Hearing God's Voice

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We are glad that you're with us today. And Jim, this is two weeks in a row. Is that right?

That it's your topic? First time ever. Yeah, yeah. Maybe the last.

But we'll see how this show plays out. But no, that is a first. Two weeks in a row. We don't typically have two weeks in a row from the same person. So congratulations on that. Well, we don't normally have nobody with an idea. Well, I wouldn't go there.

You have to go all the way down to me who rarely has an idea. That's pretty sad. Yeah, and to be fair, I rejected your first one.

So I've actually had three in a row. Just one of them is later. It's later. We delayed it. It wasn't rejected.

It was just put on the back burner for the time being. So you want to tell us about this week's topic? What?

Exactly. Oh, I'm sorry. I wasn't listening. This is about hearing from God, or listening to God, if you prefer. And it really kind of hit me as something that I've tried to do a little more of and emulate a good friend that I think hears from him every morning.

But I'm not even up every morning. But it is important for all of us. And we're going to be talking about hearing from God today. Oh, good.

That sounds like an interesting topic. And so we'll see where God leads us on that. So who's first, Jim? I think that's who's on first. Yeah.

Which would be Roberto. See? We were talking Spanish earlier. Yes. Okay. Well. Yeah, movie. So we have an interesting clip.

I found out through our pre-show slash game, because, you know, Super Bowl week, we come off that, you know. But anyway, that most guys have not seen this movie. So I thought it was a classic.

I do know it's in black and white. And so it was, the movie was called Harvey, and it starred Jimmy Stewart. So in my household, that was required watching, because my mother loved Jimmy Stewart.

And there's no doubt about that. Nonetheless, this is a very unusual movie in that everybody in the movie is absolutely certain that Jimmy Stewart is crazy, because he talks to this six-foot rabbit called Harvey all the way through the movie. And of course, nobody sees the rabbit. Anybody's obviously having all these discussions with the rabbit.

Of course, you know, the more you watch the movie, and you see how graceful, and I mean, like, Jimmy Stewart treats other people so well in this movie, compared to the way people treat him. And the more you watch the movie, the more you become convinced that the only person that actually may be sane in the movie is the guy that's talking to the six-foot rabbit. And so as you see this particular scene, they're in a bar, and he starts out talking to a man, apparently he's just been incarcerated, but he's on his way back.

He had sat down with Harvey, his rabbit, but of course nobody sees the rabbit. Then he goes back after he talks to the man who's been incarcerated, and he sits down, and the bartender comes up, and one of the visuals that you can't see is he asks him what he wants to drink, and he turns to Harvey, and he goes, oh, two martinis. You know, like, Harvey's the one that wanted two martinis, and then he has a short discussion with Harvey, and then you hear the bartender say, hey, that's four bits, and he's talking to a guy who's leaving, it looks kind of like a drunk that's leaving, without paying. And the guy says, well, the guy at the end of the counter, meaning he's listened to this, and he thought Jimmy Stewart was nuts, that he would get the rabbit to pay the bill, right?

And so, then you can hear Jimmy Stewart's response, so go ahead and play the clip. Oh, I can take you to leave it about. I did a job for him last year, too, helping him build a road. Oh, well, Mr. Meikles, we'll just have to do something about your return. Would you like to come to my house for dinner tonight? Yes, yes, but you know, the last time I was there, I kind of got the impression your sister held it against me, because I did a little time.

Oh, no, no, Mr. Meikles, my sister loves to entertain. She's very social, you know. Yes, I see by the papers.

You know, I never missed the society column. You know? Yeah, she's giving a clam bake this afternoon. This afternoon?

Yeah. Well, I'll see you tomorrow night at seven o'clock, Mr. Meikles. Thanks, Mr. Dowd.

All right, glad to have seen you. Harvey, I just... Now, what can I do for you, Mr. Dowd? What did you have in mind? What's your order? Oh, two martinis.

