We are in series right now that is leaning into loving God, loving self, and loving others. Today, let’s talk more about loving God. Prayer is one of the ways we demonstrate a love for God and how he shows us his love, too. If you have been in church circles long enough, you have heard people say that “prayer is a conversation with God.” Conversations are not one-sided. They involve a speaker and a listener, and both people fill both roles. So when we say that prayer is a conversation with God, it means that he speaks, we listen, and we speak, he listens. Tim Keller discusses this in his book, Prayer, when he says that God always initiates the conversation (to paraphrase) — we are simply joining it.

God has initiated the conversation by providing his Word, the Bible, for us. It is the literal Word of God. It is the primary way he speaks to us, but it isn’t the only way. Many times prayer feels frustrating because we can’t hear an audible voice of God. Sometimes this happens, as evident in Scripture in stories like Moses and the burning bush and Paul on the road to Damascus. But most of the time we can’t hear the voice of God out loud. We hear others say “God told me this…” and we roll our eyes because how could they know what God tells them if his voice is not heard? 

How can we have a conversation with someone we can’t even hear? This topic requires much more attention than I can give it here, but I wanted to share some of the basics that you need to know in order to be able to hear from God in your own prayer life. 

1. Follow Him. 

In John10:1-5, Jesus tells a story about a shepherd and his sheep. He says, “The doorkeeper opens it for him, and the sheep hear his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought all his own outside, he goes ahead of them. The sheep follow him because they recognize his voice. They will never follow a stranger; instead they will run away from him, because they don’t recognize the voice of strangers.” If Jesus is the shepherd and we are the sheep, we should be able to know and recognize his voice and follow it. How do we get to know his voice? We follow him. We spend time with him. We can’t discern his voice if we are not following him, if we have not given him our lives. If we do not do this, his voice will sound like the voice of a stranger. But if we give our lives to Jesus and commit to spending time with him, we will get to know his voice. 

2. Get to Know Him. 

The main way we can get to know God is by reading, meditating on, and studying scripture. The more we read, the more we learn his words by memory, the tone and inflection, the themes he cares about, the things he thinks worthy to repeat, and what he wants us to know. When we learn this, we learn his voice. How he speaks and what he means when he does. If we aren’t getting to know him in his word, we will never be able to recognize his voice. If you want to hear from God, pick up your bible. 

3. Practice Silent, Contemplative Prayer. 

This is a practice that has been neglected in contemporary Christianity. We like to talk in prayer, but rarely do we stop to listen. Imagine if that were how all of your conversations with people went— one person talking without giving the other person a chance to speak. Though God has already spoken through his word, he still speaks in new, fresh ways today. One way to tune in to hear from him is the practice of silent prayer. Here’s how I practice it— I get in a comfortable seated position, take about 30 seconds of slow, deep breaths, lay aside anything that is on my mind, and simply ask “God what do you want me to hear right now?” I sit in complete stillness and silence, and pay attention to what comes to my mind. Have I ever heard an out-loud voice in this moment? No. But I do see pictures in my mind, and there are words, phrases, and sentences that enter my mind. If it lines up with the word of God and what I know to be true about him, then I know it is his voice. His sheep will know his voice.  I stay here for as long as I need. Instead of trying to figure it out on my own, I get still and quiet. I always find myself overwhelmed by the presence of God in these moments— tears flowing down my face because I know he truly is speaking to me. And, I know that he would speak more often if I would just stop and listen. 

4. Fill Your Mind and Soul with Solid, Biblical Teaching. 

Listen to podcasts. Read books. Go to church every week. Go to small group. Have a great conversation with a friend. Fill your mind with biblical truth from people who have a deep relationship with God, where it is evident they know him and know his word. Seek their counsel. Listen to their teaching. And always run it through the filter of what you know to be true about God from his word. He often speaks to us through other people. Though it does not sound like the voice of God in the burning bush, it is him speaking. We just have to tune into it. 

Again, this is the tip of the iceberg in this conversation, but hearing from God is not as hard as we think, and you don’t have to be a monk or pastor or priest to be able to hear from him. He died for us so that we can have unhindered access to a relationship with him, and relationships require conversations. Lean in to hear what he has to say.