"Now, if God doesn't also speak to us, why would he have given us all these stories of him speaking to others? 'Look—here are hundreds of inspiring and hopeful stories about how God spoke to his people in this and that situation. Isn't it amazing? But you can't have that. He doesn't speak like that anymore.' That makes no sense at all. Why would God give us a book of exceptions? This is how I used to relate to people, but I don't do that anymore. What good would a book of exceptions do you? That's like giving you the owner's manual for a Dodge even though you drive a Mitsubishi."
I have wrestled for a long time with the whole concept of how God communicates with humanity these days. I've had so much doubt, so many questions. I've heard so many people say things like, "God led us to..." or "God spoke to me this morning...". I couldn't figure out why God didn't speak to me that way. Did God not speak that way and people were really fooling themselves, or worse, being deceived by demons or something? Did God simply not speak to ME that way? Was it something I was doing wrong? Was I not worth speaking to? I think the church I grew up in helped perpetuate those ideas, even if it wasn't intentional. They didn't illustrate or explain how or if God speaks to us, except through the Bible. And if the Bible is the only source of communication from God, that leaves so much unsaid. What if, upon your birth, your parents wrote you a long, detailed letter about your family history and genealogy, explained what it meant to be part of a family, gave examples of the depth of their love for their children and closed the letter with the promise that you would meet them again? I have no doubt that as you grew and learned to read that you would treasure that letter. But how much more valuable would it be if they didn't leave you or forsake you? What if they stayed in your life and told you how much they loved YOU, not just their children in general? What if they expressed their joy in the unique man or woman you were becoming and walked with you through the ups and downs of life, giving you the personal attention that you desperately needed to navigate life and become all that you were meant to be? How can we have such a small view of God's personal love for us? Something in me cries desperately for that to be true. Having the Bible is great, but it feels so inadequate. It isn't personal. It is a book of stories and principles and promises. You can't have a relationship with a book. You can only have a relationship with a Person. And unless that person is unable to communicate for some reason, your relationship with that person will include two-way conversation.
So where does that leave us? Am I crazy if to believe God would speak to us if we actually believed He would? And am I willing to seem crazy to embrace that possibility and reality?
That passage I quoted above really hits me, because it just makes so much logical sense to me. It doesn't make sense to me that God would speak to people, even audibly, throughout the course of history and scripture, and then for that to stop for some unknown reason. So, I feel like I am beginning a season of new life, of new faith, that God does still speak. It probably isn't audibly, though it could be, but I believe it would be no less personal. As Christians, we believe that the Holy Spirit of God dwells in our hearts now. God has taken up residence in our hearts. Wouldn't it make sense for Him to speak to us there, deep in the center of our being? To say things that are deeply true and necessary for us to know, both about Him and about ourselves, things that are too personal and unique for the scope of scripture?
I feel like I need to break out of the framework that I've grown up with and all the preconceived ideas of how God works. Not at all that most of it is wrong or false, but I feel as though certain things have been taken for granted and I'm finding that they don't answer the deep questions of my heart. I've been taught that God is a certain way and that He does things a particular way. What if some of those things weren't quite right? What if God does speak to us? What if He is waiting to speak to us and is waiting for us to believe He can and will? What if my desire for deep personal communication with this God who loves me exists because it points to the truth of what we were created for?
I don't want to assume things that aren't true. At the same time, I don't want to simply settle for the way Christianity has been presented to me when the deep questions in my heart aren't being answered by the answers I've been given so far.
Honestly, I don't know what to expect. There have only been like 3 times in my life that I have experienced thoughts that I really think were God speaking to me... but I didn't have the clarity or confidence to distinguish if it was God or wishful thinking on my part. Something is stirring in my beliefs though, that God wants to speak to us personally. I think it is something that we have to learn to hear, because so much of our lives are so busy and distracted and noisy.
I'll keep you "posted" on what I hear! (pun intended...)
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