How Often Does God Talk to You?

That Christian Website ^ | 01/24/2012 | Travis Main

[hawkins]

Prayer stands as a key component of a Christian’s life. When a Christian prays they share their gratefulness, reverence, thoughts, concerns, and needs with the Eternal Father. Even non-Christians talk to God at times in their lives. However, prayer represents only one side of communication with God. Men need to let God talk. Unfortunately, the wide majority of the world refuses to give God the opportunity. If they would let Him talk, they would be much better equipped for the lives that they have been given.

Those who give God the chance to talk to them learn:

• God created the heavens and the earth (Genesis 1:1).

• God does not listen to the prayer of the sinner (Isaiah 59:1-2).

• There exists only one way to heaven, not many (John 14:6).

• Few people find their way into eternal life, the majority find only destruction (Matthew 7:13-14).

• Faith only does not save (James 2:17).

• A Christian’s life was created in Christ for good works (Ephesians2:10).

• Those who disobey the truth will meet the wrath of God (Romans 2:7-8).

• God does not wish anyone to perish, but gives them time to choose repentance (2 Peter 3:9).

• Man can understand the Will of God (Ephesians 3:4).

• God requires man to study His Truth (2 Timothy 2:15).

• The truth of God is to be shared with all creation (Mark 16:15).

• The Love of God is that man keeps his commandments (I John 5:3).

Christians to whom God talks demonstrate a far better understanding of their life purpose than others. How can a person know for certain if God has talked to them? Is it an emotion or feeling? Will they see visions or dreams? No. God talks to man only in one way today. He talks to man when they listen to His Word, the Bible. The best way of letting God talk is picking up the Bible and reading. How often does God talk to you? Do you schedule time each day for him to talk? If you haven’t taken the time before, no better time exists to start than today. He wants to talk to you soon and often! Let him share with you the knowledge which pertains to life and godliness (2 Peter 1:3-4).

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the ping!

[johngrace]

Great Post! Thank you For Sharing!

[Lera]

True true
His WORD does not return void.

[verity]

I think you hear strange voices in your head. lol

[Revolting cat!]

I dunno what’s the problem but God don’t talk to me and never has. Whatsa matta, God?

[.30Carbine]

And he said, Go forth, and stand upon the mount before Jehovah. And, behold, Jehovah passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks before Jehovah; but Jehovah was not in the wind: and after the wind an earthquake; but Jehovah was not in the earthquake: and after the earthquake a fire; but Jehovah was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice.
1 Kings 19:11-12

[Quix]

Have gone through many intense and long

‘desert’ experiences of not hearing from The Lord . . .

at least . . . not in terms I could clearly discern or make confident sense out of.

Some were due to my contrary perversities in terms of not sufficiently hearing and obeying what He’d last said to me.

Some were due to great discouragement over traumas in my life whether caused by my junk and/or other peoples’ junk.

One of the things I’ve learned . . . or think I’ve learned . . . is that

God can out wait anyone.

AND HE INSISTS ON DOING THINGS HIS WAY.

AND HE INSISTS ON BEING RESPECTED AS ALMIGHTY GOD.

Ranting against Him may be an OK thing temporarily in earnestly trying to work the relationship through. We may as well be honest with Him. He knows our thoughts and feelings in minute detail anyway.

However, a chronic rant/ angst/ bitterness or resentment against God is NOT a good way to get a solid, clear, hepful word from Him.

He tends to be patient and gracious as long as we are earnestly trying to work out and walk out a relationship on His terms according to His instructions, His Word.

He tends to dig in His heels and ‘turn the Heavens to brass’ against our prayers when we stubbornly and rebelliously

insist that

HE BE A GOD OF OUR FANTASIES, IMAGINATIONS AND DEMANDS.

WE CERTAINLY MUST REMEMBER THAT HE IS GOD

and we are NOT.

. . . if we WANT A TRUE DIALOGUE AND RELATIONSHIP WITH HIM.

We simply have to come to the place that REGARDLESS OF APPEARANCES, FEELINGS, SUFFERINGS, COMPLEXITIES, TRAUMAS, MYSTERIES, PARADOXES, CONTRADICTIONS, . . . WHATEVER . . .

HE IS GOD and
HE IS GOOD ALL THE TIME and
ALL THE TIME HE IS GOOD and

HE DOES ALL THINGS WELL WHETHER IT LOOKS LIKE THE OPPOSITE OR NOT.

