Is God Still Talking?

Welcome to the In Touch Podcast with Charles Stanley for Monday, July 24. Does God still speak to people today like He did in the Bible?

Today's podcast kicks off a series that answers that question. He begins by saying in verse 8, But My people did not listen to My voice, and Israel did not obey Me. So I gave them over to the stubbornness of their heart to walk in their own devices, all that My people would listen to Me, that Israel would walk in My ways. I would quickly subdue their enemies and turn My hand against their adversaries. Those who hate the Lord would pretend obedience to Him, and their time of punishment would be forever.

But I would feed you with the finest of the wheat, and with honey from the rock I would satisfy you. I believe one of the most valuable lessons you and I ever learn in this Christian life is how to listen to God. Because I believe that is so important, I want to begin today a series entitled, Listening to God.

And I'm praying that God will speak through my heart to many of you to maybe at least help you learn how to listen to what He wants to say to you. Now, the first question that you and I might ask is, and the thing we have to settle is this, is God still talking? If God isn't still speaking, then there's no point in our listening, and I want to tell you, my friend, that God is still speaking today just as surely as He was in the days in which this book was written.

Now, let me be quick to say this. All the voices that are being heard today are not God's voice. There are some voices being heard today under the guise of being God's voice that could not be the voice of God because Almighty God, who is omniscient, and you see, He's never forgotten a thing He's ever said. And therefore, God would never say anything that would contradict a single verse in this book. So whenever you and I hear somebody saying something that contradicts this book, you can forget what they said.

Now, you remember two things. God isn't going to say anything else that is to be added to this book, and secondly, He's not going to say anything that is going to contradict a single verse in this Bible. Now, you and I may ask the question, why would God still want to be talking today? Hasn't He said enough from Genesis to Revelation? It looks like He said all that needed to be said. Why would He want to speak to us today?

And I'll tell you why. One, because He loves you and me just as much as He loved those people in the Old and New Testament days. He loved us just as much. He desires to fellowship with you and me just as much as He desired to fellowship with them. And if in our relationship to Him, it is a one-way trip and only a monologue, and there is no communication and no dialogue between us and the Lord Jesus Christ and friend, there can't be much fellowship when one person's doing all the talking and the other one is doing all the listening. So speaking to us and listening to us is a part of developing that love relationship that Jesus is in the process of developing with us. A second reason that God is still speaking today is this, and that is you and I need as definite and deliberate direction for our lives today as did Joshua or Moses or Jacob.

We need definite, deliberate direction in decision-making. And so God is speaking to us today because He desires that you and I make the right decision. A third reason I believe He's speaking today is this, that God knows you and I need the comfort and assurance today.

We need it just as much as those people of old because, you see, we have Red Sea experiences in our life when our back's to the wall and we don't know which way to turn. We need for God to speak to us. But I'll tell you the most important reason that God's still talking today because, you see, God wants us to know Him. I believe the priority of all of our goals ought to be to know God.

I believe that's God's priority of goals for you and me, that we might know Him through His Son, Jesus Christ. Now, the most important thing and where I want us to spend our time is this, how does God speak today? If God's still talking, how does He speak? So let's go back to ask ourselves the question, how did He speak in the Old Testament and New Testament days? Well, one of the first ways God spoke was this, He spoke by direct revelation, that is, by His Spirit. He spoke to the spirit of men like, let's take, for example, Abraham. Living in a society that was totally heathen, God reached down, spoke to the spirit of Abraham and said, I want you to get up out of the land in which you're living and I want you to go into land that I will show you and I will show you as you go. A direct revelation from God. Secondly, the Bible says He speaks through and He spoke through dreams.

And I suppose the first one you and I would think about would be Joseph. His dreams got him in trouble, not always, but sometime. Through visions, for example, what did Daniel see? He saw the empires that were to come. In fact, God gave to Daniel in that vision, He gave him a tremendous piece of world history, the things that were going to come to pass.

We still see them in the process of unfolding today. Then He spoke through His word as He gave to Moses, for example, the law, and He gave him the Ten Commandments. Then God used the law of Moses to speak to the people. Likewise, He spoke through the prophets. What did the prophets say? They said, Thus saith the Lord, and as the prophets spoke, the people obeyed. Likewise, He would speak through circumstances. For example, let's take Gideon. When God had said to Gideon, Gideon, I want you to lead the nation of Israel in battle against the enemy. And even though God had spoken very clearly, Gideon was a little afraid of the situation. He said, Lord, if you don't mind, I need a little bit more help at this point, so here's what I'm going to do.

