"Hearing God" (II)

The Nature of God's Voice

"How does God speak to us?" Willard shows from scripture six "methods" God uses to communicate with His people, but not before tackling three of the biggest misconceptions regarding God's speech to us: (1) The Message-A-Minute View. This is the idea that either God is telling you what to do at every turn of the road or that He is, at the least, willing and available to have a "word" for every situation if you'll simply ask. There's no evidence in the life of Peter and Paul (or even Jesus!) that they were continually receiving communication from God. (2) The It's-All-In-The-Bible View. This is the idea that God simply doesn't communicate with us because everything He wants to say is in the Bible. But the New Testament shows us that God actively communicates with His people, giving them direction and guidance. Jesus says, "My sheep know my voice," and how are we to know Jesus' voice if he doesn't communicate with us? (3) The Whatever-Happens-Happens View. This is the idea that there is no need for God to communicate with us. He is sovereign (no one will dispute that), and everything that happens is what He wants to happen, so what would He have to communicate to us? Indeed, what need is there for guidance? Willard is no hyper-Calvinist, and he believes that human beings have a good deal of sway in what happens in their lives. Willard advocates a conversational relationship with God, where there is clear, appropriate, and specific communication through conscious experience from God to the individual believer within the context of a life immersed in His kingdom.

The six "methodologies" of God communicating to His people are as follows:

   (1) a phenomenon plus a voice,

   (2) a supernatural messenger or an angel,

   (3) dreams and visions,

   (4) an audible voice,

   (5) the human voice, and

   (6) the human spirit or a "still small voice"

Willard looks at examples of all of these in the New Testament, but he focuses on the last, quoting 1 Kings 19.11-12. The prophet Elijah, threatened with death and feeling quite glum, seeks sanctuary from the evil queen in the mountain wilderness. An angel of God tells him to climb to the top of a mountain and await God. Elijah does so, and then God comes, but not in the way you would expect. It's such a good text (and I'm going to commit the cardinal sin and employ Eugene Peterson's The Message):

A hurricane wind ripped through the mountains and shattered the rocks before God, but God wasn't to be found in the wind; after the wind an earthquake, but God wasn't in the earthquake; and after the earthquake fire, but God wasn't in the fire; and after the fire a gentle and quiet whisper.

On page 87 Willard explains this "gentle and quiet whisper" as "taking the form of thoughts that are our thoughts, though these thoughts are not from us." Perhaps it's one of those things best explained simply by experience. An example from my own life a couple months ago: I was driving up Interstate 75 on my way to a wedding, lamenting the loss of the Wisconsinite and feeling pretty blue. I'd thought God wanted the two of us together, everything had felt so right, and I was so confident that He had a plan for us. I expressed this all to Him, and I didn't even ask Him anything--it wasn't a prayer of petition or anything--and then there came "a still small voice" that came in my thoughts, but not "of me," cutting through my fear and sadness. Hope in Me. Trust in Me. Wait on Me--and see what I will do. With those words came a sea of peace and gratitude, and tears clouded my eyes and I thanked God for that "little word" that offered sustenance and strength to that day. 

So often when we await God's word to us, we may be expecting a dream, or a vision, or some supernatural phenomenon, a shaking of the heavens and earth and an angel of God coming to us and telling us exactly what's going down and what we need to do. God certainly works in this way sometimes, but there's no reason in scripture to expect that He works this way most of the time. The "still small voice" Elijah experienced has been the norm in all the great Christian mystics and saints through the ages, and Willard goes so far as to say that this is the manner by which God prefers to communicate with His people. It isn't obtrusive, it isn't scary. It's warm, it's friendly, it's familial--and we are, after all, God's children. Willard ponders if an obsession over dreams and visions is a sort of immaturity, a craving after a fireworks display from the hand of God akin to the Jewish people demanding signs and wonders from Jesus' hand. Willard wonders if powerful dreams and visions are God's sort of megaphone for His people, getting their attention when they won't hear Him any other way.