AND WE MAY NEED TO REPENT OF OUR RESENTMENTS, ANGER, BITTERNESS AGAINST GOD. WE MAY NEED TO FORGIVE HIM FOR NOT RUNNING THE UNIVERSE AND OUR LIVES AS OUR PUNY PSEUDO-WISDOM WOULD HAVE DICTATED.

And

HE REALLY IS LOVE
HE REALLY IS HOLY

HE REALLY DOES HAVE OUR *BEST* INTERESTS AT HEART—OUR ETERNAL BEST INTERESTS.

And, He is MUCH MORE interested in our trasnformation, growth, maturity, Salvation, being conformed to the image of His Son

than He is interested in our comfort.

He would that we PROSPER and BE IN HEALTH even

AS OUR SOUL PROSPERS. Big Key.

First things first.

And, sometimes, even with righteous attentive obedient souls . . . suffering is their lot as Apostle Paul demonstrated. There’s some larger eternal goal that has taken priority.

We are not our own. We were bought with an incalculable price

OF CHRIST’S BLOOD.

WE ARE HIS TO SPEND AS HE WISHES, AS HE CHOOSES, AS HIS WISDOM, PRIORITIES AND LOVE DICTATE.

That is, if we have claimed His Salvation through Christ at all and genuinely wish to be His son/daughter.

If we haven’t, we have no claim on hearing from God at all . . . though usually, He is gracious even to horrible sinners . . . trying repeatedly to woo them to His side and to His abundant Life IN CHRIST.

Trouble is, most folks want to live with one foot in the world and one foot ‘in Christ.’

IMPOSSIBLE. Doesn’t work that way.

He requires that we SELL-OUT TO HIM ENTIRELY to the best of our choosing and abilities in walking that out daily and asking for His cleansing and completing that work within us as we cooperated.

The meat of the following video begins about 25-28 minutes into Ugandan Pastor John Mulinde’s sermon . . . he finds out how serious God is about that when God tells him . . . after doing many miracles through him in an intense ministry . . . that if God came for the pastor at that time, that John would NOT BE READY FOR HEAVEN and could not go with him.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t4WSe5tK_2Y

[smvoice]

A BEAUTIFUL AMEN to that, Quix! Just perfectly beautiful

God Bless,

smvoice

[reaganaut]

I used to be Mormon as many, if not most on FR know.

When I was LDS I was taught to pose a question to God through prayer and if I received a ‘burning in the bosom’ then it was God speaking to me and it was a ‘yes’ or ‘true’.

That isn’t how it works, as I learned when I became a Christian.

God speaks to me through his word, the Bible.

However, I have had certain experiences where I have this nagging thought and I do believe that can (isn’t always) God speaking to me through the Holy Ghost.

I powerful example of this happened several years ago. My best friend was visiting us. She grew up athiest and while she asked a few questions she wasn’t really interested in God. I had had a few opportunities in grad school to discuss my faith with her but she was of the mind “that’s ok for you but not for me”.

So, a few years ago, she is spending the weekend with us and all evening Saturday I get this nag “ask her to church”. I kept brushing it off telling myself “she wouldn’t want to go”, “She’s doesn’t believe in God”, “it will freak her out”. I go outside to get something at one point and when I came back in I heard an almost audible voice screaming in my mind “ASK HER!!!”. It startled me. So I turn towards her and ask her if she wanted to go to church with us the next day. She responded with “I don’t have any church clothes with me” and I told her that our church dress was casual and the jeans and shirt she had on would be fine.

I was still really nervous about her response during the service. But it was totally a God thing. I remember praying during the altar call that she wouldn’t be too freaked out. MrR and I were shocked when she answered the altar call. That day she accepted Christ and hasn’t looked back since. It has been amazing to watch her grow as a Christian these last few years. It was a powerful example to me of God’s ways are not my ways and I need to listen to that nagging voice.

Regarding Romney, if he is like most Mormons he will pray about it and get a ‘burning in the bosom’. Quite seriously, he will also probably call SLC and ask the Prophet for advice since they place a high value on the words of their prophet at least while they are living - once they are dead they throw them under the bus if they don’t like what they say.

[Quix]

concentrate on what He might be saying rather than what you want Him to say.

ABSOLUTELY INDEED.

However, I've been in some long desperate dark nights of the soul--extended very fiery furnaces . . .

Where I did my conscious more or less best to hear AND be obedient to The Lord and seemingly experienced mostly silence from God, for many long months.

I can look back and see where in many such situations, I may have been deaf or disobedient or insensitive to His specific directions, instructions . . . but on the whole, at the time, I was earnestly doing my best to hear and obey as well as I could understand it.

