How Do I Recognise the Voice of God?
God communicates to us by his Holy Spirit into our hearts. The question that is often asked is “How do I recognise the voice of God? What does it sound like?”
Now that is not as strange as you first may think. Often emotions, feelings, thoughts and inclinations are constantly bombarding our minds and the noise of life drowns out the voice of God. It is hard to distinguish what is God and what is not.
Added to this many other voices come with conflicting information. Ideas, philosophies, theologies and perspectives that have been cultivated in personal experience and historical beliefs. You might think this is not possible, but even Jesus was faced with the same situation. When asked by the religious leaders of the time what were the requirements to live forever? He said them, “You know the Law, how do you read it?” For Jesus knew that how each of us interprets words and writings feeds the core beliefs of our lives and these core beliefs make up our heart.
For our innermost heart is our core belief system. It is our sub-conscious deep rooted beliefs that we build our lives and thoughts on. It is where our spirit, soul and body meet. Our heart is the garden of our all we value and treasure. And it is in the heart where we cultivate our beliefs to filter and interpret the Holy Spirit.
So what does the voice of the Holy Spirit sound like? Well, it sounds exactly the same as the fruit it produces. For from the root of the tree it produces the fruit of its branches. Therefore we can know and recognise the voice of God because he speaks to us in and through the fruit of the Holy Spirit.
“But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. There is no law against these things.” – Galatians 5: 22-23.
These fruits are alive in our new creation spirit and it is with these fruits that God speaks into our core belief system (our hearts).And this means that we can recognise the voice of God because when God speaks to us:-He is faithful to His word.
His voice produces peace and not confusion.
His voice and leading will bring freedom not bondage.
God is patient, not impulsive or hasty.
His voice will always leave us with hope, not discouragement or oppression.
His voice instils confidence, not fear or intimidation.
His voice makes us know our identity in Him, rather than pride.
His voice is full of love, not condemnation.
Amazing Grace
“In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace that he lavished on us” – Ephesians 1 :7-8
Grace is the unmerited, unearned and undeserved favour of God in Christ Jesus, a person not a doctrine nor a teaching but someone who died, rose and is now seated at the right hand of the Father who is continually and consistently praying and advocating for us.
It means grace comes to us when we fail, disobey, doubt, rant and rave, rebel, struggle, crash and burn! He comes to us and calls us His own. Grace is love for the unlovely, acceptance for the unacceptable, friendship with the unfriendly. Grace comes to us with empowering power when we are hopeless failures because when we are hopeless failures we need it the most.
In that place of feeling a failure and feeling so far from God, right at that moment when we are simply desperately we need it the most. Grace whispers in our heart . “I love you right now, as you are and where you are. I love you, I love you, I love you.” It is unbelievable and it is transforming. It brings amazing value and joy to realise that God loves us and accepts us and speaks to us, is close to us, even in the midst of our failures.
Grace is the God who defends us, grace is the love that vindicates us, grace is the freedom from our oppression, and grace is the deliverance from our captivity.
Grace calls us the Father’s beloved child. Grace sees Christ alive in us and accepts us into the Father’s embrace. Grace says that God in Jesus entered into the world not to condemn the world but to shower us with his love. His eternal desire was that we would know his delight.
Even at our lowest point, grace reaches down and lifts us up. Grace is given to us every moment. And when we choose to embrace grace something amazing happens. We are released into newness of life.
Grace is an inexplicable sense of beauty or a river of delight that flows through our minds, only experienced as we release ourselves to be captivated by the goodness of God and the magnificence of Jesus Christ. It is what happens when we make ourselves available to be filled with God’s unconditional love and surround ourselves with the promises of God.
Grace sees Jesus Christ as the perfect gift of God given to us as a free gift to explode in our hearts with the glory and light of heaven. Grace is God’s boundless and relentless abundant provision given to me. It is God releasing the riches of heaven into my heart.
I can know it, I can walk on it, I can experience it, because grace is a person who is Jesus Christ and he is now alive inside me by the Holy Spirit.
All I have to do is reach out and embrace grace and walk through its open door in the fullness of God provided and given to me.
Prism of Grace 