 Hello, Radio Church, how's everybody doing? Guys doing good? Hey, next weekend is going to be a very, very powerful weekend. You just saw it on the update, but it is going to be prophetic, presbytery weekend. And we have done this a couple of different times throughout the years, and every time that we do it, it is incredibly powerful. For a lot of us, you're not familiar with seeing prophetic ministry actually carried out. This is going to be a no weird zone, but it is going to be a very powerful environment. And so I just want to encourage you to make sure that you're here at Radiant, whether it's here or at Portage next weekend, because there's some powerful things that happen when God speaks over people's lives. I'm actually going to be teaching next weekend on the gift of prophecy. So I'll set the stage. We have one of our overseers, Pastor Tom Lane is going to be here, as well as Ed Ivy, who was here the last time, and a couple of new friends who are going to be our presbyters. We have candidates that are going to come up, be invited up onto the platform, at both here and at Portage. And these men have been praying over them and writing down, praying and fasting about what God would want to say over these individuals' lives. And then there's also going to be opportunity in the service for them to share spontaneous words in season with people that are in the congregation. They're not going to be calling people's sin out. They're not going to be standing you up and saying, I know that you cheated on your taxes in 1989 and that kind of thing. It's going to be encouraging. It's going to be comforting. And it's going to be a breakthrough for many people's lives. So listen, I don't normally say this, but whatever you already maybe have planned for next weekend, cancel it and be here, because it is going to be powerful. And then on Sunday night, we're going to have special service as well as Monday morning, Monday night and Tuesday morning. So make plans to join us. Turn with me in your Bibles if you brought one this weekend to Hebrews chapter one. This is part two of our series entitled, Tuned In. And this series is dedicated to helping understand how to hear the voice of the Lord. We established last weekend that God is a God who speaks. God is not a God who's on mute. He's not done talking. God is a God who speaks. So this weekend, we're going to be talking about how does God speak to us? How does God speak to us? And you're going to realize pretty quickly that God speaks to us in some ways all the time. God speaks to us in other ways some of the time. And then there are some extraordinary ways that God speaks to us. And so let's start by looking at the word of God. Hebrews chapter one beginning in verse number one. It says, long ago at many times and in many ways God spoke to our fathers by the prophets. But in these last days, he has spoken to us by his son whom he appointed the heir of all things through whom also he created the world. So the writer of the book of Hebrews, some believe it's the apostle Paul, other people believe that it's Apollos, others still Priscilla and Aquila. Here's what I know, God wrote the book of Hebrews, right? And it starts off right at the very beginning by telling us that in the past, talking about the times preceding the coming of Jesus, preceding the incarnation, God spoke in various ways. But now on the other side of the cross, on the other side of the gospels, you and I as believers realize that the fullness of everything that God has to say to us is summed up in the person of Jesus. Now, some people have read this particular scripture over the years and come to the conclusion that God used to speak through prophets, God used to speak through supernatural means, but he's done doing that because he has sent Jesus. And what this verse is saying is now all we have to look at is the person of Jesus or the story of Jesus, and that's all that God has to say for us. But that is not what this scripture is saying. What this scripture is actually teaching us is that God is a God who, as a good father, has gone above and beyond normal measures to communicate who he is to you and I as his sons and daughters. But the fullness of everything, the epitome of what God wanted to say to us is summed up in his son Jesus. Jesus is the filter of everything God has to say to us. That means everything in the Old Testament goes through the filter of Jesus. And listen, it means everything that we believe God is speaking to us today still goes through the filter of Jesus. But here's the reality is that if Jesus is our filter or we'll say this, if Jesus is the frequency, the single frequency, then there are still multiple ways that Jesus is speaking to us to this day. And so this weekend, my goal is to share with us, is to get us anchored really in a biblical understanding of the different ways that God speaks to us today. If God spoke in various ways in the Old Testament, how does God speak to us now? Well, I'm gonna give