And still God seemed to just wait.

One period I prayed 5 hours a day and fasted frequently to seemingly no effect. That was quite discouraging.

Given my childhood and rearing, I REALLY HAVE A VERY HARD TIME when loved ones fail to communicate for whatever reason. It FEELS LIKE a murderous stab to the core of my heart, the core of my being. It feels like the most intense and heartless of insults and trashing dismissals.

It's hard, at those times to understand how The God who insists that we DO UNTO OTHERS . . . and who has infinite empathy . . . could be so 'callous,' so seemingly 'heartless.'

When God Almighty seemed to choose to ignore my earnest pleadings for dialogue . . . or even any hint of anything in my direction, from Him, . . . it was even more devastating on top of the excruciating devastations already plentiful in my life in that period.

It may well be that we have some repenting to do about our own turning A DEAF EAR to others in our lives--even back in childhood to our parents &/or others . . . maybe spouse and/or children.

We may need to repent and ask God to join us in taking the Sword of the Spirit and cutting off all the reaping from our sowing of such deaf earedness. We really do reap what we sow, otherwise.

I don't have all the answers about why God seems to push some of us to the very brink of utter disintegration and non-existence in life as we know it . . . before He sends a glimmer of Hope, a rope, a log in the hurricane.

My only and best explanation is that HE REALLY IS SERIOUS ABOUT CONFORMING US TO THE IMAGE OF HIS SON

THAT

we might BEAR A GREATER WEIGHT OF GLORY THROUGH ALL ETERNITY.

That and . . . that we SIMPLY MUST SUBMIT TO HIM AS GOD--UNRESERVEDLY--WITHOUT ONE PLEA as the hymn goes . . . that we simply must totally and finally without reservation, without fuss, without complaint, without rationalization . . . utterly CAST OURSELVES ON HIS ALTAR, AT HIS FEET for whatever disposition His wisdom and Love direct. . . . even when we have a hard time seeing and feeling Him as being loving.

We have to take His Word on that score on whatever faith we can muster, if nothing else--or else--just to lay that aside and ask Him to show us His Love ASAP . . . . or to otherwise give us some functional, practical glimmer of hope that we can latch onto.

And, sometimes, we simply can's hold on any longer to any of our notions of faith or relationship with him in super desperate moments . . . we may lose our grip and feel that we are sinking into a bottomless abyss. At least we can ASK HIM TO CATCH US SOMEWHERE DOWN THERE IN THE DARK FALLING INTO EMPTINESS.

And, He does. Eventually.

My heart has long gone out to Old Sarge in the midst of obviously great angst, pain, existential suffering. I wish I could touch him and make it all better.

Sometimes, it's tempting to ask God to MAKE SOMEONE ELSE so SPECIAL! LOL. His special assignments can have incredibly "interesting" training, conditioning programs.

They make Marine boot-camp look like a leisurely Sunday picnic.

This whole life is boot-camp. . . . for ruling and reigning with Him.

I don't have pat answers nor solutions for such.

I know reading, trusting His Word . . . is crucial. Being honest with him regularly, throughout the day is crucial.

Pastor has been leading us into PRAYING SCRIPTURE seeking His Presence . . . somewhat a la Madame Guyon . . .

Praying/reading a verse or so of Scripture a word or phrase at a time in meditative attitude . . . with unrecognizable contemplative music in the background maybe . . .

. . . Waiting on God to highlight a word or phrase with HIS PRESENCE . . . as a message of some import direct from Him to meditate and reflect on . . . to receive pics from Him about the word or phrase and His application of the word or phrase in our lives at that moment . . .

It's not something to try and do in 5 minutes. 30 min to an hour or so is more likely to be productive. And, even with the best of attitude and intentions, we may have to go a while to clear all the cobwebs out with confession, repentance, turning off the mental noise of the day etc. . .

to be ready to truly HEAR from Him. Nevertheless, He is faithful . . . and more than likely, will speak to folks who ARE STILL determining to KNOW THAT HE IS GOD.

[Quix]

BLESSED BE THE NAME OF THE LORD.
BLESSED BE THE WORD OF THE LORD.
BLESSED BE THE WAYS OF THE LORD.

BLESSED BE THE FULL PEACABLE ABUNDANT SATURATING LAVISH SALVATION OF THE LORD.

THANKS FOR YOUR KIND REPLY.

Guess I wasn’t done. LOL.

See post #30.

[Quix]

PRAISE GOD

for your finally responding to His Still Small and then not so small voice! LOL.

