Whisper: How to Hear the Voice of God

by Mark Batterson

In Dr. Tomatis’s words, “The voice can only reproduce what the ear can hear.”

We live in a culture where everyone wants to have his or her voice heard but has so little to say. And that’s because we do so little listening, especially to God. The best way to get people to listen to us is for us to listen to God. Why? Because we’ll have something to say that is worth hearing.

Ultimately, all of us need to find our voice. And by voice I mean the unique message God wants to speak through our lives. But finding our voice starts with hearing His voice.

If you aren’t willing to listen to everything God has to say, you eventually won’t hear anything He has to say.

Speak, LORD, for your servant is listening.

Maggie Koerth-Baker, “Just because you can’t hear a sound doesn’t mean it isn’t there.”

But when God wants to be heard, when what He has to say is too important to miss, He often speaks in a whisper just above the absolute threshold of hearing.

When someone speaks in a whisper, you have to get very close to hear. In fact, you have to put your ear near the person’s mouth. We lean toward a whisper, and that’s what God wants. The goal of hearing the heavenly Father’s voice isn’t just hearing His voice; it’s intimacy with Him. That’s why He speaks in a whisper. He wants to be as close to us as is divinely possible! He loves us, likes us, that much.

“The voice of the Spirit is as gentle as a zephyr,” said Oswald Chambers. “So gentle that unless you are living in perfect communion with God, you never hear it.”

Chambers continued, “The checks of the Spirit come in the most extraordinarily gentle ways, and if you are not sensitive enough to detect His voice you will quench it, and your personal spiritual life will be impaired. His checks always come as a still small voice, so small that no one but the saint notices them.”

Those who dance are thought mad by those who hear not the music. That old adage is certainly true of those who walk to the beat of God’s drum. When you take your cues from the Holy Spirit, you’ll do some things that will make people think you’re crazy. So be it. Obey the whisper and see what God does.

Nothing has the potential to change your life like the whisper of God. Nothing will determine your destiny more than your ability to hear His still small voice.

“Quiet is a think tank of the soul.”17 Simply put, God often speaks loudest when we’re quietest.

Be still, and know that I am God.

chronic noise may be the greatest impediment to our spiritual growth.

Silence is anything but passive waiting. It’s proactive listening. The noted author and professor Henri Nouwen believed that silence was an act of war against the competing voices within us.

If you want to hear the heart of God, silence is key. If you want the Spirit of God to fill you, be still.

“Better is one day in [the Lord’s] courts than a thousand elsewhere.”

Silence is the difference between sight and insight. Silence is the difference between happiness and joy. Silence is the difference between fear and faith.

Did you know that the electron shell of the carbon atom produces the same harmonic scale as the Gregorian chant?

we try to create God in our image rather than allowing Him to create us in His.

God’s love is meteoric, his loyalty astronomic, His purpose titanic,

Yet in his largeness nothing gets lost.

We don’t always hear what’s actually being said. Why? Because we hear everything through the filter of our histories, our personalities, our ethnicities, and our theologies.

Just because we speak the same language, it doesn’t mean we hear one another.

You are the answer to someone else’s prayer.

The Hebrew word used to describe God’s proximity is paniym, and it’s multidimensional. In regard to time, paniym refers to the split second before and the split second after—a parenthesis in time. In regard to space, paniym refers to the place right in front and right in back—a parenthesis in space.

Some Hebrew scholars believe that the name of God, Yahweh—or without the vowels, YHWH—is synonymous with the sound of a breath.

no place is devoid of God’s presence.

one of the best ways to gauge the will of God is to discern whether or not the peace of Christ is ruling in your heart.

You will eventually be shaped in the image of the loudest voice in your life—the voice you listen to most.

the sound of God’s voice does not decay with distance.

change of pace + change of place = change of perspective. Sometimes

We don’t just listen with our ears. We listen with our eyes, with our hearts.

Signs are as easy to misinterpret as they are to interpret, so here’s an important rule of thumb: cross-check your interpretation against Scripture.

listening to those who listen to God is no substitute for seeking Him yourself.

If you become reliant upon others for inspiration, that’s called spiritual codependency.

we never get to the bottom of the Bible. According to rabbinic tradition, every word of Scripture has seventy faces and six hundred thousand meanings.7 In other words, it’s kaleidoscopic.

One of the jobs of the Holy Spirit is quickening, and it’s the difference between information and transformation.

The Bible comes alive only when we actively obey it.

Beta waves are associated with normal waking consciousness, including anxious thoughts and active concentration.

Reading the Bible for depth is called lectio divina. Lectio divina is an ancient Benedictine practice, and it’s one way to discern the voice of God. It involves four steps, or stages: reading, meditating, praying, and contemplating.

Take delight in the LORD, and he will give you the desires of your heart.

I read three thousand books before I wrote one.

Seeking God first is delighting yourself in the Lord. Seeking God first is giving Him the first word and the last word. Seeking God first is making sure His voice is the loudest voice in your life.

He’ll change our desires, intensify our desires, and upload new desires within us. Those desires actually become spiritual compasses by which we navigate the will of God.

“God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him.”

But when we delight ourselves in the Lord, God will give us the desire to do whatever He’s called us to do, no matter how difficult it is.

Some of us have no idea what we want, because we sacrifice our desires on the altar of other people’s expectations.

“The voice we should listen to most as we choose a vocation is the voice that we might think we should listen to least, and that is the voice of our own gladness. What can we do that makes us the gladdest?…I believe that if it is a thing that makes us truly glad, then it is a good thing and it is our thing.”