Listening to what God is saying is extremely important to every believer

 Welcome, dear friends to the column of our Daily word for spiritual strength! May grace and peace from the Father and our Lord, Jesus Christ be with you this day! Yesterday we discovered that there are several voices that people can heed to in their lives. We mentioned in particular the following voices: people voices, satan’s voice, Personal voice and the voice of God. We also said that the ability to hear the voice of God is based our quality decisions and actions to know and do what God is saying. Listening to what God is saying is extremely important to every believer. 15 times in the New Testament Jesus repeats the expression «He who has ears to hear, let him hear» (see Matthew 11:15; 13:9,43; Mark 4:9, 23; 7:16; Luke 8:18; 14:35; Revelation 2:7, 11, 17, 29; 3:6,13,22; 13:9). The Philip’s translation of the Bible states it the following way: “The man who has ears to hear must use them”. I would paraphrase this the following way: “the person who has spiritual ears must learn to use them in the appropriate way”. In all those verses cited above, God is showing us the importance and necessity of hearing His voice. After we receiving Jesus as or Lord and Saviour, God granted potentially us everything we will need to enable us to hear His voice. Even though, it’s up to us to develop that potential and to make the decision to hear and to recognise His voice.The ability to hear God’s voice is a biblical promise for the children of God. 

That is why Jesus said: «My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me “. (John 10:27).

 Even though God has promised to speak to us and guide us in life, many things depend still depend on us for that to happen. Below are three simple steps you should take in order to initiate the process of hearing God’s voice. 1) You must desire to hear from God. The desire to hear from God must become a NECESSITY for you. That is what we read about in the following passage: 

” It happened as they went on their way, he entered into a certain village, and a certain woman named Martha received him into her house. She had a sister called Mary, who also sat at Jesus’ feet, and heard his word. But Martha was distracted with much serving, and she came up to him, and said, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister left me to serve alone? Ask her therefore to help me.” Jesus answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is needed. Mary has chosen the good part, which will not be taken away from her “. (Luke 10:38-42).

 We must decide to choose the good part as Mary did. There is nothing more important in our life than fellowship with God, the guidance of the Holy Spirit and hearing the voice of Jesus, our Good. It was a matter of choice for Mary; it will also be a matter of individual choice and decision for us. Mary had to decide what was more important to her at that moment – to hear from God or to care for other urgent matters. The truth is that you will never bear many fruits unless you learn to hear the God voice. If you fail to make a firm decision that hearing the voice of God s important to you, you will spend very little time on it. If you desire to be guided by God, He will guide you. Desire is the key moment. Tell God: “Lord, I want you to guide me. I am open for it. Holy Spirit, please speak to me, because your servant is listening.” 2) Ask God for it in prayer. Once the desire and the decision is in place, the next thing that has to happen is to simple ask God about it. Ask God to speak to you concerning the issues that are on His heart and God will answer your prayer. 

«But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach; and it will be given to him. But let him ask in faith, without any doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, driven by the wind and tossed. For let that man not think that he will receive anything from the Lord. He is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways». (James 1:5-8).

 God gives wisdom to those who ask Him for it that is why you need to consistently and constantly pray for wisdom! Þ When you realise you lack something, you will pray for it Þ When a person is overwhelmed by the desire to receive something in his life, he turns his desire into action. Þ The first action of a true believer in anything is praying to God. Þ Hearing from God means access the wisdom and the secrets of God, and pray is a key to that. «The friendship of Yahweh is with those who fear him. He will show them his covenant». (Psalms 24:14). One of the conditions for effective prayer that guarantee access to divine secrets of God is walking in the fear of God. So if the desire is there, and there is prayer action coupled with that desire, please do not forget the walking in the fear of God aspect of it. 3) Begin to listen to God’s voice. When you pray for wisdom, you should listen to what God is trying to speak to your heart. Ask God to make you sensitive to His voice. Ask Him to give you ears that hear, then God will definitely answer your prayers! But you must create the time to actually listen. If you do all the talking in the prayer, God will not have the chance to speak. So practice the art of just listening in the presence of the Lord. Let’s continue from here tomorrow! God bless you abundantly! Rufus Ajiboye, pastor