Two martinis? Harvey, it seems that Vida is having a party this afternoon, and I... Oh, you knew? Well, I just thought that she might be offended if we weren't there. After all, she's the only sister I have, and I... How's that?

I'm the only one I'm ever liking to have, yes. Absolutely right. Well, we'd better hurry up. That'll be four bits.

The one at the end won't pay for it, do it. Come back here. He'd be delighted. He'd be delighted.

Well, let's drink up. And he is delighted, right? I mean, it's fascinating that, you know, that's...

When you think about it, who invited the guy who'd been incarcerated to his house for dinner? And when you think about all that, you know, I see it as a picture of that. However, if you have a conversational intimacy with Jesus, you feel like you're nuts. And, you know, since the first time I ever talked to the Lord, I came and told Tammy, you know, that I'd talked to Jesus, and, you know, Leslie was gonna be okay. Those of you who heard that story, you know, you know, heard that story, know that she looked at me like I was nuts. And not long thereafter, I had a conversation with Jesus and had a sales meeting that actually turned around Crown Dodge, but I remember the look of everybody when I told him that I'd talked to Jesus.

I'm pretty sure they felt like I was talking to Harvey. And I was talking recently, just, you know, within the last week. Those who know me know I struggle with keeping my blood sugar under control. And so, me and the Lord, we sometimes don't agree.

I don't know if you have that issue, but, you know, so I was having a struggle with my blood sugar being 131, and I was eating right, and I was doing everything right, I thought, yet my blood sugar was 131. And I said, what's up with that? And he said, it's the nuts. You're eating too many nuts. And I went, it can't be nuts. Nuts are good for you. That's nuts. It's not the nuts. I bet I ate too late. Tomorrow night, I'm going to eat earlier. So I kept eating my nuts, which by the way was nuts.

And anyway, next morning, get up, the blood sugar is 131. Oh my goodness. What is it, Robby? It's the nuts. Okay.

Okay. I'll quit eating the nuts. Next morning, my blood sugar is 107.

I'm not kidding. And I did it for a week. And for the first time ever in the history of Robby, since I've been using this meter, I had a full week with not one blood sugar out of range. And the only difference in anything that I did different was no nuts, which seems nuts. But, you know, if you talk to the Lord, you can have an amazing relationship.

Or when you talk to somebody who talks to the Lord, you can hear from God. Because I had an outer range when, of course, I'm excited when I have just a, or when I get down to 131. But I had the same sort of thing happen this week where I had a bunch of pistachios. I figured they're good for me two ways. I'm exercising while I eat them and I ate a bunch of pistachios. And the next morning, and I'd been good all day, the next morning I was higher than you were.

Around 160-something. It's nuts. I'm telling you. Sometimes you feel like a nut, sometimes you don't.

Some of us have a lot more almond joy in our life than mounds. Yeah, that's true. So Harold, what would you like to speak to us on this topic about? It's always good to get your perspective. Well, the thing that strikes me about it is God doesn't show up with a picture ID.

So how do you know it's Him? I think it's important that you know the Word, because He is not going to contradict His written Word. But if you don't know the Word, then you may believe something that you think is God and it's not. So I would encourage anyone who expects to hear from God first, learn His Word, and then try to listen to hear what He may have to say to help you as your utilization of that Word.

To me, it's very important. That's good. So Robby, where would the nuts be in the Scripture? Well, actually, it's in the Song of Solomon.

I went down into the Garden of Nuts to see if the vine flourished and the pomegranate budded. I'm just saying. Oh, that's there. Okay.

Fair enough. I've been in the Garden of Nuts for some time. But I will point out, just for fun, and to poke at Harold, because he knows we don't necessarily agree on a lot of things, that I had no understanding of the Bible when I first started talking to Jesus. You know what he told me? Read the Bible.

I'm serious. I would not—I mean, he pointed me in that direction, and I'm so glad he did. But it does not exclude you from hearing from God if you're not an expert on the Bible.

