CAN'T YOU TALK LOUDER, GOD? (Shultz) Ch 14-19

CAN’T YOU TALK LOUDER, GOD?

Secrets to Hearing the Voice of God

Chapters 14 -19

By Steve Shultz – Destiny Image Publising, 2007

(All bullets are quotes from the book unless otherwise noted.)

SATURDAY, November 29

How Good Do I Have to Be to Hear God’s Voice?

Luke 15:4-7  MSG

Suppose one of you had a hundred sheep and lost one. Wouldn’t you leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness and go after the lost one until you found it? 

• ·       When you feel unworthy or disqualified – when you are beating yourself up – you tend not to have hearing ears.
• ·       Four part Sheep Analogy: 1. We all hear His voice because we are His sheep; 2. No one is good, not even one of us; 3. All we, just like sheep, have gone astray; 4. God goes after every single ‘lost’ sheep.

            We will NEVER be good enough or holy enough or pure enough…..for anything.  But God talks to us anyway.  God loves us anyway.   It’s how he draws us into the fold.  It’s how God finds us when we wander.  Therefore, God is talking to us long before we even realize, perhaps, that God exists!  That’s comforting!  We don’t have to earn the right to hear God.  Jesus did that for us.  We don’t have to score high on the ‘good meter’ to merit a conversation with God.  It can happen at anytime, or all the time, and it does. 

SUNDAY, November 30

How Bad Do I Have to Be for God to Stop Talking to Me?

James 3:17 MSG

Real wisdom, God’s wisdom, begins with a holy life and is characterized by getting along with others. It is gentle and reasonable, overflowing with mercy and blessings, not hot one day and cold the next, not two-faced.

• I have an answer for this often-asked question – really bad.  In fact, really, REALLY bad!

            God will always be available to talk…no matter what we do wrong.  The Bible is God speaking in written form.  We can always read.  Jesus spent most of his time with sinners, talking to them.  God desperately wants to spend that kind of time with us – just chatting, being in relationship.  The God that Jesus represents is not a God of harsh judgment, but a forgiving God….over and over again.  Like the Prodigal Son, we can come back, again and again, with humility and seeking forgiveness.  God will be there, waiting for that prayer date. May we keep the date regularly.  

May the light of God illumine the heart of my soul. 

May the flame of Christ kindle me to love. 

May the fire of the Spirit free me to live this day.

 (Celtic Benediction - Newell)

MONDAY, December 1

Dreams – A Way to Hear God’s Voice

Proverbs 3:12 MSG

But don’t, dear friend, resent God’s discipline;
    don’t sulk under his loving correction.
It’s the child he loves that God corrects;
    a father’s delight is behind all this.

            I found this a more difficult chapter.  The author writes of first hand experience in prophetic dreams, of the attempts to ruin America from the inside through soap operas destroying marriages, and the need to pray for the safety of our leaders.  Quite the collection of thoughts, no?  The Proverbs scripture is the only one mentioned in the chapter. 

            But perhaps the important point is this: God does speaks in dreams.  It didn’t just happened to Joseph or Jacob thousands of years ago.  Especially if we are in direct communication with God on a daily basis and ask God to use our dreams to speak to us, we might find it more likely to hear God.  Sometimes the timing of our dreams is the key. 

            I recently awoke early in the morning with a distinct feeling that I needed to pray for a particular individual and his family.  I did so, knowing only that he was struggling with terminal cancer.  Was this the turning point in his long fight?  Did he lapse into a coma that morning?  I don’t know.  I do know he passed away 3 days later.     

            Totally off the subject….during my walk on the beach yesterday, I came upon a series of labyrinths that had been drawn in the sand, complete with an arrow for START here!  I immediately entered.  I wound my way to the center and began to pray my way back out.  I discovered the labyrinth had no way out!  I wondered if this was a ‘Thessalonian’ Labyrinth, the ‘pray without ceasing’ kind as you couldn’t stop!!  That made me consider the Celtic Knot designs we have been using to construct prayer drawings.  The knots are an unending, continuous flow of pattern which supports the Celtic belief that life should be filled with unending prayer.    

            I’ll close with the Celtic Benediction from last night:  May the grace of heaven’s vastness be mine to renew my soul in sleep, to enlighten my dreams in the night, to open my spirit to eternity until the angels of light awaken me.   (Celtic Benediction - Newell)

TUESDAY, December 2

When They Tell You God Doesn’t Speak Today

Jeremiah 31:33-34 MSG

 I will put my law within them—write it on their hearts!—and be their God. ……They’ll know me firsthand, the dull and the bright, the smart and the slow. 