you four ways that God speaks to us. And so if you're taking notes, you can follow along. It's gonna be very easy. It's gonna be one, two, three, four. I'm gonna throw a lot of scripture in because that's one of the primary ways that God speaks to us. And we're going to invite the Holy Spirit to speak through his word to us. So Holy Spirit, we thank you that Jesus called you the comforter, the one who would lead and guide us into all truth. And right now I pray against the spirit of distraction. I pray against the spirit of confusion. I pray against the religious spirit. And I pray that today, Holy Spirit, you would lead and guide us as your children into all truth, open our eyes to be able to see great and wonderful things out of your law that strengthen and equip us as sons and daughters of God. In Jesus' name, everybody said, amen. So how does God speak to us today? How do we tune in? In order to tune in to what you wanna listen to on the radio, you gotta know the frequency. How do we tune into what God has to say to us on a daily basis? Because as we said last weekend, God is always speaking to us. Just like right now in this room, there's radio waves, sound waves, music, phone calls, information that is moving and flowing through this room, but it's invisible to the naked eye and you would be completely unaware of it unless somebody told you how to tune into it. And as soon as you know the frequency, you're able to harness all of that wonderful music. You're able to harness the information on the internet. You're able to download the information text and that kind of thing. And then it becomes revelation to you. It informs you. Well, our frequency is Jesus, but through the filter of Jesus, how does God speak to us? There's four ways. And number one, it's the primary way is that God is always speaking to us through His written word, the Bible. God is always, everybody say always. God is always speaking to us through His written word because all you have to do in order to hear from God through the written word of God is all you gotta do is open it. All you have to do is open it and God is right there speaking to you. It's like a signed check. All you have to do is cosign that check and believe what you read because faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. And so if we go to the Bible and we read it, God is speaking to us because the Bible is the only book that when you are reading it, it is equally reading you. See, Jesus said about His words, He said this, the words that I speak to you are spirit and truth. They are spirit and life. So there's something powerful about the word of God. The Bible is not just any other book. The Bible says about itself in 2 Timothy 3.16, it says all scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction and for training and righteousness that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work. Psalm 119, by the way, which is the longest chapter in the Bible is a chapter written by the psalmist about the Bible, about God's word. And it says in Psalm 119, 105, it says your word, is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path. Hebrews chapter four, verse 12, talking about the word of God, it says for the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and spirit of joint and marrow, listen, and discerning the thoughts and the intentions of the heart. So the word of God, the Bible, the written word, the logos of God is always speaking to us. And I don't know if you think about it very often, but we have such an incredible gift in the Bible. When God gave us the Bible, it was a revelation of himself, of his heart, of creation, of new creation, and of his plan of redemption and all the character and attributes of who he is. If God is truly a father, then he's relatable. And if he's relatable, he's going to communicate and tell us about who he is, but also inform us about ourselves. And if he wants us to please him, he's going to give us the revelation of how to please him. And he's also going to give us an indicator of where he's taking the world that we live in. All of that is found in the pages of scripture. And you know, the blessing that we have is that God is always speaking to us through the scriptures. He's always speaking to us. How many have ever done one of these? You need a word from God. You're just looking for direction from the Lord. And you're just like, Lord, speak to me. And you just took your Bible and you said, all right, I need a word from you. And you just flipped it open. How many have ever done that before? Come on, be honest. I'll raise my hand. The other day this was wild. The Lord put a scripture on my heart. I was in the middle of studying for something. And I had walked away. I was in the kitchen and the scripture came to my mind of something that I'd read that connected really, really well to what I was trying to write, actually. And so I went into my study and my Bible was closed and I just took it and I flipped it where I thought it was