God is a loving Father who loves to communicate with His children. The Bible says that God’s voice roars like thunder. At the same time, His voice is as gentle as a whisper. Whatever voice He uses to speak to us, we should learn to recognise Him and hear Him.

The Lord Jesus Himself said, “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me” (John 10:27). Why is it that we can’t hear Him at times? Here are some possible reasons:

Maybe it’s because you are not truly following Him

Jesus said “My sheep.” He is our Great Shepherd who takes good care of us and tends to our needs. Sheep are not the smartest of animals and they need a shepherd (or at least a sheep dog) to keep them away from harm. Once a sheep veers away from the shepherd, it quickly gets lost!

In the same way, we won’t hear Jesus correctly if we veer away from His teaching! In the same way that the shepherd has to be within visible or audible range from the sheep, we have to keep our eyes and ears focused to God’s Word so that we can properly hear Him!

Maybe we didn’t develop our relationship with Him

Learning to recognize someone’s voice takes time. We need to dive deep into God’s Word and press into His Presence during our prayer times so that we will familiarize ourselves with Him.

The prophet Elijah once had an experience regarding this in 1 Kings 19:9-13. God spoke to him while he was hiding in a cave. While he was waiting on God, there were three things that came: a strong wind, an earthquake, and fire. Elijah didn’t get up although the first three came. Instead, he got up after a “still small voice” (or a gentle whisper) came. That’s because God was in it.

In the same way, we need to recognize God’s voice from all the other “voices” we hear. There are some voices that sound legitimate, but are actually fake. And most often, the fakes out-volume God’s voice when we don’t know His.

So how will we know if it’s God who’s talking? Here are some things that you should use as basis for God’s voice.

1) God always agrees with His Word

“God is not a man, so he does not lie. He is not human, so he does not change his mind.” (Numbers 23:19)

2) God will never tell you to commit sin

“What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?” (Romans 6:1-3)

3) God will never mislead you to another gospel/another “Christ”

“Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ. But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let them be under God’s curse! … If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let them be under God’s curse!” (Galatians 1:6-9)