The Lord God called . . . “Where are you?” Genesis 3:9
M y young son loves to hear my voice, except when I call his name loudly and sternly, followed by the question, “Where are you?” When I do that, I am usually calling for him because he has been into some mischief and is trying to hide from me. I want my son to listen to my voice because I’m concerned about his well-being and do not want him to get hurt.
Adam and Eve were used to hearing God’s voice in the garden. However, after they disobeyed Him by eating the forbidden fruit, they hid from Him when they heard Him calling, “Where are you?” (Gen. 3:9). They didn’t want to face God because they knew they had done something wrong—something He had told them not to do (v. 11).
When God called for Adam and Eve and found them in the garden, His words did include correction and consequence (vv. 13–19). But God also showed them kindness and gave them hope for mankind in the promise of the Savior (v. 15).
God doesn’t have to look for us. He knows where we are and what we are trying to hide. But as a loving Father, He wants to speak to our hearts and bring us forgiveness and restoration. He longs for us to hear His voice—and to listen.
Yes, my soul, find rest in God; my hope comes from him. Psalm 62:5
God’s will is sometimes hard to follow. He asks us to do the right things. He calls us to endure hardship without complaining; to love awkward people; to heed the voice inside us that says, You mustn’t; to take steps we’d rather not take. So, we must tell our souls all day long: “Hey soul, listen up. Be silent: Do what Jesus is asking you to do.”
“My soul waits in silence for God alone” (Psalm 62:1 nasb). “My soul, wait in silence for God alone” (62:5 nasb). The verses are similar, but different. David says something about his soul; then says something to his soul. “Waits in silence” addresses a decision, a settled state of mind. “Wait in silence” is David stirring his soul to remember that decision.
David determines to live in silence—quiet submission to God’s will. This is our calling as well, the thing for which we were created. We’ll be at peace when we’ve agreed: “Not my will, but yours be done” (Luke 22:42). This is our first and highest calling when we make Him Lord and the source of our deepest pleasure. “I desire to do your will,” the psalmist said (Psalm 40:8).
We must always ask for God’s help, of course, for our “hope comes from him” (62:5). When we ask for His help, He delivers it. God never asks us to do anything He won’t or can’t do.
First, if we’re going to hear from God, we need to be listening for God.
No one modeled this better than Jesus.
Jesus modeled silence, solitude, and stillness as a way to hear from God. He often climbed mountains, away from the crowds, to be strengthened, encouraged, and empowered by his Father. It’s hard to hear if you’re not listening, and even Jesus took time to step away from the chaos of disciples, miracles, and teachings to listen to his Father.
In our world of noise, we need to do the same thing. Church tradition offers what has been coined “silence and solitude” as a Christian practice that encourages us and helps us hear from God.
For me, this often looks like sitting in the woods for a few hours without anything but my heart, mind, soul, and a journal. I pray for a bit. I think and allow my thoughts to wander a bit. I listen to the sounds of the birds and the creaking trees. I write down phrases I feel God is developing in the quietness of my heart. And when it’s too cold, I sit in a chair in my bedroom looking out of the window, following this same routine.
But silence and solitude don’t mean we have to find a completely silent place (for many—like me in my house with three kids ages 12 and under—this is impossible). It could mean getting into a space with limited or no distractions and no devices.
We can find a place where we can close our eyes, take a few deep breaths, and simply listen.
Second, sometimes it’s wisest to wait.
Sometimes when God hasn’t spoken yet, it means we are supposed to wait.
About 12 years ago, I was accepted to a position for a company, but I also had to fundraise my salary. Fundraising can take a while, but in my desperation to get going for God, I quit my other job—the one that, you know, paid me. It was one of the dumbest decisions I’ve ever made! It took another 8 months for enough money to come in. My family and I barely made it, and all of that was unnecessary.
Looking back, God never told me to quit my job. I do think God led me to the new position, but he was quiet when it came to the question of timing. Instead of waiting for him to either a) bring in the money or b) say, “Okay, now is the time,” I dove into the shallow end of the pool and found out it was empty.
If you get to a decision-making moment and don’t feel “clear” about it yet, be encouraged that God is with you in your decision-making. But if you have time, follow the advice of the Ents in Lord of the Rings, “Don’t be hasty.”
As a wise mentor once told me, “all you can do is make the best decision with the information you have in front of you knowing that later you may look back with more information and see that it wasn’t the right one.” And that’s where it is such a joy to follow Jesus! Even if you make a mistake, we serve a God that can redeem mistakes, and even use those unfortunate moments for his glory and our good (like he did when I quit my job and he still took care of my family).