and I opened up to the exact verse. I was like, hello. So it worked that time. But how many know that it doesn't always work like that? I had a friend of mine who did this and he said, you know, I just needed to hear from God. And so I thought the Bible. So Lord, just, you know, do it. And he opened it up and it said, and Judas went out and hung himself. And he said, well, I need another word. So he flipped it over and it says, you go and do likewise the next verse. And he's like, well, that can't be God. Now, when I'm talking about God always speaking to us through the Bible, I'm not talking about like the role of the dice casino style God speaking to us. I'm talking about letting the word of Christ dwell in us richly. You see, today we have more Bibles than we've ever had at any other time in history, but yet according to the most recent surveys, Bible reading or Bible literacy is at its lowest point in almost 100 years. And I think that it's interesting that we have more options. We have more Bibles. We have more programs. We've got it on our phone. You can listen to it. I mean, it's everywhere. It's in the drawers at hotels, but yet we're living busy lives where we're not actually consuming the word of God. And so the word of God, listen to me, is the basis of everything else and every other way that God speaks to us. It's not necessarily in the U version notes, but I want to read to you Colossians chapter three. Paul writes in Colossians 316, he said, let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs with Thanksgiving in your heart to God. And whatever you do in word or indeed, do everything in the name of the Lord giving thanks to God. He starts off by saying, let the word of Christ dwell in you richly. The word let means you have to allow it. And the way that you allow it is you live a life of constant pursuit of the word of God as found in the Bible. The Bible doesn't get into our hearts by osmosis. It's not like a USB port that you can like download it. No, the way that you get the word of Christ richly dwelling in you is you have to read it. One of my earliest memories of my grandfather as a little boy was that my grandfather worked at Jenner Motors early in the morning. I would crawl out of bed, go run out, sit on his lap at 5.30 in the morning. And he would be reading his Bible every morning. Today my grandfather's 86 years old and his memory of certain things, the slipping, his body is getting tired. He used to be a real strapping, strong guy. Now he has a real hard time walking, but at 86 years old when you sit down, you'll have a conversation with him. Everything that you say, his answer will be scripture. Every single thing that you say. When you say, well, you know, the weather has kind of been roughing Michigan. Well, Genesis says, you know, seed, time and harvest, sun, spring, winter will be until the ends of the earth. And Ecclesiastes says, he's got a scripture for everything. And even when the election was taking place, I said, well, who do you think is gonna win? He said, well, you know, it says before Jesus comes, the last Trump will sound. And so, you know, he's even got his sense of humor when it comes to his Bible reading. But he's, what has he done? He has developed in his life a relationship of hearing the voice of God every day by sitting down and consuming the scripture, by reading it and letting it richly dwell in us. I wanna ask you, every one of us in our hearts have something richly dwelling in us. What is richly dwelling in your heart? As a disciple of Jesus, the one thing that we should pursue more than anything else to let it richly dwell in our heart is the word of Christ. Because listen, it says in this scripture that whatever words that we allow to richly dwell in us will become the words that we richly communicate to others. It will affect how you work because it says, let all that you say and do be as unto the Lord. Well, the word that we take into our heart transforms us and changes us even in the way that we communicate to others, songs, hymns, spiritual songs with Thanksgiving, it affects our attitude, it even affects the way that we go to work and it affects the way that we relate in our relationships. It changes us from the inside. It actually renews our mind according to the will of God. So the primary way that God speaks to us is he speaks to us through his written word. Charles Spurgeon, the Prince of Preachers from England about 120 years ago, he said this about the Bible. He said, if you wish to know God, you must know his word. If you wish to perceive his power, you must see how he works by his word. If you wish to know his purpose before it actually is brought to pass, you can only discover it by his word. You see, the Bible, the word of God is living and active and if we will let it richly saturate us day by day, day by day of our life, what will begin to happen is our worldview and our perspective of who we are and who God is and his purpose and his plan and his destiny for