Hearing From the Heart

In the following days, I’m going to deal with the practical outworking of this theme of 'Hearing the voice of God'. I’m going to ask and answer the question: How can we hear God’s voice? I want to turn, first of all, to the teaching of Jesus in the Gospels. Many times, Jesus spoke about having ears to hear, and particularly so when He was teaching in parables. For instance, in Mark 4:9, we read:

Then Jesus said,

“He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”

And in Mark 4:23, a little further on in the same chapter:

“If anyone has ears to hear, let him hear.”

What does that mean, having ears to hear? Obviously, Jesus was not referring to physical ears. Presumably all the people who were listening to him were in possession of two physical ears, at least the great majority of them. Most of them were not physically deaf. But Jesus still said, “If anyone has ears to hear, let him hear.”

So what was He talking about? I believe that He was not talking about outward physical hearing and physical ears, but about an inner condition of the heart. I believe the essence of what we are saying is that we have to hear God with our heart. There’s such a thing as having a heart to hear God, a hearing heart. I’ll turn to an example from the life of Solomon. Early in Solomon’s reign as King of Israel, it says the Lord appeared to Solomon in a dream and asked him a very vital question.

At Gibeon the Lord appeared to Solomon during the night in a dream, and God said, “Ask for whatever you want me to give you.” 1 Kings 3:5

That’s a situation that I’m not sure most of us are ready to face. Suppose God appeared to you and said, “Ask for what you want and I’ll give it to you.” What would you ask for? Let’s read Solomon’s answer.

“Now, O Lord my God, you have made your servant king in place of my father David. But I am only a little child and do not know how to carry out my duties. Your servant is here among the people you have chosen, a great people, too numerous to count or number. [And now here’s Solomon’s request. He was confronted with a situation that was too big for him. He knew he couldn’t handle it. What was he to ask for? This is what he says:] So give your servant a discerning heart to govern your people and to distinguish between right and wrong. For who is able to govern this great people of yours?” [And the comment is:] The Lord was pleased that Solomon had asked for this. 1 Kings 3:7-10

Now, where the translation says “a discerning heart,” the Hebrew says literally, “a hearing heart.” That’s what we’re talking about, a heart that can hear God. And Solomon received it as a gift from God. God gave it to him because he asked for it. Let me pause and ask you this. Have you ever asked God for a hearing heart? Do you realize that it’s with your heart you hear God? Do you realize that this is going to make all the difference in your life whether you can hear God’s voice with your heart?