“Samuel did not yet know the Lord: The word of the Lord had not yet been revealed to him.” — 1 Samuel 3:7
Samuel heard a voice call his name, but he did not know it was God who was speaking. He had to be told by Eli that it was the Lord (1 Samuel 3:9). In the same way, although God may be speaking to us, we may not know that it’s His voice. So we need to learn how to recognize His voice. We can’t do that if we don’t know how He speaks. And how would we know how God speaks unless we know who He is and what He’s like?
The passage says that Samuel didn’t know the Lord then because the word of the Lord wasn’t revealed to him yet. That tells us that knowing God’s Word is crucial to knowing God Himself.
The Bible says, “All Scripture is God-breathed” (2 Timothy 3:16). The Bible is God’s revelation of Himself to us in writing, His primary means of showing Himself and His ways to us. So if we want to understand and know Him well (Jeremiah 9:24, ESV), we have to understand and know Scripture well.
The more I get into God’s Word, the more it helps me to know God better—what His character and His ways are like. I get a more complete picture of who He is, and that allows me to recognize His voice more clearly.
So if I hear a voice that prompts me to indulge in lust or envy or pride or selfishness or hatred, I know it’s definitely not Him speaking, because the Lord exercises and delights in kindness, justice and righteousness (Jeremiah 9:24). It cannot be God’s voice because it would be contrary to His character, which is compassionate, gracious, patient, loving, faithful, forgiving, and just (Exodus 34:5-7).
When I hear a voice that tells me to obey the Father’s commands and reveal His heart to others (John 15:10, Matthew 5:16), to love the Son and walk as He did (John 14:15, 1 John 1:7), to grow in the fruit and gifts of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22-23, Romans 12:6-8; 1 Corinthians 12:8-10), then I recognize that it’s clearly God speaking to me because it’s consistent with who He says He is in His Word. The Bible is our plumb line to discern how He speaks.
God can also speak in a variety of other ways. For example, He can speak to us in an audible voice; in His still, small voice, like a gentle whisper in our heart (1 Kings 19:11-13); through the people around us (Acts 21:11); in dreams (Genesis 40); through nature (Romans 1:20); in visions (Acts 9:10-18); in prophecies (Acts 11:27-28); through circumstances (Acts 16:6-7); and through miraculous events, among many others.
However, unless we are grounded in our understanding of what God and His ways are like through reading the Bible, we would not be able to accurately interpret these other forms in which He might speak to us. Just like how we would tend to misinterpret what a person does or says when we don’t truly understand his or her character, we’d be more likely to misinterpret God’s voice and actions if we don’t know what He’s really like.
Jesus said, “My sheep know Me” (John 10:14). We have to know the Shepherd so that we know what His voice sounds like. And to know Jesus, the Word of God (Revelation 19:13), we need to know the Bible, God’s Word.
My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. John 10:27
I’m hard of hearing—“deaf in one ear and can’t hear out of the other,” as my father used to say. So I wear a set of hearing aids.
Most of the time the devices work well, except in environments where there’s a lot of surrounding noise. In those settings, my hearing aids pick up every voice in the room and I cannot hear the person in front of me.
So it is with our culture: a cacophony of sounds can drown out God’s quiet voice. “Where shall the Word be found, where will the Word resound?” poet T.S. Eliot asks. “Not here, there is not enough silence.”
Fortunately, my hearing aids have a setting that cuts out the surrounding sounds and enables me to hear only the voices I want to hear. In the same way, despite the voices around us, if we quiet our souls and listen, we will hear God’s “still small voice” (1 Kings 19:11–12 nkjv).
He speaks to us every day, summoning us in our restlessness and our longing. He calls to us in our deepest sorrow and in the incompleteness and dissatisfaction of our greatest joys.
But primarily God speaks to us in His Word (1 Thessalonians 2:13). As you pick up His book and read it, you too will hear His voice. He loves you more than you can ever know, and He wants you to hear what He has to say.
I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me. John 10:14
One year for vacation Bible school, Ken’s church decided to bring in live animals to illustrate the Scripture. When he arrived to help, Ken was asked to bring a sheep inside. He had to practically drag the wooly animal by a rope into the church gymnasium. But as the week went on, it became less reluctant to follow him. By the end of the week, Ken didn’t have to hold the rope anymore; he just called the sheep and it followed, knowing it could trust him.