our life will begin to be shaped by this and a whole lot less shaped by the things of the world, the perspective of the world. God is always wanting to speak to us through the scripture. We just have to let it. And next week and the week after that, I'm gonna be talking about specifically how to develop a secret place relationship with the Lord where you can hear the voice of God through the scripture and in prayer. It's so important that you have a secret place, time and a place to meet with God on a daily basis. It will change your life. If you don't have that, if you're not used to reading the Bible, listen, the only way to get it richly on the inside of you is to start and to get it on the inside of you because I promise you, God is always speaking. The second way that God is always speaking to us is God is always speaking to us through his indwelling Holy Spirit. Now this is a little bit more subjective and let me just say this, that in the body of Christ there is a tendency for people to pitch their tent in one camp or the other and say, well, I'm a word person or I'm a spirit person. Over in the word camp, it's like God only speaks through the Bible. We only know God through theology. We study the scriptures. We understand the doctrine. And that's the only way that God speaks. All this subjective Holy Spirit stuff, that's not happening anymore. God doesn't do that anymore because all we need is the Bible. And then you've got people over in the spirit camp who say, no, you know, we don't need theology. We don't need doctrine. We don't really even need the Bible. We've got the Holy Spirit and everything is spontaneous and subjective in the moment. And we're just Holy Spirit people. But can I tell you that if Jesus is our filter, we need to realize what Jesus said, that God the Father is looking for worshipers who will worship him in spirit and in truth. We need both. There is not a contradiction between the scriptures and the spirit. There might be a contradiction in us in a division that we have falsely created, but the Holy Spirit's not over here going, that Bible stuff is so dry. That's just so fundamentalist and so, you know, Westboro Baptist. And, you know, that's just so, we're just spirit. We got spirit. Yes, we do. We got spirit. How about you? And the Bible's not over here going, oh, that Holy Spirit, he's weird. That's like, you know, the crazy cousin who, you know, waves the banners and starts swinging from the chandeliers. I'm just the Bible. I'm the intellectual, the PhD. No, the scriptures were inspired by the Holy Spirit. You don't have a Bible without the Holy Spirit. And without the Holy Spirit, here's what happens. If you have only scripture without the Holy Spirit, you will be dry. But if all you have is the spirit without the scriptures, then you'll become like a river that has no river banks. And you'll experience flood and devastation and destruction because you can easily be deceived without the boundary markers of scripture. But when those two work together, it's a powerful, it's a beautiful thing. It's not, they're not distinct and they're not separate. God is always speaking through the scriptures and God is always speaking to us in the scriptures through the Holy Spirit. I want you to think about this scripture. First Corinthians chapter two, verses nine through 16 says, it is written, isn't that interesting, right there. The Holy Spirit inspiring scripture, quote, scripture. You got to only be God to be able to quote yourself in the Bible, how about that? And the Holy Spirit says, it is written, I has not seen nor ear heard nor has it entered into the heart of man, the things that God has prepared for those who love him. How many love him? How many love him? The Bible says that you've never seen it, you've never heard it, you can't even imagine it, the things that God has prepared for you because you love him, but then it goes on and it says this. But God has revealed them to us through his spirit. Isn't that interesting? It says, for the spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God, for what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of that man, which is in him. Even so, no one knows the things of God except the spirit of God. Verse 12, now, this is so key. We have received not the spirit of the world, but the spirit who is from God that we might know the things that have freely been given to us. So just like Jesus said that it's to your advantage that I go away so that I can send the Holy Spirit and he will lead you and guide you into all truth and he will take of what his mind and reveal it to you, the Holy Spirit has been given to us, the indwelling Holy Spirit, so that you and I will know the things that have been freely given to us, the inheritance that we have in Jesus Christ, the change that has taken place, the promises that God has for us, the future, the destiny, the power that he has for us. Those things are not revealed to us just by our own intellect. Those things are