I'm going to lay out the fleece tomorrow morning. He laid it out twice. One morning He says, I want it to be soaking wet in the midst of dry grass.

The next day He said, I want it to be as dry as gunpowder in the midst of wet grass. And so as He listened and watched God work, God just reached down to Gideon and gave him the assurance and the confidence that He needed. So He spoke through those circumstances. Likewise, He spoke through angels.

You'll recall how He introduced to Joseph the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ through an angel. Likewise, and if you'll look at the life of Paul, how did God usually speak to the life of Paul? He spoke to him through the Holy Spirit. He was on his way into Asia, and He says the Holy Spirit forbade him to go there. The next verse says the Spirit of Christ gave him direction as to what and what not to do. So the Holy Spirit spoke through him. And then the last way that I want to mention that God spoke in those days was He spoke audibly. And you'll recall the Saul of Tarsus in Damascus rode on his way to persecute the believers in Damascus. The Bible says that Saul of Tarsus heard a voice from heaven, was smitten blind, and God spoke to him.

And let me ask you a question. How are we to listen to God? How is He going to speak to us? So I want to share with you some ways I believe that God speaks to us today. I believe that the Lord's primary way of speaking to us is through His Word. We have the complete revelation of God. God doesn't need to add anything else to this book.

Now listen to me. The revelation of God is the unfolding truth of God by God about Himself that could not have been received any other way except by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit controlling the minds of the men who pen the pages that make up the Word of God. This is the breath of God breathed, as He says, upon those men that they might know the truth. This is the revelation of God.

You can't add to it. And a man may try to subtract from it, but he cannot. It is still the revelation of God. This is God's primary way of speaking. A second way that the Lord speaks today is through the Holy Spirit, and that's the primary way that the Lord spoke in the days of the New Testament through the Holy Spirit because, you see, He says Christ is our life. Christ Jesus is living within us. We are indwelt by the Holy Spirit. He's the one who receives the message of the Lord. And so what happens is God just speaks to our spirit through His Spirit who is within us, and He gives us direction for our life.

Now listen, that doesn't mean that He only speaks when some crucial issue arises. If I am walking in surrendered obedience to Him, I have the right to expect anything I need from God at that moment. If it is the routine of my life of that day, I have the right to believe that God is directing my life moment by moment. There will be times when He wants to make a turn. There'll be times when He wants to stop us.

There'll be times when He wants to make a change and has to get our attention. But we have the Holy Spirit living within us so that it ought to be the natural, normal style of the believer, those who are filled with the Spirit and living in the Spirit surrendered to Him, that we can claim the presence and the direction and the guidance of the Holy Spirit at any given time. That is the Spirit of God speaking to us.

But I want to tell you something. God is just as interested in talking to you today about what concerns you as He was David, whom He spoke to so beautifully, so clearly in the Psalms. He is just as interested in the things that you and I are interested in. He is interested in giving clear-cut direction through His Word and through the Holy Spirit just as clearly as He did in those days. If God wants me to obey Him and I report for duty every morning, then He must guide me and His two primary ways of guiding me through the Word and through the Holy Spirit. But there's a third way, and that is that God speaks to us through other people. Now, if God speaks to us and He does through other people, what does that say about our ability or our willingness, our capacity to listen to other people? Friend, listen, if God speaks through other people to us, one of the things you and I need to learn is this. We need to learn to listen to God as He speaks to us through other people. And I believe all the people you and I ought to be able to listen to, the folks we live with, people who love us the most, people who put up with us, people who pray for us, and especially among God's people.

We ought to be able to learn how to listen to one another. That when God wants to say something to us through somebody else, we will be able to hear it. Listen, not as from the person, but as from God. Now, you say, but let's get back to this question about visions and dreams.

Do people have dreams today? And usually people will refer who believe in this, people who will refer to Joel chapter two. And you'll recall here is a Scripture where God prophesies that in the days to come you'll pour out His Spirit on all mankind. He says, your sons and daughters will prophesy, but now watch this.

He says, your old men will dream dreams. So people say, well, now, what about visions and dreams? Let me say, first of all, the Bible does not ever say to seek the mind of God in dreams.

