How to Hear God’s Voice Daily

How do we keep it simple with Jesus?

We do our part vs. do our part. See the subtle but critical difference? If we can wrap our busy selves around our part, doing it would not be so hard.

One piece of drawing closer to Him is our availability. The Lord ministered these words to my daughter, Rachel, “Your progress is not your responsibility. Your responsibility is availability.” That just blew a hole in some of our behaviors, didn’t it? But it makes sense that if He is leading us, then we progress when we are available to be led. Availability doesn’t require greatness on our part—simply a humble awareness of our need for Him.

When we become concerned about our progress, the good virtue of patient endurance leading to excellence of maturity can instead easily become a works-based life of performance. This only leads to a self-made perfection, which is, perhaps, the furthest thing God wants from us. This is a counterfeit to real, true spiritual growth that leads to His perfection being formed in us. Can you see how this lie bleeds into our “trying” to hear His voice?

In this scenario, we begin to believe it is our own perfection and spiritual maturity that causes our Father to want to speak to us—or not speak to us. This is a requirement we impose upon ourselves.
Remember! God’s perfection is sure. Our perfection is not required to sit at the table; instead, our perfection is actually acquired while we are seated at the table with Him.

Ironically, when we think we must be perfect, we are too busy working out our so-called perfection to actually sit down. This creates an endless religious cycle that goes nowhere but gradually descends into hopelessness. We think we are walking by faith and trying to stay steady on our scriptures but, all the while, we’ve become shipwrecked by putting our faith in ourselves and not in Him.

What is the way out of this cycle? We must trust Jesus’ ability and spiritual maturity to know how to speak to us and be heard by us more than we distrust ourselves. It’s that simple. And yet, it’s profoundly true. To believe God’s truth is to experience His freedom and His promises.

Try this! Really! Do it! Don’t just read about it (maybe that is what is wrong in the first place).

Get ready to experience an important moment. But first, if you’ve never asked Jesus into your heart, flip to the back of this book to page 253 and pray the short prayer inviting Jesus to come into your heart, and He will. Again, it’s so simple. Then come back to experience this moment with Him:

Put your hand over your chest or belly, whichever feels to you like you are recognizing His Spirit in you.

Close your eyes and focus on Jesus.

Say this out loud:

“I love You, Jesus.”

Then, be quiet and just listen!

Ready, go….

What did you hear?

If your answer is “nothing,” think again.

Did words quickly come back to you? Did you dismiss them as being your own thoughts?

When I do this with children, it’s always fun because they are the easiest group to lead. They hear something and just naturally believe it’s Jesus. They hear Him say all kinds of things like, “I love you too!”, “You are going to have a great day!” or “I’m proud of you!” He seems to stick to the pretty simple phrase of “I love you too” with adults. Maybe it’s all we can handle at first.

I often open up my conversations with Jesus, saying, “I love You, Jesus.” He always says, “I love you too.” Often, He adds my name to His declaration. Many times, He will just keep right on talking afterward.

This has been a wonderful way to introduce my children and grandchildren to His loving voice. One night, I said to my daughter, “Emily, let’s talk to Jesus. One, two, three,” and she said with me,” I love You, Jesus.”

To me, Jesus said the simple, “I love you too.” But Emily kept her eyes closed longer and was intently listening. I grew impatient to see how it turned out and asked her, “What did He say?”

She looked at me with annoyance on her face and said, “Shhh, you’re interrupting Him!” and went back to listening. If we could be so childlike, oh, the wonders we would hear!

What a beautiful open door for all of us to experience His love. Jesus is the miracle of Emmanuel, God with us, and He wants His love to be experienced in reality, not in mere words alone.

Ephesians 3:14-19 (TPT) proves this to be His will:

So I kneel humbly in awe before the Father of our Lord Jesus, the Messiah, the perfect Father of every father and child in heaven and on the earth. And I pray that he would unveil within you the unlimited riches of his glory and favor until supernatural strength floods your innermost being with his divine might and explosive power. Then, by constantly using your faith, the life of Christ will be released deep inside you, and the resting place of his love will become the very source and root of your life. Then you will be empowered to discover what every holy one experiences—the great magnitude of the astonishing love of Christ in all its dimensions.

How deeply intimate and far-reaching is his love! How enduring and inclusive it is!

Endless love beyond measurement that transcends our understanding—this extravagant love pours into you until you are filled to overflowing with the fullness of God!

When we stop believing the lie of the enemy that says, “Those were just your thoughts,” we can believe what we heard so quickly spoken in our hearts was, indeed, the voice of our Lord.

When we invite Jesus to speak with us, we are responding in faith to His invitation to come. Would the Good Shepherd of our soul let the enemy of our soul have access to the space between us? Would He stay silent when we answer His call, allowing Satan to imitate Him? No and no.

John 10:1-5 (NLT) says:

“I tell you the truth, anyone who sneaks over the wall of a sheepfold, rather than going through the gate, must surely be a thief and a robber! But the one who enters through the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep recognize his voice and come to him. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. After he has gathered his own flock, he walks ahead of them, and they follow him because they know his voice. They won’t follow a stranger; they will run from him because they don’t know his voice.”

I believe we can live in the Spirit—in our Lord’s presence—to the degree that Satan cannot get a word in edgewise as they say in Texas. If Satan can’t speak to us because we won’t listen, he won’t be able to plant lies in our hearts anymore! This is the powerful and peaceful result of giving Jesus full reign over our souls.

Now, go back and try that conversation starter with Jesus again. This time with a new faith in your heart and a purposeful trust in the Good Shepherd, the gatekeeper and King of your soul.

I am confident that you heard Him respond because it’s what He does!

Psalm 78:1-2 (KJV) says:

Give ear, O my people, to my law [teaching]; incline your ears to the words of my mouth. I will open my mouth in a parable [in instruction by numerous examples]; I will utter dark sayings of old [that hide important truth].

You are on your journey with Him already. Trust Him to be your Teacher and Friend, to shine light on His sayings to you even as you read His Word in His Presence.

Worship Him as you sit with Him. This is a crucial piece of relationship with Jesus—not only in your journal time but in all your time with Him.

Worship is not just something you do, but it is a posture and positioning of your heart.

You speak worship every time you choose His Word over your circumstances. You exemplify worship as you obey Him, and you beautifully worship Him as you sing the words of spiritual songs from your heart. As you express yourself to Him, you are humbling yourself before Him and aligning your soul in submission to His greatness. As you sing, you are declaring to your mind, will and emotions that He is God Almighty—you are not.

He becomes bigger to you while you begin to recognize the rested peace of being small, cared for and loved—truly loved by Him. In His presence in true worship, you become aware that you can be real with Him, sharing all your thoughts and cares, and He will listen to you. He is so kind as to use your times of worship to tell you who you are in Him.

This is Jesus, our human Son of God and Son of Man in one. God and Man in us and One with us. We have no idea who we really are until we hear it straight from Jesus. I heard my friend, Grace, say a profound thing: “Our identity is found in His Voice.”

He knows how to be heard, and He invited us to simply come, expecting to hear. Jesus admonished the 12 disciples, the multitudes and the Church repeatedly from Matthew to Revelation with these words, “If any have ears to hear, let him hear.” He offered us promise after promise of what we can expect as we hear, believe and do His will. My prayer for you is that you may have ears to hear.