There is a story about a man who works for a construction company and was spearheading the pursuit of a multimillion dollar project against several other large competing companies. Judging from his decisions regarding the bid, his colleagues expected one of the other bigger companies to win the job. However, this man always prayed before submitting his bids, and with prompting from the Lord, he made a small adjustment to his bid. His company won the contract, and others were curious to find out how it came to be that one of the other companies did not win it as expected. It came down to that small adjustment that he had made to the numbers.
You see, God is interested in our lives; business, career, employment, ministry, family, etc. He longs to lead and guide us. How about you? Do you pray? Every heart wants to hear God’s voice because we know that if we can just hear His voice, all will be fine. He will never lead us astray. Our hearts long for a flawless guide, someone to grasp our hands and show us the right path or give us a “yes” or a “no” to our plans. God wants to do just that. Psalm 32:8 says, “I will instruct and teach thee the way to go; I will guide thee with my eye.” He wants to lead and guide us.
How do I hear from God?
I’d like to explain it using the word “B-E-S-T” as an acronym
B-Being present
simply means you’re focused and engaged in the here and now, not distracted or mentally absent; being fully conscious of the moment and free from the noise of internal dialogue. Psalm 46:10 says, “Be still and know that I am God.” You must quiet your heart down. You cannot be buying and selling in your heart. There is a story in 1 Samuel 3:4-14 where God first called Samuel to give him a message for Eli the priest. Samuel was present and attentive. God called Samuel three times, and he kept going to Eli, not knowing it was the Lord until the fourth time, when Eli instructed him what to do. Verse 4 states that “the Lord called Samuel: and he answered, here am I!.” The key words are “here am I.” Here am I before the Lord. He was fully awake and present in front of the Lord, not checking his texts or thinking about his to-do list. We must remove distractions and give our full attention to the Lord if we want to hear from Him.
E-Expect to hear from the Lord in your prayer time :
Jeremiah 33:3 Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and shew thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest not. Prayer is a dialogue, not a monologue. We are so good at the monologue part. We pray, pray, pray, but when it comes to waiting to hear, we are not patient. We must wait for the answer. Psalms 62:5 says, “My soul, wait thou only upon God; for my expectation is from him.” Sometimes God wants us to just be still in His presence so He can pour His grace, wisdom, and knowledge into us. We must be intentional and cultivate the habit of stillness before God to hear from Him. “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me:” (John 10:27) In John 8:47a, the Bible says “He that is of God heareth God’s words…” In your prayers, ask him to speak to you. After Eli instructed him on what to do, he was expecting the Lord to speak to him. So, you must expect God to speak to you!
S-Study how God speaks to you. If you don’t know how, study the scriptures to find out how God speaks to other people and listen to teachings on the subject. The way God speaks to me might be different from the way God speaks to you. Personally, God speaks to me through scripture; to you, it might be dreams, visions, etc. We shall explore the different ways God speaks to us.
In the case of Samuel, it was an audible voice (1 Samuel 3:4-14) For you, it might be the scripture (see Psalms 119:105). Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path. John 14:21 He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved by my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.) The Holy Spirit quickens scriptures to our attention, and suddenly we simply know that particular verses are meant for us.
Let me tell you from my personal experience: I was once very sad and overwhelmed. I did not know what my future held. I went to church to pray before the altar and told the Lord how since I was born, it’s been trouble upon trouble. I wept bitterly, asking the Lord, “Is this how things will be?” Suddenly, the Lord spoke to me to read Psalms 129. At first, I did not want to read it because, first of all, it is not one of those popular consoling psalms, but because the Lord said to read it, I opened to Psalm 129:1-4. “Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth, may Israel now say: Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth: yet they have not prevailed against me. The plowers plowed upon my back: they made long their furrows. The Lord is righteous; he hath cut asunder the cords of the wicked. ” I knew it was for me immediately. I wiped my tears away and began to praise God. Here we are today, still praising God.
There is a story of a woman who was contemplating using a credit card to buy bed sheet sets, but the following morning, during her devotion, this is what she read: Proverbs 22:26-27 “Do not be one who shakes hands in pledge or puts up security for debts; if you lack the means to pay, your very bed will be snatched from under you.” And that’s how she stopped herself from incurring more debt. So study to know how God speaks to you.
T-Trust Him: God will speak to you more often if you trust and obey him.
Proverbs 3:5 Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. 6 In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths
2 Chronicles 20:20 And they rose early in the morning and went forth into the wilderness of Tekoa: and as they went forth, Jehoshaphat stood and said, Hear me, O Judah, and ye inhabitants of Jerusalem; Believe in the Lord your God, so shall ye be established; believe his prophets, so shall ye prosper.)
More revelation and guidance will be given to you as you trust and obey God.
I’ll conclude with this verse from Job 37:5 EASY “When God speaks, great things happen. He does things that we can never understand.” I pray that you will prepare to hear from God and begin to experience His blessings in your life.
Start today- when you do your devotion, spend time listening to God and write it down. God bless you for reading this blog; till next week!