not revealed to us by the world. It's interesting that it says that we've not received the spirit from the world. There's a, listen, there is a spirit of this world that if we submit to it, we'll begin to lay out all the things that seem like an inheritance that eventually lead to death and bondage. The spirit of this world will always lead you off into prodigal living, promising you pleasure, happiness, success and materialism, but in the end you will be locked up, blinded and deaf and longing to return back to the Father's house. That's the spirit of this world. But the spirit of God is on the inside saying, no, you used to be a sinner, but now you're a saint. You used to be a slave, but now you're a child. You used to be in this world without God and without hope, but now you have been brought into the Commonwealth of Israel. You've been made a fellow member of the household of God. You are seated with Christ in heavenly places. You will judge angels. You will reign over the universe with Jesus. You will sit in judgment even over the 12 tribes of Israel. You've been changed, transformed. You are loved. And the Holy Spirit will take the scriptures and illuminate them to us in a way that our dry, logical, natural mind, rationalism will miss so much of it. Let me go on and read the rest of this because it's so powerful. Verse 13, these things we also speak not in words which man's wisdom teaches, but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But the natural man, listen, the natural man does not receive the things of the spirit for their foolishness to him, nor can he know them because they are spiritually discerned. So the natural man, you've got this old natural mind that is trained in the ways of the world. It's fleshly, it's carnal. That will never, ever cooperate and embrace the things of the spirit. But yet you also have the spirit on the inside of you that's saying, no, let me teach you what God thinks. Let me teach you God's perspective. Let me give you God's ideas. Let me illuminate the word of God to you. This goes right along with our understanding of why we need the Holy Spirit. He comes to teach us and lead us into all truth and all the things that have been given to us. And the scriptures and the spirit work in tandem in our life. The prayer that I pray every single day when I read the Bible is this, Holy Spirit, open my eyes to see beyond the words to what you want me to see and hear what you want me to hear. Because I don't just need to read the Bible as an intellectual exercise. If you read the Bible as an intellectual exercise, the Bible says that knowledge puffs up. And so you'll get arrogant, proud, argumentative, divisive, debatable and religious. You ever met somebody like that? Listen, there is no one meaner on the planet than a Christian with a text without the spirit. Because we love to beat people up over the head with the Bible. It's like, God hates you. God's gonna send you to hell. God is gonna make this whole world burn. Let's make some bumper stickers. This car will be unmanned in case of a rapture. In other words, we don't care about you. We outta here, baby. Is that the spirit of Jesus? Who said that God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son? That's not the spirit of Jesus. The spirit of Jesus says, I love you. I'm pursuing you. I'm long suffering. I could have judged the world, but I'm long suffering and waiting because I don't want any to perish. Christians with just the Bible and not the spirit attached to it become mean and destructive. The Bible says in 2 Corinthians, it says that the letter kills, but the spirit gives life. The letter kills, but the spirit gives life. We need both the spirit and the scriptures together. And we need to realize the new covenant is a better covenant than the old covenant because we have both the written and the writer. In the Old Testament, they just had the word and they had to try and figure out the word and they missed Jesus when he was coming because they thought just following the Bible as a book was going to make them right with God. And then when God sent Jesus as the savior of the world, they rejected Jesus because Jesus challenged their traditions and religious ideas about the book and didn't realize Jesus actually was the book in flesh. Think about that for a minute. They rejected the word in the flesh because the word in the flesh didn't reflect their translation or interpretation of the word in print. Man. But what happens when you have both? You have the writer of scripture. He dwells on the inside of you. He's the best teacher that you could ever have. And here's the promise that we have. God is always, the Holy Spirit is always, he's always speaking to us. He teaches, he speaks to us through the scriptures, some of the other things that we need to become experts in is he speaks to us through that still small voice of the Holy Spirit in our life that is not a fleshly voice. We're oftentimes we're looking for God to give us an