths with your friends?
As Christians, we share spiritual truths with others. We do this through words taught by the Holy Spirit. We read God’s Word. As we read God’s Word, the Holy Spirit teaches us spiritual truths in spiritual words. These are the words we use to share spiritual truths.
This happens on a level we are not even conscious of.
Conversations With God
There is a conscious conversation we can have with God. We speak and God speaks back. It is what we call “being led by the Spirit.”
He who belongs to God hears what God says. (John 8:47 NIV)
And whenever you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear this command behind you: “This is the way. Walk in it.” (Isaiah 30:21 CSB)
God will direct our life by speaking to us through His Holy Spirit. We don’t hear the Holy Spirit in our mind. We hear Him in our human spirit. This is where God will talk to us.
Every Christian can hear God. We must train ourselves to hear Him. Hearing God clearly is a matter of intimacy. We develop intimacy with God so we can know His voice.
Let me give you an example. My wife and I go to a party with our friend. Our friend is you. This party takes place in a large conference room in a hotel with about two hundred people.
There is music playing in the background, and everybody is talking to each other. You call me by name from across the room, but I don’t hear you because of all the noise. My wife calls me from across the room and I instantly respond.
What made the difference?
Hearing God’s Voice Requires Intimacy
The difference is intimacy. I haven’t developed the same level of intimacy with you as I have with my wife. Cindy and I have spent hours together in many situations. Some of this time is just the two of us talking and sharing. Through this growing intimacy, I have come to know her voice over any other voice.
It is the same with God. When we spend time with God talking and sharing, we develop intimacy. As this intimacy deepens, we will hear God’s voice over all the other voices in the world.
Yes, there are many other voices competing for your attention. Your conscience, satan, various media, your friends. These are all the other voices competing with God’s voice in your life.
How Do We Learn to Recognize God’s Voice
Learning to hear and recognize God’s voice is a process. It doesn’t happen overnight. It takes investing time in the process to learn God’s voice.
Three Steps to Learning God’s Voice
- Study the Bible daily.
- Spend time alone with God daily, doing nothing else but focusing on Him.
- Do whatever God commands in His Word.
This is the three-step process to learning God’s voice. There are no shortcuts. The more time you spend doing the process, the faster you will learn God’s voice.
Study the Bible Daily
This step of the process teaches you how God speaks. When God speaks, it is always in line with what He has said in His Word. Studying the Bible builds a repository of His Word in our spirit. This is the well the Holy Spirit will draw from when speaking to us.
If that well is empty, the Holy Spirit has nothing to work with. We need to keep the well full.
(For more about studying the Bible, you can read about my easy Bible study method anyone can do HERE.)
Spend Time Alone with God
This is the step of intimacy. You must take time to be alone with God. We must do this without doing something else. Not driving, doing a hobby, working, or anything else.
This is the time you set aside for just you and God. Just like I do with my wife, Cindy. If I only spent time with her while I was involved with other things, she wouldn’t be happy. This is because my focus wouldn’t be on her alone.
Take the time to focus on God and God alone. It is only then you can learn to hear God’s voice over all the other voices in your life.
Do Whatever God Commands in His Word
Why is this step included in the process? If you don’t do what God commands you in His Word, He will stop talking to you. Why? Because you aren’t listening to Him.
Not only will He stop talking to you, but He also wouldn’t need to give you commands that are not explicitly expressed in the Bible. What do I mean by this?
God said in His Word we are to work. What He doesn’t say in His Word is where we are to work. That is something He would directly command us to do. But why should He tell us where to work if we aren’t listening to Him about working?
Learn the Deep Things of God
Now for learning the deep things of God. God is not keeping anything from us. He withheld knowledge from those under the Old Covenant. They were spiritually dead and unable to understand the deep things of God.
We are spiritually alive with God’s Holy Spirit dwelling in us. God is not withholding anything we need for life and godliness. (see: 2 Peter 1:3)
This is exactly what the Apostle Paul told the Corinthians in his letter.
Now God has revealed these things to us by the Spirit, since the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. For who knows a person’s thoughts except his spirit within him? In the same way, no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. Now we have not received the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who comes from God, so that we may understand what has been freely given to us by God. We also speak these things, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, explaining spiritual things to spiritual people. But the person without the Spirit does not receive what comes from God’s Spirit, because it is foolishness to him; he is not able to understand it since it is evaluated spiritually. (1 Corinthians 2:10–14 CSB)
We can learn the deep things of God. First, learn how to hear His voice. Then you can receive His revelation knowledge and direct guidance. You will hear his voice clearly.
This will propel you to a different spiritual level.
The Challenge
Take the time to hear God’s voice over all the other voices in the world. Then delve into the deeper things of God. It will change your life. You will enter a spiritual realm that more careless Christians can never access.
The time and effort spent doing this will reap eternal rewards.
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