Does GOD talk to you?

Jesus said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love me, for I have come here from God. I have not come on my own; God sent me. Why is my language not clear to you? Because you are unable to hear what I say. You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies. Yet because I tell the truth, you do not believe me! Can any of you prove me guilty of sin? If I am telling the truth, why don’t you believe me? Whoever belongs to God hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God.”

John 8:42

I am interested in what others think about this verse from the bible. To me it has a different meaning than churches teach (in fact most verses do to me). However, I am interested what others think.

My personal belief is that the scripture is saying only those that serve GOD will recognize truth, those that serve EVIL will recognize truth as deception. It is my opinion, that true servants of GOD will be the outcast of our present day society, as those who deceive work to silence the truth, and are glorified in our society currently. This means to me that many of the churches serve that deception by sticking to strict church doctrine and interpretations of biblical scripture. However, the end times is a spiritual battle occurring right now between truth and deception. We may call this world wide enlightenment, or unrest, but the truth of the matter is we are seeing through the deception in record numbers.

Sometimes I feel God is talking to me through the universe and all that is in it such as via TV, radio, animals, people, signs, dreams, thoughts, websites, phone calls, etc...

its great to communicate

but heck GW Bush while president boasted that he can, he talks to God! and look what good it did =/

anyways, actions speak louder than words. assuming God is everything & omniscient, already knows everything including what we're thinking or mean to say.

reply to post by ExPostFacto


God often speaks to me. It has nothing to do with church, and God doesn't have to use words. God can also take blasphemy very well, and I have gotten the best responses at the worst times.

I don't "serve God" and I definitely don't serve the church. I do believe in God, but I don't waste time personifying the god. I just believe and pray and observe, and God is apparent in all things, especially nature, whether that be observable nature, such as wildlife, or human nature.

I've had a couple of scary experiences where I challenged God, and I've often had prayers answered, where I asked the question, and I suddenly knew the answer like it was my own idea, but I know it wasn't because I disagreed with the answer, and I argued the point (with myself kind of?) until the real answer became clear.

Believe and pray often and follow your heart and your own instincts.

reply to post by ExPostFacto


Whom ever belongs to God hears what God says. I believe the word of God is alive. It lives forever. The truth lives forever because the truth is simply reality. Reality being what has happened or what exactly has been done.
The way things are. Wheather we read or hear Gods word we don't need a pastuer or preacher to interpret the meaning to us.
We hear or read and know what God is saying. The same as you know what your father ( lil f ) is saying you know also what your Father in Heaven is saying. I hope that's discernable the way I wrote that?

SnF

reply to post by getreadyalready


Yes, this is exactly how God communicates to me. I do not hear words, it is the simple truth that is shown to me. I have an open mind and my eyes are ready to see, my ears ready to hear. I also have gotten those moments where the truth comes, and I do not believe it until I allow the information to flow through me. Then I realize it is the truth.

Gods word is like your own Farthers word, you know when you are going against your farthers word and you fear it. Unfortunately in todays society we are numbed to this. Your character (knowing and speaking with God) in relation to everything you do in life is more important than your competancy (knowing what you need to function in society). In many cases we use our competancy above our character, this is where we have problems in work and other things in life. Our character comes from who you are and more than out weighs your competancy, always put your charcter before your competancy.

Peace

once ,i had a dream,in the dream god was on his throne,i was brought through a door behind his chair and behind his left shoulder.he turned his body and leaned and said to me.dont build it.my plan was to destroy a city and all its inhabitants with my weapon design,so i never built it.
another time i was found guilty by a jury and sentenced to thirty days.while waiting in cell,to be transfered to main jail the next morning i said in my mind,god let me out of this jail,this is a test.the doors opened up.i was told to go to jail library,expecting to get beat up by cops that i had shamed in court.instead it was judge telling me to leave his jail and apologize to innocent cop.i was put on probation instead.when the jail doors open to the outside a fire engine turned on its siren..later on ride home we saw a bad car wreck.somebody died.thats where the firemen had gone too.if you want to pray correctly.go in a closet,in private.it takes three days to get an answer.one day for the angel to carry your prayer to god
one day for god to hear it.one day for angel to bring answer back.this world is wierd and i dont know what to believe.im agnostic.i do believe there is some kind of entity,we cant see.whether good or evil,i dont know.i also got a preacher resigned from a church one year after he betrayed me.on the exact weekend ,one year later,i unlocked his daughters car on a sunday night.he could not find a locksmith.you should have seen his face as i walked towards daughter with a machete at nine oclock at night.i slim jimmed her car.he offered money.i turned it down as i walked away quietly.karma?god has a sense of humor.i dont know.he resigned and moved a few weeks later.the church had about a hundred members.
i was not one of them.

It ofcourse depends on how one defines 'truth'.

If circular, faithbased, subjective postulates (often disageering with other circular, faithbased, subjective postulates) are the measuretape, then theists have their own type of 'truth'.

Personally I prefer the more rational way of achieving truth, which isn't a self-contained bubble with practically no reality-relevance.

I like the question that you pose in this thread and I will use this opportunity to share my own personal testimony.

God spoke to me when I was a young man through Jesus Christ's sermon on the mount. (Matthew 5 through Matthew 7). This sermon resonated with my soul. It has since set me on a course to seek God my Father throughout the journey of my life and understand his will.

Before reading this particular passage in the bible I was typically very inquisitive as a child and constantly asking my parent's questions concerning life and death. How did I get here? Why do we die? Why do I exist in this body? etc... Both of my parents were non believers and gave me the typical answers based on their understanding of the world through acceptable scientific observations. These answers did not satisfy my curiosity, especially my question of why I was inside this particular physical vessel. Why this one and not another?