audible voice, but we need to learn the voice of the Holy Spirit. It's a still small voice. Sometimes the Holy Spirit speaks to us through peace. Sometimes he speaks to us through conviction or what we call our conscience. How many have ever had a moment in your life where you know you shouldn't be doing something or enter into a conversation or go to a place and you have this quote, check or sense in your heart? Has anybody ever experienced that before? Can I say that's the Holy Spirit? We say, well, my conscience. You don't have a conscience without the Holy Spirit. It's the Holy Spirit on the inside of you just saying, hey, nudging you, have you ever had one of these moments? All of a sudden your heart starts beating and you have this sense, I'm supposed to give something to somebody and then your mind's going, why would we do that? We could use that. I mean, I don't, no, I don't wanna do that. I don't wanna give and you just keep seeing this picture of something. Give them your watch, buy them dinner, boom, boom, boom. And it just won't go, anybody ever had that type of thing? That's God speaking to you, that's the Holy Spirit. But we have to learn his language. And here's what we need to realize that the Holy Spirit speaking to us will always speak from the foundation of the word of God, but he also has his own language, it's peace, it's impressions, it's conviction, it's what I call holy nudges. Let me explain it to you this way. Raise your hand if you're married. If you're married, raise your hand, okay. So what you know is that when you start dating, you know very little about the person that you are going out with. But the more time that you spend getting to know that person, studying them, you begin to learn and understand that verbal communication is only about 25% of communication. Because the longer you're married, you begin to figure out your, at least in my case, you begin to figure out your wife's body language. Is anybody married to somebody who has very demonstrative body language? Or how about more importantly, what they don't say than what they do say? Like here, I'll give you an example. Jane's not here to defend herself this weekend, but for example, I know that when I'm texting Jane, I'll say, hey, I wanna buy this thing or I'm gonna go out after work and I'll be home later, are you okay with that? If she says, yes, well, an exclamation point, then she's all good. If she says, okay, that means she's all right with it. But if she says, fine, fine does not mean fine. Fine means you're gonna pay a price. Come on, somebody. Fine means you can do it, but I ain't happy about it. And when you come home, you're gonna pay the price. So when I get fine, I cancel plans. I'm just like, no, I'm good. Nope, not willing to pay that price. Nope, love you, baby. If it's K, I'm like, let me tell you why. And if it's yes, then I'm like, all right, listen. I know her language and I know her body language. I know the look on her face, the nudge. I know her eyes. I know the tone of her voice. I know certain language. That is, if you typed out what she said or didn't say, you could walk away and go, well, there's no problem there. But if you see the eyes, the times of affirmation or the low nudge, there's times where we can look at each other over at dinner table and we have guests over and I just tell where she wants me to go, what she wants me to say, what she wants me to get. Why? It's because I've spent a lot of time with her. And when you spend time with God in his word and you spend time welcoming and looking for the impressions of the Holy Spirit and recognizing how the Spirit speaks to you and the language that he uses, whether it be peace, whether it be pictures, whether it be a still small voice, whether it be conviction, do not quench the Holy Spirit. Do not brush that off. Do not grieve the Holy Spirit the scriptures say, why? Because when the Spirit leads us in something and we don't follow that little prompting, which he's always doing, we just need to learn to pay attention about it. My dogs, for example, I've shifted gears from Jane to my dogs, but my dogs are so crazy because they want scraps off the table. So they will come up and those sit there. Anybody else dogs do this? They just like look at you and they're waiting for you. And I'll just kind of look at them. You ain't getting anything in day school. I mean, they're at like attention. They know, I know you've done it before. And if I wait long enough, you'll do it again. And so I'll sit there and then finally, they know when I begin to like peel something with my fingers, they figured it out. That if I peel things with my fingers, that I'll toss it to them. So I sit there, his mouth will start drooling. Or if I get up in the morning and goes directly to the coffee maker, they know they're not going to doggy daycare. But if I get up on certain days of the week and I put a ball cap on, they run for the door because they know that movement means they're getting in the