Learning to Hear the Voice of the Lord: Volume 1: The House

By Ian Mitchell

God seeks real relationship. He is not a religion, He is not an idol... He is love.
As Christians, we need to learn how to hear and recognize His voice.
The Lord can do amazing, awesome things.. if we would just step out and listen.
Listening is not easy. It's normal to feel crazy at times, but it is so worth it.

Just as in demonstrated in the book of 1 Samuel, we need to be instructed how to recognize God's voice. Sometimes this instruction is from the Holy Spirit himself, however others of us need someone to come beside us and show us that the voice we have experienced all along may be the God of the universe communicate in to us. This can be through pictures, dreams, nature, songs and sometimes a voice. I am not sure that our traditional church structure does a good job at this. Revelation is given in our contemporary model through Pastors, daily devotions and even the Bible, however some of the greatest messages to us come from the Lord himself. This interaction is biblical, and not reserved for the religious elite or the trained. My book is a humble attempt to share my experiences of listening to the Lord over a few years, hoping to ignite or connect something inside of the reader. For those that already have a mature relationship with the spirit of the Lord, this book will seem basic and even uneventful. But for the countless people I interact with daily, this is revolutionary. This book is for the ones that are too embarrassed to ask their pastor, super faithful friends or anyone if God really talks. My argument is that God 'talks' to us ALL. We just don't always recognize Him

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Jul 5, 2017
• ISBN: 9781543903669

Ian Mitchell

Ian Mitchell is the author of Isles of the North (2004) and Isles of the West. He lived for twelve years in Moscow, where he researched his book, Russia and the Rule of Law. He now lives in Campbeltown where he also makes films about books he has read in the course of his research.

Book preview

Chapter 1: Isaiah 58

Shortly before the events described later in this book, I was struck by a passage in Isaiah. I had spent so much time in the poor and neglected part of the United States, seeing deprivations that I had previously been exposed to only while growing up in Asia. (You don’t need to go to a foreign land to see poverty and despair, by the way. Come with me to eastern Kentucky, where you will see some of the poorest counties in America, drug addictions tearing families and communities apart, and children suffering from neglect and malnutrition.) I would witness deprivation during small church visits and revivals, where I would join a few adventurous evangelists and ministers called to serve the poor and the afflicted in the eastern Kentucky region. Guitar in hand, I would show up at these small gatherings and experience an acceptance that I had only dreamt of.

As a result of my time spent among the poor, my faith was strengthened, as I found a deep hope that they would be delivered from their deprivation. This experience reset my middle-class mind, as I witnessed a desperate desire to obtain what I thought were trivial amounts of money. I recall the parents of one particular child praying earnestly for $25. This $25 was needed so the parents’ daughter could rent an iPad for a year to use at school. That experience quickly reset my gauge for measuring need and want. The substance addicts I saw blew my mind. During one of my first visits to Ashland, Kentucky, I was brought to a buffet pizza lunch after one of the revivals with a group of approximately ten brothers and sisters who were seeking Christ’s help to overcome drug addiction. It was a family-friendly, buffet-style restaurant with about thirty tables; several families attended. Obviously, the restaurant was a popular local choice for good pizza at a great price. As we sat down, the group started sharing. Some of them knew each other, some didn’t. This group proceeded to share the name of their drug of choice and explain in detail their depravity. I remember looking around nervously to see if others around us were hearing this, as members of our group were talking loud and proud about their personal pitfalls and struggles. I was also in awe at the openness in which they were sharing their ugliness: serious drug usage, selling themselves for the next fix, criminal acts leading to prison time. After they were done talking about their weaknesses, they became even bolder about the redeeming love and power of Jesus. The whole group’s volume increased, hope and joy filled the entire restaurant. I realized then that I had been robbing God of His glory, because I was hiding my ugliness for fear of being judged by others. But by not testifying to our failures, we leave no room for the message of a Savior who is bigger than all of our ugliness.

Experiences like this lunch in eastern Kentucky among men and women much less fortunate than me made me appreciate, in a stronger and deeper light, what the God of the universe is seeking from His children. So wonderfully expressed in the scripture below.

Is this the kind of fast I have chosen, only a day for people to humble themselves? Is it only for bowing one’s head like a reed and for lying in sackcloth and ashes? Is that what you call a fast, a day acceptable to the Lord? Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke? Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—when you see the naked, to clothe them, and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood? Then your light will break forth like the dawn, and your healing will quickly appear; then your righteousness will go before you, and the glory of the Lord will be your rear guard. Then you will call, and the Lord will answer; you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I. If you do away with the yoke of oppression, with the pointing finger and malicious talk, and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness, and your night will become like the noonday. The Lord will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail. Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins and will raise up the age-old foundations; you will be called Repairer of Broken Walls, Restorer of Streets with Dwellings. If you keep your feet from breaking the Sabbath and from doing as you please on my holy day, if you call the Sabbath a delight and the Lord’s holy day honorable, and if you honor it by not going your own way and not doing as you please or speaking idle words, then you will find your joy in the Lord, and I will cause you to ride in triumph on the heights of the land and to feast on the inheritance of your father Jacob. The mouth of the Lord has spoken.

—Isaiah 58:5–14 (New International Version [NIV])

In this Scripture, God speaks directly to His people—a people that have become content with the status quo and complacent in their pursuits. A people that have become religious for their own advancement and follow His commands for their personal gain. A people that have forsaken the grace of God and that refuse to be caught rubbing elbows with those who don’t look, act, or talk like them. Being a creative Type A personality, I find pure joy in the gentle yet straightforward nature of our God in this passage. He so eloquently provides a clear and poignant way to remind us how we are to attain His favor—and all of this was written long before the contemporary, Christian-loved book of James. The Lord is looking for us to express pure, compassionate, selfless relationships where love rules and the unrelenting love, His love, is poured out from us to all those around us. He is not seeking our religious acts or routines, He wants our lives to reflect the love that He has poured out for us to all, even our enemies.

For months this Scripture in Isaiah was one of my favorite Scriptures to cite when talking to church groups and the people of God. Who wouldn’t want to hear a formula that expresses how to have our healing quickly appear and how to have God stand as our rear guard? I figured I had stumbled onto some hidden wisdom that I could pass onto others; some great biblical insights that could change the life of another person during my short visit to their church or that could alter the happenstance passing of our lives. Little did I know that I would be led through the meaning of this new favorite Scripture of mine in only a few months as God revealed to me His desire for a true and transparent relationship in my own life.

During this time I felt as though I was walking close to God. Countless times I would find God leading me to divine appointments and all kinds of circumstances that would challenge my comfort level so that I could minister to people. God was challenging my boldness