Hearing His Voice, Part 2

Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good! His faithful love endures forever. Has the Lord redeemed you? Then speak out! Tell other he has redeemed you from your enemies (Psalm 107: 1-2, NLT).

It was a regular Sunday morning, so I thought. Until I rolled over and saw the clock read 5:45 a.m. “Why, Lord?” I thought to myself. “Why are you waking me at this ridiculously early hour on my day off?” Despite my lack of understanding, I rose from my bed, still sleepy-eyed from an interrupted night of sleep and fumbled my way to the bathroom and then into the kitchen to start a pot of coffee. I wasn’t sure why the Lord had woken me so early, but I did know He was calling me to settle into my usual spot to see what He had awaiting me there. As of late, my morning quiet time has been guided by a book that leads its readers through specific scripture in an attempt to improve their knowledge and understanding of key components of the Bible. After spending some time lingering in Genesis, but not really feeling connected, I found myself yearning for the Lord to speak to me more directly about something He had recently put on my heart. Of all things, in a slightly distracted moment, I decided to open my Twitter feed. Yes, I know, it sounds crazy, but there it was. Less than one minute prior to me opening the app on my phone, Beth Moore had shared a tweet about Psalm 107. More on that later.

One night the week prior, I stirred in the night around 2:30 a.m. After multiple attempts to go back to sleep, I felt the Holy Spirit asking me to get up and pray for a specific friend of mine. Once again, not fully understanding why, I found myself awake in the middle of the night, making a cup of tea and settling on my couch with my Bible. Psalm 139 was where I landed and, over the course of the next couple of hours, I prayed aloud and spoke words of His truth and love over my friend and her heart. Before I knew it, I was on Amazon, ordering a bookmark with the words “fearfully and wonderfully made” on it as a reference to the specific Psalm I had been lead to use as a prayer weapon for my friend. Having ordered the gift, I wasn’t sure how the Lord was going to use it, only that I felt led to place the order and then wait to see how He would lead me.

Fast forward from that night to the Sunday morning of Psalm 107. Just prior to opening to the words of Psalm 107, I had paused my quiet time to shower and prepare myself for the day ahead, though I wasn’t quite sure what it would hold. I’d been feeling this pull on my heart to invite this friend to spend some time together. I kept feeling hesitant, as I didn’t want my own desires to lead and direct our time together. I knew I wanted the opportunity to connect, but my prayer was for the Lord to orchestrate, guide, and direct the occasion.

Cue the concept of voice recognition.

I was struggling between hearing my own voice, fighting the voice of the enemy that was attempting to keep me from obedience, and adhering to the voice of the Lord as He was leading me to reach out. Without proper training in voice recognition, I may have succumbed to the tricks of the enemy. But, thankfully, as a result of prior training and forming good spiritual habits of prayer, quiet time, and reflection, in addition to His words in Psalm 107, I was able to quiet the competing voices and heed the prompting of the Holy Spirit. As I flipped to the pages of Psalms in my Bible and began reading aloud, Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good! His faithful love endures forever. Has the Lord redeemed you? Then speak out! Tell others he has redeemed you from your enemies. Those few verses spoke directly to my heart. What a beautiful command from the Lord to speak out about His goodness in my life. I immediately thought to myself, “Yes, Lord. I will follow your lead and step out in obedience.”

Moments later, as I was processing what I had just read, my eyes were drawn to my bookcase on the opposite wall. Immediately, I remembered a book I had read over a year prior that had been instrumental in helping me better understand and overcome a personal battle. “Share the book with her,” I heard Him say. Not audibly, of course, but in my spirit, because of my trained voice recognition, I felt confident it was the Lord. Then a light bulb when off, and I immediately exclaimed, “That’s why I bought the bookmark!! Thank you, Lord.” Before I knew it, the Lord had strung together multiple individual moments to create the perfect package of confirmation in regard to my decision to step out in obedience.

I just love how God works. He is an amazing Father, and this is just one such example of how vital it is for our spiritual journey that we train ourselves in the area of voice recognition. It takes time, repetition, prayer, support, and encouragement to train our brains to hear His voice and follow in obedience. But friends, when we do, it is such a wonderful gift to experience the Lord in those ways. And that gift, once it is received, is something you will never want to turn away from.

Though He can speak to our hearts in an unimaginable amount of ways, there really is something special about sharing a quiet space with the Lord. I used to struggle with this. I always felt like I had to have a set amount of time or a perfectly prepared space, but I have only recently come to understand that mindset as a lie from the enemy intended to keep me from engaging with the Lord and learning to hear His voice. If you’re like me, maybe He will meet you on your couch in the middle of the night or in the wee hours of the morning in your Jesus chair. Life is busy, and we all have different things competing for our attention and time. I know it can be so difficult trying to carve out the time, but I implore you to pray about where God may be calling you to meet with Him.

Don’t allow the enemy to convince you that a large chunk of time or a perfectly prepared spot is necessary. Rather, remind yourself that you need only to come to Him with an open ear, prepared to hear His voice and a heart open to experiencing blessings from the Lord in a way you never have before. And, as it states in Psalm 107, when the Lord redeems you and changes your heart, be prepared to speak out and watch as He works in and through you to positively impact the lives of so many others.