PREPARE TO WORK
Most people who believe that God exists would say that they desire to have an intimate relationship with him. But then, having said that, their efforts to pursue God occur primarily in public settings (e.g. church, synagogue, Bible studies, prayer meetings, conferences, etc.) These practices are right and reasonable according to religious traditions, but they are in conflict with what God says about seeking him in their heart.
The principle of seeking God in our heart is best pursued in diligent, consistent, quiet study of the Bible. This was the practice of the Bereans who examined (i.e. carefully studied) scripture daily.
Learning how to hear God’s Voice is not for people who follow a casual approach to learning about God. It is not as simple as going to church, reading a book, going to a Bible study, doing daily devotions, or even reading your way through the Bible in a year. These are all casual, legalistic, religious approaches to learning about God. Indeed you may learn a little bit if you do these things, but those approaches will never take you to the unsearchable depths of knowing God that serious, discipleship study enables.
STUDY TIP: See TWO KINDS OF KNOWLEDGE for more about how to know God intimately.
Most religious people sincerely want to know God. But, instead of studying to show themselves approved by God, they are more willing to listen to a religious leader, read a religious book, listen to religious music, or attend a religious conference than they are willing to study. Thus they accept and adopt as gospel what the interpretation of another person rather than engage in personal study to learn how to hear God’s spoken voice. Although they claim to believe and trust in the entire Bible, they do not take seriously God’s many commands to listen to his voice. This model of passive (we would even call it “lazy”) spirituality does not line up with what God says about seeking him.
People who do not know how to study the Bible are spiritual babies who eat warmed over, regurgitated, spiritual food (i.e. milk) fed to them by religious teachers. What they call spiritual food is barely milk, and is surely not the solid spiritual food available to mature New Covenant disciples. Solid spiritual, life-giving food is only available those who feed on the words that proceeds from the mouth of God.
Learning how to hear God’s spoken voice is like any other worthwhile effort. It takes time, and much chewing (i.e. meditating) to fully digest the solid spiritual food that comes from the spoken word of God. This can be contrasted with religion that tries to make spiritual growth fast and easy.
Religious people have not been taught or encouraged to learn how to feed themselves by listening to God’s voice or to dig their own spiritual wells. Thus they barely survive on a starvation diet of sermons, books, religious music and conferences. Because of their failure to feed themselves and their children on the spoken word of God, they are famished spiritual infants.
This condition is the opposite of the spiritual maturity of New Covenant disciples who dig for and eat solid food (i.e. God’s spoken word) that is spiritually nourishing and tastes sweet like honey. They dig deep spiritual wells that produce satisfying, life-giving, spiritual water. They are serious learners (i.e. disciples) who go places in the Bible that they have never visited before and connect scriptures for which they never saw connections. And even if they had been there before, they now listen for God’s voice to reveal hidden mysteries that they never understood. They have learned to hear and obey God’s spoken word while reading the written words of the Bible. Little by little, the written law is leading them to faith.
New Covenant disciples are learners and teachers. True disciples know that they must be diligent, hard working learners. Going to church or synagogue weekly does not make someone a learner. Reading a daily devotional or the weekly Torah parasha and going to church or synagogue weekly does not make someone a learner. Study, hard study, followed by serious application of what you have learned to your life, makes you a learner and a disciple. Studying until you have heard God’s voice is the narrow gate that leads to life that comes from God’s mouth
Sadly, religious people do not learn according to God’s standards. By taking their instruction from men who presume to speak as prophets of God, they have acquired a dumbed-down picture of God that reduces him into something less than what he really is. They have done the same to Jesus who is much more complex than the sentimental, iconic images typically used to portray him in Christian literature and pictures. Lacking real depth, God and Jesus become Sunday School characters, icons, or golden calves, made by men who want to reduce God and Jesus to images of themselves rather than study and listen to God’s spirit which will teach them all things.