“How can a Christian identify God speaking to him or her?”

April 2016 – Grace & Truth Magazine

QUESTION: How can a Christian identify a reliable way of hearing God speak to him or her?

ANSWER: God spoke to Adam and Eve and a number of other Old Testament men and women directly. We see this especially when we read the earlier books of the Bible. By the time we get to Job we find that “God may speak in one way, or in another, yet man does not perceive it. In a dream, in a vision of the night, when deep sleep falls upon men, while slumbering upon their beds, then He opens the ears of men, and seals their instruction” (Job 33:14-16 NKJV ). As we read the story of Joseph beginning in Genesis 37 and the account of Nebuchadnezzar’s dreams in Daniel 2 and 4, we see how important dreams were to these ancient people. They wanted to understand exactly what God was saying to them, and they felt it important to pass this on to others. But we are responsible to hear His Word, observe His ways and to learn from these.

Today, God speaks to us through His Word. Psalm 119 tells us this repeatedly. Psalm 19:7-11 adds more to this subject, as do many other passages of His Word, the Holy Scriptures. God’s Word, the Bible, is complete. “Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will by no means pass away,” our Lord Jesus Himself stated (Mk. 13:31). In verses 18 and 19 of the last chapter of Revelation we are warned against adding to it or taking away from it. Second Timothy 2:15 tells us to study, or be diligent to rightly divide the Word of Truth. When we preach or speak to others we must base what we say upon what we find in God’s Word, correctly identifying connections and divisions He made in it.

There are people today who claim that God speaks to them directly – that they have revelations from God. We must be extremely careful of such people. Since God is God and we are His creatures, we cannot limit Him. God may indeed speak to an individual through some event or even through a dream, but what he learns from such an experience must be checked out. God does not contradict Himself. Any purported revelation from God must be verified with the written Word of God and must not in any way deny or contradict it. And since God’s Word is complete, if one feels that God is speaking to him or her through an experience or a dream, such a message is for that person alone. It may be interesting to others, but it is not authoritative for anyone else.

Hence it is absolutely wrong for a person to say, “Thus says the Lord,” in reference to a personal experience, dream or word they may claim to have gotten from the Lord. It is wrong for a man or woman, regardless of who they may be, to add anything to God’s Word. Preachers and teachers of God’s Word should be especially careful not to base their preaching or teaching on their personal experience or fancied revelations, but on the written Word of God, interpreted consistently with the rest of God’s Word. Only what is consistent with the plain teaching of God’s written Word can reliably be trusted as “God speaking to me.” I must be careful not to trust the bold claims of anyone who tells me he has a word from the Lord for me.

Answered by Eugene P. Vedder, Jr.