How Does God Speak To His People Daily?

By Ron Jones ©Titus Institute 2009


Summary article:

When Adam and Eve fell into sin, God cast them out of the garden (Gen.3). The casting out of the garden was God’s judgment for sin. Previously they had been able to be in God’s presence where God manifested himself in the garden in some physical way (Gen.3:8) and they were able to see him and speak with him and hear his voice.

God’s judgement was that they could not longer experience this fellowship with him on earth on a daily basis. The ability to be able to hear God speak to a human being on a daily basis and fellowship with God was forfeited at the fall and will not be enjoyed again until heaven.

Human beings would now have to live by faith.

God speaks to us through his Word the way a father who has gone to a distant country and is physically absent speaks to his children in a letter he sends to them from that country. However, unlike the human father, our heavenly father has sent his Spirit into our hearts to instruct us in truth, to convict us of sin, and to encourage and comfort us and give us hope through the reading of his Word.

Paul makes this clear in Romans 15:4 when he writes, "For whatever things were written in former times were written for our instruction, that we through the patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope."

In John 14:7, Jesus declared that the Holy Spirit whom he called the "Spirit of Truth" would dwell within us. The Holy Spirit uses the truth to instruct us, convict us, and encourage and comfort us.

We are to live by faith in what God says in his Word because this is God's communication to us. We need to trust and obey his word and thus follow him.

God still spoke audibly after the fall, but only when it had to do with his redemptive plan.

When God has spoken throughout the Old Testament it is always to someone who has an important role in his plan of redemption. The subject of God’s speaking is never fellowshipping with that person and sharing the personal life and circumstance of that person. It is always with a purpose and involves the mission and ministry of that person in God’s plan of redemption.

God spoke to Abraham by his voice without physical manifestation in Gen.12:1. He spoke to him again in the appearance of a man in Gen.18. God spoke to Moses in a burning bush (Exod.3).

Each of these “appearances” was not to personally fellowship with these men, but to reveal to them certain aspects of God’s truth because they were appointed by God to play important roles in his plan to save the world.

For a more in-depth explanation of this, please see "How Has God Spoken To His People Throughout the OT and NT?

When we get to heaven we will again have the wonderful opportunity and blessing of fellowshipping with God in his presence and “hearing” him “speak.”

In the meantime, as all believers of all ages beginning with Adam and Eve we are to live by faith.

God gave us truth about him and about everything else we need to know about so that we would have something to trust in, His Word.

God knew we needed to “hear” from him so he spoke his Word to the prophets of Israel and through His Son who became a man and through Jesus’ apostles. They wrote that Word down so we could read it and understand it. The Old and New Testaments of the Bible is that revelation they received.

Heb.12:1-2 says,
“God, who at various times and in diverse ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by his Son, whom he has appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds.

Therefore we would have His Word to trust and depend in which is his communication with us.

It is like the Lord went on a journey after the fall of Adam and Eve and left with us sixty-six letters from him revealing everything we need to know for following him.

When we read them we would be hearing from him in written form.

The Scriptures are love letters from God in which he has told us everything we need to know about him and what he desires for us.

When we trust and obey the Scriptures we are living by faith and thus we are following God’s plan for our lives as believers.

When we pray to God we are communicating with him and when we read his Word he is communicating with us.

For a more in-depth Biblical explanation on knowing God on a daily basis see “How Do We Know God?”

You may ask, “Then how do we as Christians know God’s will for our lives as we live by faith every day?”

In the moral areas, we read, study, and understand the Scriptures to see what God’s Word has revealed and we submit to it, trusting and obeying it.

In non-moral areas such as where to live, what school to attend, what career to have, we have the freedom of choice with the responsibility of exercising wisdom. As long as we stay within the moral limits God has set in the Scriptures, and exercise wisdom, we should trust the Lord to lead us toward or turn us away from that choice (if the Lord has chosen to work in another way in our lives).

We need to pray for wisdom and guidance and then make a decision based on wisdom and trust the Lord to direct our steps. The Lord will provide or shut off opportunities to implement our decision or part of it. The Lord will bring additional information or advice into our lives that will cause us to continue what we have decided or reexamine our decision.

Prov.16:9 says,
“A man's heart plans his way, but the LORD directs his steps.”

For a more in-depth Biblical explanation on knowing God’s will on a daily basis see “How Do I Know God’s Will?”