God still speaks today by the Holy Spirit through His written Word, through His anointed servants, and through such supernatural means as dreams, visions, inward assurance. Divine Providence, or circumstance. God never speaks to us in any subjective experience in contradiction to His written Word.

All such experience must be judged by and agree with Holy Scripture. We need to open our hearts to receive the word of the Lord not only from the Bible, but through the other channels by which God speaks.

a) Listen To His Voice

The seven times repeated warning in Revelation 2 and 3 is for us to heed in this day: "He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches. "Note the use of the present continuous tense saith, meaning "to hear what the Spirit says and continues to say."

How Does The Mustard Seed Grow? This same tense is used by Jesus in Matthew 4:4: "...Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth [present continuous tense] out of the mouth of God. " We live not only by what God said in His written Word, but by the word that (present tense) ' proceeds and continues to proceed out of the mouth of God. " We walk in life by hearing and obeying the proceeding word of the Lord by whatever means He chooses to speak that word to us. When we refuse to accept that God can speak to us through other than the written pages of the Bible, we may cut ourselves off from communication with Him, and spiritual death begins to set in.

b) Don't Refuse His Voice.

When God spoke to the Israelites, Hebrews 12:19 points out that "...they that heard [the voice of words] is treated that the word should not be spoken to them any more... " When they rejected the voice of God, they lost faith and they were shut up under law.

Hebrews 12:25 therefore warns: "See that you do not refuse him who is speaking [present continuous tense]. For if they did not escape when they refused him who warned them on earth, much less shall we escape if we reject him who warns from heaven. " Many today are bordering on this very danger of refusing " Him that speaketh " (the suffix "eth" means "speaks and continues to speak"). Some teach that the days of miracles are past. They're trying to live by what God said, and refusing to hear what He is saying. So they've rejected the God of miracles. Such as these will abide in undeveloped faith because they try to bring the Scriptures down to their experience rather than their experience up to the Scriptures. If we are going to grow in faith, our hearts and our ears must be open to Him.

We must believe that the word of the Lord can come to us today. We must accept guidance by the Spirit's voice, and in accord with the Scriptures which communicate His will to us. If we do not refuse His voice (like the children of Israel), but hear it and obey it, faith will be increased in our lives. 

c) Be Ready For His Voice.

Now we needn't strain to hear His voice. We need not go through all kinds of ritual and ceremony for God to speak to us. God can and often does speak to us when we are least expecting it. One of the most important words of the Lord to me came one morning in New Mexico. It was in a restroom, while I was bending over the basin to wash my hands and face for breakfast! Suddenly, God's voice came to me. On another occasion I was leaving a Sunday morning service. My mind was thinking about the trip home. Unexpectedly, God gave me a "word of wisdom" for a member of the church which resolved
a serious problem in her life.

d) Tune In To His Voice.

There is the capacity in God to speak to us through His Holy Spirit direct from Heaven. And there is in us the capacity to hear through our spirit when He speaks. Paul refers to man as spirit, soul and body (I Thes 5:23). The spirit is that inward
part of man that is God-conscious. The soul (intellect, will and emotions) is that inward part of man that is self-conscious. The body (responding through the senses) is that part of us that makes us world-conscious. So, then, because we are a spirit
and God is a spirit, we can have communication. For example, a room is filled with hundreds of sound signals beamed out from radio and television stations. But we can't hear them unless we turn on a radio or TV set. As soon as we tune the set to the station, those sounds are transmitted into something audible or visible. In the same way, we can "tune in" to God and receive His signals, some of which are audible and visible!

Faith comes by hearing God's word, obeying what you've heard out of a heart of love for him. Let us stir up our faith , and make it grow by continually practicing these principles: HEAR! OBEY! LOVE! SAY !
By Ralph Mohoney
World MAP