car, going to play with their friends at doggy daycare. We need to be experts at the non-verbal communication, the subjective communication of the Holy Spirit that's still small voice. The nudges, the impressions. So God is always speaking number one through the word. He's always speaking number two through the spirit. Number three is where God often speaks to us. It's not always, but it's often. And God is often speaking to us through others. He'll often speak to us through others. And why it's often and not always is because God wants you to develop an always relationship with him so that he can supplement that with an often through other people. He wants you dependent on him, not dependent on others. But he wants you built up and strengthened by others because that's the way that he's formed us. He's made us. He will oftentimes speak through others and he'll speak through others through spiritual gifts. First Corinthians chapter 12 talks about spiritual gifts. Let me just read this. Verse one through six, this is now concerning spiritual gifts, brothers. I do not want you to be uninformed. You know that when you were pagans, you were led astray to mute idols, however you were led. Therefore, I want you to understand that no one speaking in the spirit of God ever says that Jesus is a curse and no one says that Jesus is Lord except in the Holy Spirit. Now there are a variety of gifts but the same spirit. There are a variety of service but the same Lord and there are a variety of activities but it's the same God who empowers them. Listen, in everyone. To each is given the manifestation of the spirit for the common good. And then it lists off all the different gifts of spirit. Word of wisdom, word of knowledge, prophecy, tongues, interpretation of tongues, discerning, working of miracles, healing, and faith. Nine gifts, manifestations of the Holy Spirit that God gives to all of us. They're in us because the Holy Spirit's in us and he will use us for it says for the common good. In other words, to edify, to strengthen and to build other people up. Now, next weekend, we will see the ministry or the gift of prophecy or prophetic. Words of wisdom, words of knowledge and prophecy that are used to strengthen, to build up. 1 Corinthians 14 verse four says that the gift of prophecy is always to bring comfort, strength, and encouragement. We're gonna see that next weekend. And you might think to yourself, wow, that's just out there. It's wild, the gifts of the spirit. But again, let me do a survey. How many of you have ever been in a conversation with somebody and you just had an idea, a wise idea to help them navigate their situation in the Lord or you've had somebody just randomly come on your heart that you hadn't seen in a while and you felt like you should call them or pray for them? How many have ever had something like that? Can I just tell you, you've operated in the gifts of the Holy Spirit and you just didn't even know it. That's a word of wisdom. That's a gift of knowledge and prophecy. You see, the Holy Spirit is not weird. The Holy Spirit is supernaturally natural. Oftentimes the things that, whoa, that person just popped into my heart and in my head. I had no idea. I don't know where that came from. I don't believe in coincidences. I believe in God incidences. I believe that God orders our steps. And oftentimes he will use us to speak to others. And oftentimes God will use others to speak to us. Some of the most powerful defining moments in my Christian life, even as a pastor, when I've been in critical moments of making decisions or discouragement, I've had people that I trusted who came up to me and said, I felt like the Lord wanted me to give you this scripture. And it was exactly what we needed in that moment. Or prayed over us and gave us a word. Right now, Jane and I have a file on my computer that has prophetic words that people have spoken to us over the years. One in particular that was spoken in 2001 when our church was 150 people, we were going through one of the most difficult situations ever. I was unprepared for it. And this man named Jim Stevens, we were invited to Grand Haven, Michigan. We went up to Grand Haven. For these prophetic meetings, we showed up late. Nobody knew us, walked in the back and the man, Jim Stevens was up there and he said, young man who just sat down and at that time I was a young man. So he said, young man, would you stand up is that your wife? And I said, yes, he stood up and he gave us a word from the Lord. He said, the Lord wants you to know. And he downloaded this whole thing that 18 years later, we are now walking in as a church. He told us you're gonna plant churches all across America and you're gonna plant them overseas. Your church is gonna grow. God's gonna bring young people. There's gonna be an expression of worship. You're like David who's out in the pasture. You've been overlooked. God wants you to know, just continue to work in the vineyard. Don't give up. God's put a spirit of strength