However, I couldn't agree with him more that the more you learn the Word, the more you'll enjoy talking to him, because you're getting an opportunity to see how he talks in the language that he uses. And so it's absolutely a beautiful thing. But don't wait. Don't wait. Start now. Yeah, and I think it's important that you test the fruit of whatever you think you're hearing, to some degree, right?

You're not eating nuts is not really going to hurt anything. Right. Right.

I mean, right. Yeah. He's still going to die. Maybe not as soon.

Not as soon. Yeah. But yeah, and so— Right, right. No, no doubt that if you know the Scripture says don't do that, you didn't hear that from God. Harold's exactly right on that point.

It's just that, you know, I don't think, in my mind, you know, if you can hear from God, like, he won't actually contradict his Word. No, I agree. I agree.

Right. I definitely—well, I'm sitting between them, and I'm between them on that. I agree with Harold as well, but I was talking to God and hearing from him before I really paid any attention to the Bible, read the Bible. But Jesus does tell us that his sheep will hear his voice. Now, we hear lots of different voices, or at least I do in my head, and that's why I'm schizophrenic.

But the ultimate thing is, if you hear something that is contrary to the Word, you can immediately say that's the devil, or it might be me, but it's more likely the enemy. Yeah. Thank you, Jim. We do have a boot camp coming up March 30th through April 2nd. The only thing I would say is if you haven't been to a boot camp or to an entrenchment, you actually can't come to this one because it is an advanced camp. If you have been, this is where you want to be on March 30th. It's no better place.

God's got some really cool stuff there. We do have an entrenchment coming up later this year. We don't know when, and also a fall boot camp that you can go to if you haven't been to one. But go to masculinejourney.org to listen. How did God remind you who you were at boot camp?

Oh, in so many different ways, from beginning to end. You better expect God to show up because He's going to show up. If you give Him the time, He's going to show up big at this boot camp. It's so important to me that I'm going to drive 550 miles to get there. You can spend three days laughing with your brothers and fishing, shooting.

It don't get no better than that. And then you're given time to spend time with God, and He will talk to you with the brothers, friends, the things that you're taught and the things that you think about. Just amazing experience all the way around. What we have at our boot camp is something that makes you stronger, and it gives you the strength to go on your regular walk with God. It's something that will make you be bigger than you were when you got there. I think sometimes as men, we feel like we're on our own, and we've got to do everything ourselves. And the way of the world is on our shoulders, and it's our job to fix everything and make everything right and have all the answers. And I think when you come here, you just get really honed back in and reminded that God really is for us, that a good Father helps you.

And a good Father makes you have all the tools you need, and a good Father comes through for you when you need Him, and you just feel less alone. There we go. It is over already, hearing His voice.

And there was sort of a battle of bumps, and I was allowed to win. But I had trouble hearing a screechy girl being God's voice in the alternative. Yeah, yeah. And this was the week of that holiday that gets chocolate and flower people in the green for the year, Valentine's Day. And so Lionel Richie is for those that are... No Barry White, you want to play?

Well, Barry White's up there too. But I would have fallen asleep. It was hard enough with Lionel. Yeah, it was tough. That was a tough one. But that is about hearing the voice of someone you love.

And the same excitement that we had as teenagers hearing someone we had fallen in love with should be the same excitement we have in hearing from God and the anticipation. And that's why I went with the romantic. Yeah, that's fine. I lost out on the bump, but that's okay. You were outvoted technically, but it's still... We went with your... Oh, had to throw that in. Yeah, no, it was good. It was good. The other bump was Call Me from a group called Blondie.

And it wasn't about the lady singing it, it was about her lyrics. And it was just, call me anytime, day or night, call me. And the whole thought on that was, God's available to us, we don't have to even pick up the phone. He's just there.

And so they both have great points, and I appreciate you doing that. He's there 24-7 and 366. Yeah, exactly.

Exactly. So Rodney has the next clip, correct? He does.