I’ve had Him yell !STOP! in my mind, just before stepping out in front of a truck I was oblivious to.

[Alamo-Girl]

Thank you for sharing your testimony, dear brother in Christ!

[Quix]

Perhaps you would be willing to share your experiences, exhortations and tips involved with

HEARING GOD??

[editor-surveyor]

God talks to me constantly.

I’m not always listening, and often don’t want to hear what he is saying.

[metmom]

Maybe in that way I pray for myself but I don’t specifically pray for myself because I am such a tiny being compared to God, it would be somewhat rude. But I believe I am significant enough to fit into God’s plan and that is good enough for me!

Good grief, man. EVERYONE is significant to God. He died for them.

Did you know that He placed you in the exact location and time so that it would be easiest for you to find Him?

Acts 17:24-27 24 “The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands. 25 And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else. 26 From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. 27 God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us.

He wants a relationship with each and every one of us, personally and individually.

Don't disparage yourself and your value to God so.

[metmom]

God is always speaking to us. He is the WORD.

We're the ones deficient because we don't take time to listen.

Psalm 19:1-4

1 The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. 2 Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge.

3 There is no speech, nor are there words, whose voice is not heard. 4 Their voice goes out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world.

We all just need ears to hear. God will give us that if only we ask.

God is a God of relationship, not performance.

[Elsie]

How Often Does God Talk to You?

A LOT more than I listen!!

[Elsie]

How Often Does God Talk to You?

How do you know that it is GOD???

You need to listen to the TRUTH!

---

http://www.lds.org/ensign/1973/07/what-is-a-living-prophet?lang=eng

 

 

Snippets follow...

 

 

 

---

 

It is an easy thing to believe in the dead prophets. Many people do. For some mysterious reason there is an aura of credibility about them. It is not so with the prophet who lives among us, who must meet life’s everyday challenges. But it is a great thing to believe in the living prophets. Our salvation is contingent upon our belief in a living prophet and adherence to his word. He alone has the right to revelation for the whole Church. His words, above those of any other man, ought to be esteemed and considered by the Church as well as by the world. One day this truth will be understood.

 

 

 

Orson Pratt has said, “The very moment that we set aside the living oracles we set aside the revelations of God. Why? Because the revelations of God command us plainly that we shall harken to the living oracles. Hence, if we undertake to follow the written word, and at the same time do not give heed to the living oracles of God, the written word will condemn us. …” (Journal of Discourses, vol. 7, p. 373.)

 

 

 

It is a privilege to follow the President of the Church.

 

 

 

 

[Elsie]

God doesn’t talk to me anymore.

Cowboy Poetry

by Bill Jones

 

 

 

 

Jake, the rancher, went one day
to fix a distant fence.
The wind was cold and gusty
and the clouds rolled gray and dense.

As he pounded the last staples in
and gathered tools to go,
The temperature had fallen,
the wind and snow began to blow.

When he finally reached his pickup,
he felt a heavy heart.
From the sound of that ignition,
he knew it wouldn't start.

So Jake did what most of us
would do if we had been there.
He humbly bowed his balding head
and sent aloft a prayer.

As he turned the key for the last time,
he softly cursed his luck.
They found him three days later,
frozen stiff in that old truck.

Now Jake had been around in life
and done his share of roaming.
But when he saw Heaven, he was shocked --
it looked just like Wyoming!

Of all the saints in Heaven,
his favorite was St. Peter.
(Now, this line ain't needed
but it helps with rhyme and meter)

So they set and talked a minute or two,
or maybe it was three.
Nobody was keeping' score --
in Heaven time is free.

"I've always heard," Jake said to Pete,
"that God will answer prayer,
But one time I asked for help,
well, he just plain wasn't there."

"Does God answer prayers of some,
and ignore the prayers of others?
That don't seem exactly square --
I know all men are brothers."

"Or does he randomly reply,
without good rhyme or reason?
Maybe, it's the time of day,
the weather or the season."

"Now I ain't trying to act smart,
it's just the way I feel.
And I was wondering', could you tell me --
what the heck's the deal?!"

Peter listened very patiently
and when Jake was done,
There were smiles of recognition,
and he said, "So, you're the one!!"

"That day your truck, it wouldn't start,
and you sent your prayer a flying,
You gave us all a real bad time,
with hundreds of us trying."

"A thousand angels rushed,
to check the status of your file,
But you know, Jake, we hadn't heard
from you in quite a long while."

"And though all prayers are answered,
and God ain't got no quota,
He didn't recognize your voice,
and started a truck in Minnesota."