It doesn't say that. I'll tell you, if you'll think about most dreams you've had that the most confused, mixed up things you've ever seen in your life and usually can't even tell all the details when you wake up, I wouldn't put much stock in dreams, and I would say to you, compared to the Word of God, there is no comparison. You stick with the Word and let the dreams go. Secondly, somebody says, well, now, what about visions? You hear people talking about visions, and I'm not going to put God in the box. I couldn't anyway and say that God never gives people visions. I would simply say this.

The principle here is this. Never seek a vision to find the mind of God. He says we're to seek the Lord. He says we're to focus our attention upon things above, not on earth. Nowhere am I admonished to seek a vision. And I had a friend of mine on one occasion who told me that his salvation experience was based on this, that flying home from a business trip and circling the airport where he lived, that the way the sun was reflecting through the clouds, that the sun and the clouds made a cross, and he knew then that he was saved. That has nothing to do with confession, repentance, or belief in the Lord Jesus Christ as his personal Savior.

That's all they had to go on was the sunshine and the clouds. Friend, that's a poor way. In fact, I want to tell you that is a very dangerous way to make any kind of a decision. Now, let me say this, and I want to say this carefully. The only time I would say that God's ever shown me anything like that was at the end of a long period of weeks and weeks and weeks of seeking the mind of the Lord and feeling the pressure moving, and I knew that God was going to show me something, and I'd been praying every night. I was away in a revival meeting, and I had every night to myself after the service, and I would come home and get down by the bed praying and asking God to show me. I knew He was going to show me, but I couldn't see it, and so one night when I was asking Him, Lord, out of desperation, please tell me what You're saying. God says I'm going to move You. I lived in Florida at that time.

I said, when? And it's just like for a split second in my spirit, here was one of those little home movie screens, and all of a sudden flashed across that screen was September, and that was it. The next night I came back, got down to pray, couldn't pray. No burden, nothing to pray about.

I moved to Atlanta September the 30th. Now, let me say this. I wasn't seeking anything but to know the mind of God. I don't believe there's any Scripture that you and I can find that would give us a basis for seeking a vision. If God wants to show you something in His own way that's His business, you let Him do that. The most dependable ways to find the mind of God is through the Word, through the Holy Spirit, and through, listen, through others, but listen, not through just any other, but through somebody who is filled with the Spirit and walking in the Spirit. You be sure that the person you're listening to is walking in the Spirit of God. And then, of course, God speaks to you and me through circumstances as He did in those days. And I think in my own life, being just laid out for three weeks, was God engineered a circumstance so that I could hear what He was saying. He stopped everything dead in its track for me so that I could hear Him and I would never be able to thank Him enough for that. Sometimes it's failure, God uses that to speak to us. Sometimes it's success, He'll use that. Sometimes it's a disappointment, sometimes a tragedy, but God speaks through circumstances to us.

The question is this. Do you suppose it could be that God has been speaking to you and you've not been listening? Do you think possibly that the Lord may have been trying to say something to you about your life and you've had your own thing going and you've had your pattern set and you've sort of put your life in this particular avenue and this is the way you intend to live and you just hope God just pour His blessings in on your plan?

Or do you suppose that God may be saying something to you that you're not hearing? If you're lost, let me tell you what He's saying. I can tell you what He's saying. Here's what He's saying if you're not saved.

He's saying, I love you, have a wonderful plan for your life. My son died and all of your sin's been placed on him. And if you will not confess your sin and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ as your Savior and His death on the cross is adequate payment for your sin and trust your life to Him, He'll save you today.

Write your name in the Lamb's Book of Life and beginning today you can start a whole new life and a brand new fellowship with Him. And I know that's what He's saying to you because you see, that's the first subject God ever brings up in a person's life and that's their relationship to Him. It may be that God has said to you, I want to reevaluate your life at this point and I want us to check up to see if you're in the center of my will doing what I want you to do. Are you listening?

It may be that God has said to you, she's the one I want you to marry. Are you listening? It may be that God has said, that's not my choice. Are you listening? And you see, the key is not just to listen, but to listen with the spirit of obedience.

And my friend, listen to me. The God who wrote this book and the God whose Son went to the cross is a loving God who will speak to you today as clearly and as definitely as He spoke to the man who penned that book. What God is waiting for is listeners. Thank you for listening to Is God Still Talking? If you'd like to know more about Charles Stanley or InTouch Ministries, stop by InTouch.org. This podcast is a presentation of InTouch Ministries, Atlanta, Georgia.