He does. Rodney, anything you wanna say before you get to your clip? No, you wanna talk about the Advanced Bootcamp? I know I just made a comment during the break.

Well, yeah, you made a comment. Yeah. I just don't know if everybody understands as to why we say, hey, if you've been to a previous bootcamp or an entrenchment, then you can go to the advanced. Well, the advanced by the term advanced is, it's basically building on the foundation of what we do at bootcamp. So it's taking some of the topics that we do deeper, and it's also doing a lot of other topics that we may not do or do as in depth or do very often in a regular bootcamp. It's just in the whole idea is to go further and deeper with God, which is a whole after hours theme also.

Yeah. And if you have been to a bootcamp and you wanna know, okay, what's different? Well, we'll share a little bit of the secret sauce. What God's laid on our heart for this particular bootcamp is twofold, is to go into the advanced warfare talks from Wild at Heart on their bootcamp. And we're doing some of those, the majority of those. And then we're also gonna dig deeper into the masculine journey, which is a series that we just went through not too long ago on the radio show. And we're gonna go deeper into that, actually deeper than Wild at Heart ever goes into it, because we feel like there's a lot more fruit to be mined there and feel like God's been pressing that on our heart for a while now. And so you don't mind fruit, I get that Jim, but yeah, more... Mixed metaphors are fun. That's fine. I mean, I guess you... Well, no, there's no fruit that you mind.

Potatoes are the fruit, but still, you don't mind it, you dig it. Anyway, Rodney, you have a clip. So we'll just get off the whole mining of whatever to the clip. Back to the show. Back to the show.

All right. So on hearing God's voice, when at first I saw this, the very first thing that came to my mind was, so faith comes from hearing and hearing by the word of Christ. That was just the first thing that kind of just jumped right into my mind.

I started wondering, well, what other places... Because there's an awful lot that jumped out of like, there's a lot of talk about hearing, whether it could be positive and it could be negative. And I just kind of was perusing. The other part that I really liked was the stretch in Galatians 3, 2 through 6.

This is the only thing I want to find out from you. Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law or by hearing with faith? Are you so foolish, having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected in the flesh?

Do you suffer so many things in vain, if indeed it was in vain? So then, does he who provides you with the Spirit and works miracles among you, do it by the works of the law or by hearing with faith? And then he references to Abraham. So even Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness. There is a lot of impact that I think you really want to contemplate on in hearing from God. It's the basis for our faith. The word, the Bible, is the basis.

I know we had the talk earlier. Yes, hearing from God is very important and can be very meaningful. And I just know that it gets abused. And that's, I think, where Harold's point is, you know, hey, this gets abused a lot. Watch where you're going with it, and it has to be reckoned with the Word of God. So everybody's just, you know, you get some people that come up with some a lot of crazy things, right?

But where I went with this and all, based on all that, because that's some of the same thoughts in my mind is, here's the reinforcement, here's also the danger sign, right? But here in this clip that I found here, it's, her name is Rachel Flowers, and she did a documentary. Somebody found out about her and said, we got to do this documentary, which this clip is nothing more than the part of the trailer. And it kind of introduces it. There's not as much in there other than understanding who she is. But the documentary is called Hearing is Believing. And when we come back, I'll explain a little more. Hi, my name is Rachel Flowers.

It's been a while since I talked to you. I'm making a documentary film called Hearing is Believing. Lorenzo de Stefano is making the documentary. And it's been pretty exciting.

Sometimes it was a little hard, but most of the time it's been pretty exciting. Hi, I'm Lorenzo de Stefano. I'm the filmmaker behind Rachel Flowers, Hearing is Believing. It's a feature documentary about a young Rachel Flowers, 20-year-old, really gifted musician, a very sweet person, very smart young lady, who we discovered quite by chance and who became pretty clear that we had to drop everything and make a film about her. If you like Rachel's music as much as we do, and you've come to know and admire her for who she is, we'd love to get your support. If you'd like to learn more about it, you could go to rachelflowersfilm.com and write to me and let me know what you think.