In the New Testament, Jesus compares Himself to a shepherd, stating that His people, the sheep, will follow Him because they know His voice (John 10:4). But those same sheep will run from a stranger or thief (v. 5). Like sheep, we (God’s children) get to know the voice of our Shepherd through our relationship with Him. And as we do, we see His character and learn to trust Him.
As we grow to know and love God, we’ll be discerning of His voice and better able to run from the “the thief [who] comes only to steal and kill and destroy” (v. 10)—from those who try to deceive and draw us away from Him. Unlike those false teachers, we can trust the voice of our Shepherd to lead us to safety.
I commit you to God and to the word of his grace, which can build you up and give you an inheritance among all those who are sanctified. – Acts 20:32
After years of research, scientists have learned that wolves have distinct voices that help them communicate with each other. Using a specific sound analysis code, one scientist realized that various volumes and pitches in a wolf’s howl enabled her to identify specific wolves with 100 percent accuracy.
The Bible provides many examples of God recognizing the distinct voices of His beloved creations. He called Moses by name and spoke to him directly (Exodus 3:4–6). The psalmist David proclaimed, “I call out to the Lord, and he answers me from his holy mountain” (Psalm 3:4). The apostle Paul also emphasized the value of God’s people recognizing His voice.
When bidding farewell to the Ephesian elders, Paul said the Spirit had “compelled” him to head to Jerusalem. He confirmed his commitment to follow God’s voice, though he didn’t know what to expect upon his arrival (Acts 20:22). The apostle warned that “savage wolves” would “arise and distort the truth,” even from within the church (vv. 29–30). Then, he encouraged the elders to remain diligent in discerning God’s truth (v. 31).
All believers in Jesus have the privilege of knowing that God hears and answers us. We also have the power of the Holy Spirit who helps us recognize God’s voice, which is always in alignment with the words of Scripture.
Samuel said, “Speak, for your servant is listening.” – 1 Samuel 3:10
I felt like I was underwater, sounds muffled and muted by a cold and allergies. For weeks I struggled to hear clearly. My condition made me realize how much I take my hearing for granted.
Young Samuel in the temple must have wondered what he was hearing as he struggled out of sleep at the summons of his name (1 Sam. 3:4). Three times he presented himself before Eli, the high priest. Only the third time did Eli realize it was the Lord speaking to Samuel. The word of the Lord had been rare at that time (v. 1), and the people were not in tune with His voice. But Eli instructed Samuel how to respond (v. 9).
The Lord speaks much more now than in the days of Samuel. The letter to the Hebrews tells us, “In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets . . . but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son” (1:1–2). And in Acts 2 we read of the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost (vv. 1–4), who guides us in the things Christ taught us (John 16:13). But we need to learn to hear His voice and respond in obedience. Like me with my cold, we may hear as if underwater. We need to test what we think is the Lord’s guidance with the Bible and with other mature Christians. As God’s beloved children, we do hear His voice. He loves to speak life into us.
Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send?” . . . I said, “Here am I. Send me!” Isaiah 6:8
When Swedish missionary Eric Lund felt called by God to go to Spain to do mission work in the late 1890s, he immediately obeyed. He saw little success there, but persevered in his conviction of God’s calling. One day, he met a Filipino man, Braulio Manikan, and shared the gospel with him. Together, Lund and Manikan translated the Bible into a local Philippine language, and later they started the first Baptist mission station in the Philippines. Many would turn to Jesus—all because Lund, like the prophet Isaiah, responded to God’s call.
In Isaiah 6:8, God asked for a willing person to go to Israel to declare His judgment for the present and hope for the future. Isaiah volunteered boldly: “Here am I. Send me!” He didn’t think he was qualified, for he’d confessed earlier: “I am a man of unclean lips” (v. 5). But he responded willingly because he’d witnessed God’s holiness, recognized his own sinfulness, and received His cleansing (vv. 1–7).
Is God calling you to do something for Him? Are you holding back? If so, remember all God has done through Jesus’ death and resurrection. He’s given us the Holy Spirit to help and guide us (John 14:26; 15:26–27), and He’ll prepare us to answer His call. Like Isaiah, may we respond, “Send me!”
All believers in Jesus have the privilege of knowing that God hears and answers us. We also have the power of the Holy Spirit who helps us recognize God’s voice, which is always in alignment with the words of Scripture.
