Here we are in the fifth month of the Year of the Local Church. It is also the Year of Divine Healing, Divine Heath, Divine Prosperity and Divine Recovery. Whatever the devil has stolen from you must be returned sevenfold. No matter what is happening in your life right now, let’s stand in faith for a demonstration of God’s goodness.
Thank you for continuing to stay faithful and committed to EMIC. Pastor Terri and I pray for you every day, believing that God, who is your Source and your Provider, will bless you, and keep you safe and protected as you seek Him first in everything you do. We also ask that He meet every need you have, and give you the desires of your heart, according to His WORD and will for you.
Our God is not keeping back anything from us. Psalm 84:11, Amplified Bible, Classic Edition, says, “For The LORD God is a Sun and Shield; The LORD bestows [present] grace and favor and [future] glory (honor, splendor, and heavenly bliss)! No good thing will He withhold from those who walk uprightly.” Most importantly, He is not withholding His voice.
I have really been seeking The LORD lately about hearing His voice more accurately. I want to be led by the Spirit in everything I do. And I know that’s your desire as well.
According to John 10:11, Jesus is our Good Shepherd. It says, “I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd gives his life for the sheep.” He repeats this phrase in verse 14: “I am the good shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine.”
John 10:3-5, New King James Version, is very clear about hearing His voice: “To him the door- keeper opens, and the sheep HEAR his voice; and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. And when he brings out his own sheep, he goes before them; and the sheep follow him, for they KNOW his voice. Yet they will by no means follow a stranger, but will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of strangers.” Verse 16 says, “They will HEAR My voice.” And verse 27 declares, “My sheep HEAR My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me.”
Some years ago, I was reading through John 10, and thinking about the voice of the Good Shepherd. Suddenly, this phrase came to me and I have been confessing it ever since:
I hear the voice of the Good Shepherd, and a stranger’s voice, I shall not follow.
Say that out loud several times, then begin to believe for the ability to hear the voice of The LORD.
Some might say, “But the voice of The LORD is only reserved for special ministers. I have never heard His voice and I never will.”
Wait a minute! Stop that kind of talk!
You and I were created by God to hear His voice. Proverbs 20:12 says, “The hearing ear
and the seeing eye, The LORD has made them both.” Mankind was designed to hear God’s
voice from the very beginning. Precedent was set with Adam and Eve. Genesis 1:28 says, “God BLESSED them, and God SAID unto them….” In Genesis 3:8, “they HEARD the voice of The LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day.”
In Psalm 40:6, AMPC, the psalmist writes, “You have given me the capacity TO HEAR and obey.”
Psalm 85:8 is a great verse to confess: “I WILL HEAR what God The LORD will speak: for he will speak peace unto his people, and to his saints.” The AMPC says, “I will listen [with expectancy] to what God The LORD will say, for He will speak peace to His people, to His saints (those who are in right standing with Him).” Hearing God’s voice begins with a decision of faith to receive what we were originally created to have.
The voice of The LORD is manifested in different ways.
There is the voice of the written WORD. Proverbs 4:20-22, The Message, tells us, “Dear friend, listen well to my words; tune your ears to my voice.” We develop an ear for God’s voice by reading what He has already written.
There is the voice of the inward witness. Romans 8:14, NKJV, says, “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God.” The primary way God leads us is by the voice of the inward witness. It is the still, small voice on the inside that guides, directs and points us in the right direction.
There is also the voice of the fivefold ministry. Romans 10:14 says, “How shall they hear without a preacher?” In Luke 24:32, the disciples said about the recently resurrected Jesus, “Did not our heart burn within us, while he talked to us by the way, and while he opened to us the scriptures?” That is a major reason why we attend church. The pastor is a gift to the Body of Christ—as well as the prophet, apostle, teacher and evangelist. They hear from God, and speak for God.
The Apostle Paul put it this way in 1 Thessalonians 2:13, AMPC: “And we also [especially] thank God continually for this, that when you received the message of God [which you heard] from us, you welcomed it not as the word of [mere] men, but as it truly is, The WORD of God.”
Say this out loud right now: “LORD, You created me to hear Your voice. You have given me the capacity to hear You. I hear the voice of the Good Shepherd, and a stranger’s voice I shall not follow. I will hear with expectancy what You have to say. I hear Your voice in the written WORD, as I am led by the Spirit and through the fivefold ministry.”
As Samuel said in 1 Samuel 3:10, “Speak, LORD, for Your servant is listening!”
Hearing The LORD with you,
Pastor George