• If you believe that God speaks or even MAY speak, then maybe He will speak to you. 
• There are voices, impressions, and clues God has been giving to you, but you’ve been ignoring them.  It’s not that God is now going to start to speak for the first time….It’s that you’re going to start to listen for the first time to what God has been saying to you all along.

            Sometimes we have to shed some of our old habits in order to focus on something new.  We have to take off the gloves, change our glasses, or disregard tradition to ‘boldly go’ into the unknown realm of God.  God isn’t going to change, but we are!  That can be a little exciting, but it can also be a little scary! 

            What is holding me back?  What is limiting my ability to see and hear God  all the time and in everything around me?   Is God speaking through friends in my midst?  As I enter into the Advent Season, how might I use this time of preparation to be ready to recognize God’s voice?  

On this Giving Tuesday, I’ll close with these lines from my morning Celtic Prayer:  As I have received so free me to give.  As I have been granted, so may I give….I have know people pregnant with your spirit of generosity.  Let these be guides to me this day.  Amen.  (Celtic Benediction - Newell)

WEDNESDAY, December 3  Debugging the Prophetic

1 Corinthians 14:3 VOICE

 But a person who has the gift of prophecy teaches in a way that builds up the community, draws them near, and comforts them.

• There are many kinds of prophetic ‘downloads’; ….no one form of delivery that can be discerned as from God.
• Most prophecy is meant to build up and strengthen and encourage.
• Very few prophesy over both individuals and nations equally.
• The difference between a psychic and a prophet can be stated according to three factors: source, certainty, simple obedience.
• If you receive a bad dream…pray that the dream will not come true in the way you saw it.  Simply act on your dream in prayer.
• Sometimes when you least think you’re hearing God’s voice, you are hearing Him the most, because you are following your gut instinct, your sixth sense, or your faith, in other words.

            In many ways, author Shultz uses this chapter for the ‘nuts and bolts’ questions about prophesy and prophets, about those who hear God’s voice in an active way.  While he responds to a dozen common questions, I am going to focus on just three areas:  the goal of prophesy, acting on bad dreams, and our sixth sense.

            Shultz quotes 1 Corinthians 14:3 as the ultimate goal of prophesy: to encourage and support.  Use your gift to build up those around you, not to highlight the sins of others (remember the sin in your own eye first!!)  If I think I received a message from God that is supportive, share it!  That is probably God’s intent.  One day recently as I was walking home I decided I would seek a collection of God-texts from the ‘city’ (having already finished alphabets on the beach and in the mountains).  I only found a handful of letters, but when I got home and looked closer, I discovered I could spell Affirm Others.  That message has stuck with me.  God speaking?  I think so…in MY language. 

            Secondly, bad dreams can sometimes be God’s request to pray against a certain situation.  When we receive a message from God that seems disastrous, our best response is to pray AGAINST the event from happening.  Perhaps we aren’t the only one to experience that dream.  God listens to the collective prayers of the people.

            Our gut instinct or sixth sense just might not be OUR thoughts, but God intervening in our mind.  That is a type of prophesy that operates on faith alone.  It is common and just as valid as ‘hearing God’s voice’. 

Let me be learning to trust the darkness and to seek its subtle blessings.

Let me be learning the night’s way of seeing that in all things I may trace the mystery of your presence.  Amen.  (Celtic Benediction - Newell)

THURSDAY, December 4

When the Tree Fell – Parting Comments

            Shultz concludes his book with a personal account from a reader of a time when God spoke through actions in answer to prayers several years earlier.  It was a good reminder of ‘God-time’.  We can easily think God is absent or silent because responses or voices are not forthcoming on OUR time schedule.  Learning to trust and operate by God’s watch can free us to fully function within the Kingdom of God.

            Shultz had one final ‘tidbit’ that I gleaned from his list of resources.  He was promoting a CD set that championed the concept of grace.  Still working on my list of One Thousands graces, the word caught my eye, but the concept was even more reassuring:

            God calls us to boldly come before the Throne of Grace.  It is not called the Throne of Judgment. 

            May I recognize and receive the grace of God in the abundant measure that frees me to fully hear God speaking in my world today.  May I have the trust and strength to act upon God’s messages.  God is speaking to ALL of us in a variety of languages.  May we all learn to listen more attentively.