Bye. And then the verse that came to my mind was 2 Corinthians 5-7, we walk by faith and not by sight. And just thinking about her story and the life that she lives, walking by hearing, you know, she hears everything. That's her main communication tool with everybody else. And then she's got incredible voice, which, you know, comes from hearing other things. And then she can translate that. Rodney, you might want to point out she's blind. I am. Okay.

Yeah, I know. But she's blind and, you know, she's going through her entire life listening and being able to pick up all these different sounds and imitate them. It was really funny in that I didn't put it in there because it's just so small, but she starts to introduce herself and then she hears the ice cream truck and immediately starts playing the tune on the ice cream truck. You know, it's like a Bach or Beethoven or something like that, that it's like beautiful. And you're just like, man, she just picks that up and just runs with that, that God gives us the ability to overcome our deficiencies and be able to go into life and be able to project the things that we do have, the strengths and the gifts that we do have very well.

And somebody else who's blind may not have her gifts, but they got different gifts. And it's just so important to make sure that you're always working on hearing from God in the way that He's going to communicate with you and have that intimate relationship. Thank you. David, do you have something you'd like to share? Yeah, with what Rodney was just talking about, make sure you listen to how, I mean, God communicates to everybody differently. And it happens to be at certain points, maybe you're doing something or not. For me, for instance, it could be a song that comes on the radio during a time. My word of the year, we've talked about it on a previous show is patience. I got that word from going and hunting with my buddies because I lack a lot of patience pretty much in everything. So you just got to sometimes slow down and stop and listen or do whatever you're doing and that's how He talks to you.

Yeah, agreed. It's not necessarily just an audible version and He comes down and says, hey, I'm God, listen to me. I mean, sometimes He does that, but. Yeah, when you look back at the stories of the Bible, obviously they had the written word that they discussed and all that. But when you look at the stories of the Bible, God chose to speak to His people and talk to them about things that necessarily wouldn't be normal things to do, like Abram at the time, before he became Abraham, was asked to leave everything he had. And people probably looked at him and said, wow, that's crazy.

Why would you do that? I mean, you've got a great life here, but God continually called people on adventures into things that didn't seem to make sense. Like Noah building the ark in a drought. Yeah, they'd never had rain before, before he built the ark.

They'd had some dew and some things like that, but never had physically rain. And so he didn't even have a context for why he would need this boat in the middle of the desert. Yeah, I think they use that at Wild at Heart quite a bit, talking about hearing from God is the Bible is a book of examples, not a book of exceptions.

Right. And I think we're expected to hear from God. I mean, you talk about the story of Elijah when he, you know, we look for God to be in the big noisy thing, the earthquake, the wind, the fire, but it's that still small voice.

Jim said it earlier, his sheep hear his voice and they follow him. Now I will say, God talks to us in different ways. It can be the circumstances that are around us. It can be the word, but there's no doubt. We are, this says the spirit of the man is a candle of the Lord.

I believe that God has a way of speaking to us through his spirit. And John Eldridge's favorite story, which I also love is of David. Right. And you know, most men, if we do something and it works well, we always go back to that, you know, the little boy with the hammer, every the world looks like this, a nail to him.

Right. So there's a story in, you know, first Samuel where King David had gone up against the Philistines and he was supposed to go through this, you know, right straight through to take them on and he, and he beats them. But then he ends up facing them again a couple of years later. And rather than going right back and do that, he says, let's inquire the Lord. So they go to Lord, Lord says, no, this time you'll wait for him to come through the balsam so you can hear him. And once again, you know, he's waiting to hear from God. And as Andy says, you know, that's the example of what we're to do.

Exactly. We have so much more coming up in the after hours. We have a clip from The Chosen, which is Jim's.

We have one from Andy, Born Supremacy, I think it was, and then one for me from Field of Dreams. So you want to do that, listen to that and go to masculinejourney.org to look at our upcoming events. We'll talk with you next week. This is the Truth Network.