and courage on the inside of you. Don't quit. You're thinking about quitting, don't quit. And it was one of the most profound moments. It anchored us in the call of God. We needed it in that moment. Listen, there are moments where you need more than, God, I read your words faithfully every day but I need something more that will strengthen and encourage me and let me know that right now you see me, you hear me, you care. And the powerful, awesome thing is that God does see us and he does hear us and he does love us and he does know us and he wants to speak to us. See, God speaking to us is just not about some extraordinary signs and wonders. It's a father leading and guiding us. God oftentimes will speak to us through others and then finally, God sometimes speaks to us through extraordinary means. What do I mean by that? Well, I'm talking about wild stuff. I'm talking about when you read the book of Acts which has angels in Acts chapter five that are bringing the apostles out of jail and telling them to go into the temple and preach. God spoke to them through an angel. I'm talking about dreams like in Acts 10 where Paul sees the Macedonian call. I'm talking about visions like in Acts 10 where Peter sees a sheet drop down and unclean animals and God opens up the door to the Gentiles because of a vision that he's seen. I'm talking about audible voices from the Lord where you hear it and other people hear it and some said it thundered but Paul heard the voice of the Lord speak to his life on the road to Damascus. I'm talking about like Numbers chapter 22 where Balaam's donkey spoke and rebuked him. How many know God speaks through donkeys? I'm talking about signs in the heavens like stars over Bethlehem. I mean, we look at those things sometimes and say, well, God, I want one of those. Those are extraordinary means. Sometimes God will speak to us. Sometimes we're tempted to read the book of Acts and go, God, how come you don't? I wanna have all that happening all at once and you don't realize the book of Acts covers 30 years. All those things took place over 30 years which means they happened sporadically but they were supernatural and they were powerful. A lot of times what we're looking for is God to speak to us through extraordinary means and we neglect the way that he's always speaking to us. Instead of saying, this is my daily bread. See, church, this is our daily bread, daily bread. When we live lives based on the word of God, we are building a database in our heart letting the word of Christ dwell within us richly for the Holy Spirit to grab ahold of and speak to us. But make no mistake about it, God is always speaking to us. Would you stand up with me? God is always speaking. In fact, right now God is speaking and I wanna pray a prayer and I want everyone who's listening to just bow your heads and close your eyes if you would as I pray. In fact, before I pray with everyone in a posture of prayer, even while I was preaching, I heard the voice of the Holy Spirit say to me that there's someone who's gonna be watching this played back on a video screen and who's gonna think to themselves, I came to church thinking I was gonna get a word from God and now it's just a video message. But the Lord wants you to know he's already prepared this moment for you and even through the transmission of video, God wants you to know you've not gone too far, you're not alone, it's not hopeless and you've not been overlooked. God is your Father and He's calling you back home. You came looking for a sign and today this is the sign, the voice of your Father saying I see you, I love you and I'm calling you home. See, what I would ask you as I pray today as we've been talking about God speaking to us is what is God saying to you today? What is God saying to you? What is the Holy Spirit speaking to you? What did he speak, what did he highlight through the word today? I think some of us, God's highlighting some, maybe some apathy in our heart where it's, God, I don't wanna be dry, I don't wanna be apathetic anymore, I wanna draw close to you, I wanna be close, I wanna grow, I don't wanna just go through the motions. I think God is speaking to some of us just to become much more disciplined and regular in our pursuit of God, not out of religious obligation. God wants to stir up the passion in our hearts to really love Him. The key to hearing the voice of God is hunger and expectation. And Lord, today we say we hunger to know you, to draw close to you, to hear your voice. Holy Spirit, speak to us. Teach us to tune into your voice, to tune everything else out, to pay attention to your promptings, your leading, your nudges, your peace, your conviction. Holy Spirit, we don't wanna grieve you. Holy Spirit, we don't wanna quench you. We wanna walk and step with you. Teach us to do that, teach us to be people that follow hard after your voice, people that are standing on the rock of your word and that are encouraging one another with our lives. In Jesus' name, amen.