Who Is Calling? How to Discern the Voice of God

By Dianne Butts

Go visit Archie.  His cancer has advanced.  I wanted to visit, but my schedule was full.  Was this thought from God?  My own nagging conscience?  Or the enemy drawing me away?

When we hear a spiritual “voice”, how can we tell if it’s God?

Constant.

When I first felt the inkling to write, I thought.  Me?  Write?  Was God asking me to write for Him?  “Is this my idea or God’s?”  I asked my friend, Linda.  “Our desires come and go,” she said, “but God’s desires persist”.

God called Samuel three times (1 Samuel 3), but young Samuel didn’t recognize God’s voice either.  When Eli figured it out, he instructed Samuel to respond to the Lord.  God didn’t knock Samuel out of bed with a blast of thunder, but His persistent calling didn’t let Samuel rest.

Calm.

How can we differentiate between God’s nudges and impulses that are not from God?  Impulses feel urgent, often coming in “shoulds” and “oughts”.

Jesus and the disciples certainly felt the pressure of impulses.  One day a message arrived from Mary and Martha: “Jesus, come quick!  Lazarus is sick!”  “Yet…Jesus stayed where he was two more days” (John 11:6).  When He left for Bethany, Lazarus was dead (vs. 7, 14).  Jesus calmly continued His work.  Then, He went to Lazarus.

Do impulses pull us away from God’s work?  Distinguishing between God’s nudges and other impulses brings less fruitless busywork, more eternal fruit — and calm.

Convicting or Condemning?

We can distinguish between our enemy’s voice and God’s by where it leads.  Surely when the religious leaders brought the adulterous woman to Jesus, she wanted to run away.  After He ordered anyone without sin to throw the first stone and the people left, He asked, “Has no one condemned you?”  “No one, sir,” she said.  “Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared (John 8:10, 11).

Satan’s voice condemns us causing us to want to run from Christ.  But as believers, we no longer stand before God condemned (Romans 8:1).  God’s voice leads us to Christ for forgiveness.

Character.

Sandy grew up in a home filled with anger.  “I associated these angry ‘voices’ in my mind with the voice of God.  Now,” she said, “when I ‘hear’ a negative voice, I ask, ‘Is it characteristic of the God I know and love through Scripture?’”

God’s voice reveals His character.  He is holy (Leviticus 11:44), righteous (Psalm 11:7), just (Psalm 9:16), merciful and forgiving (Daniel 9:9).  He is compassionate, gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness (Psalm 86:15).

When the voice within us causes us to mistrust God or believe He won’t forgive us, we are not hearing the voice of God.

Clear.

“My husband and I wanted another child,” said author Tricia Rhodes.  But six years passed, before a familiar voice said, “Tricia, your pain isn’t because you haven’t had another child but because you’ve come to believe I’m not good”.  I heard Him because I was still listening [i] Jesus prayed, “‘Father, glorify your name!’  Then a voice came from heaven, “I have glorified it, and will glorify it again” (v. 28).  The crowd said it had thundered; others said an angel had spoken (v. 29).  Thunder?  An angel?  Did they not recognize the voice of God?  God speaks clearly, but are we listening?

Go visit Archie.  I left my writing and headed to Archie’s house.  We had a wonderful visit, I still completed my writing work, and Archie soon went home to the Lord.  Step by step, God is teaching me to recognize His voice.

Dianne E. Butts (www.DianneEButts.com, http://Twitter.com/DianneEButts) has written for more than 50 Christian publications and fifteen books. Read about her current book-in-progress at www.DeliverMeBook.blogspot.com.

This article first appeared in the February/March 1999 issue of Virtue.

Scripture quotes are from the New International Version.