Needless to say I had quite a tumultuous time during my teenage years, I was often withdrawn and very emotional. During this period of my life I began to experience attempted alien abductions. I later discovered that these attacks were actually demonic and not from extra terrestrials that were visiting us from the far reaches of our galaxy or other parts of the cosmos. Incidently these attacks started occuring at exactly the same time that I had started reading the bible. It was shortly after this period of time that I read the sermon on the mount and my heart began to change. I started to realise that my whole life up to this point had been completely self centered. My emotional problems largely stemmed from being entirely consumed by myself and my own desires that raged within my soul. In a way, I started to 'let go' and 'let God' reveal his truth. I earnestly began seeking him and praying with a sincere heart, I wanted the truth and nothing else.

I am now 34 years of age and God still speaks to me and is constantly working on my character. I often spend a lot of time reflecting on Christ's teachings and how his character slowly but surely is pushing my old character aside. I am far from perfect but through the Holy Spirit and God's mercy I have been able to run the race marked out for me by my Lord. I do believe that people are given opportunities throughout their lives to reach out and take hold of God no matter what their circumstances may be.


AC 17:26 From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us.


Here is some audio of the sermon from the bible that cut my heart and humbled me before my Creator:

reply to post by ExPostFacto

However, the end times is a spiritual battle occurring right now between truth and deception.

Glad to see someone who realizes the end is in the present tense.
In a way, the people who think the end time is a future event have forfeited the battle.

I feel very envious of those that 'hear' from God.
Having had ongoing challenges/troubles over the last years, I have prayed alot & asked for guidance, a sign etc.
I'm yet to receive one, or if I had, I'm obviously too dense to recognize it.
Although this does rattle my faith, I do believe that if I'm meant to have a sign then I will receive one.
I could really use one now......

Originally posted by jewells
I feel very envious of those that 'hear' from God.
Having had ongoing challenges/troubles over the last years, I have prayed alot & asked for guidance, a sign etc.
I'm yet to receive one, or if I had, I'm obviously too dense to recognize it.
Although this does rattle my faith, I do believe that if I'm meant to have a sign then I will receive one.
I could really use one now......

Please let me encourage you with a few scriptures:

MT 7:7 "Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened."

RO 5:2 And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us.



I can understand the envy, the irony is that I envy you:

JN 20:29 Then Jesus told him, "Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed."

reply to post by jewells

Having had ongoing challenges/troubles over the last years, I have prayed alot & asked for guidance, a sign etc.

Having not succumbed to those challenges should be a sign that you are being guided. The sort of sign you may be thinking of, in my opinion, is not something you would really want. Either you are cornered in a desperate life and death situation or are so perplexed you are in danger of having a stroke, or an angel is giving you information which leaves you wondering what that was all about. In other words, having angelic encounters is not a sign of happy days. Or maybe you imagine that if you met an angel, you would have more faith. The Book of Hebrews in the NT says that all the Israelites had the same baptism through the Red Sea but they fell in the desert. My opinion on such experiences is that they just give you a keener sense of impending doom, more than making you think you are ready for anything.

Originally posted by jewells
I feel very envious of those that 'hear' from God.
Having had ongoing challenges/troubles over the last years, I have prayed alot & asked for guidance, a sign etc.
I'm yet to receive one, or if I had, I'm obviously too dense to recognize it.
Although this does rattle my faith, I do believe that if I'm meant to have a sign then I will receive one.
I could really use one now......

We complain that we don't hear God speaks - but the truth is - it is us, who have not learnt the art of listening.

reply to post by ExPostFacto


I think what Jesus is referring to in this verse, is the fact that he is the Word of God manifested, and that everything he did in his 3 1/2 year ministry is supposed to testify that he is the living Word of God. The goal is to bring everyone into this highest truth through the baptism of the Holy Spirit. It's my own personal opinion, that many who claim to be christians need to inspect their relationship with Jesus because he prophesied, that the road to life is narrow and few find it. The best advice I could give to my christian friends would be to do a serious word study on the word "Know." What does it mean to "know" Jesus.

We should know him intimately, like we know our very own spouse. Again, this is accomplished through the baptism of the Holy Spirit. The baptism is union with God and produces his Son, Jesus (the Mind of Christ). It is repenting that opens the door to knowing and knowing is truth. Everything Jesus did was to bring us the truth.

Jesus did all the hard work and it is up to us to connect all the dots (spiritual dots). When all the dots are connected it is then possible to hear the audible voice of the Holy Spirit, Jesus, and God.

Originally posted by ExPostFacto

Jesus said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love me, for I have come here from God. I have not come on my own; God sent me. Why is my language not clear to you? Because you are unable to hear what I say. You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies. Yet because I tell the truth, you do not believe me! Can any of you prove me guilty of sin? If I am telling the truth, why don’t you believe me? Whoever belongs to God hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God.”

John 8:42

I am interested in what others think about this verse from the bible. To me it has a different meaning than churches teach (in fact most verses do to me). However, I am interested what others think.

My personal belief is that the scripture is saying only those that serve GOD will recognize truth, those that serve EVIL will recognize truth as deception. It is my opinion, that true servants of GOD will be the outcast of our present day society, as those who deceive work to silence the truth, and are glorified in our society currently. This means to me that many of the churches serve that deception by sticking to strict church doctrine and interpretations of biblical scripture. However, the end times is a spiritual battle occurring right now between truth and deception. We may call this world wide enlightenment, or unrest, but the truth of the matter is we are seeing through the deception in record numbers.

edit on 24-9-2011 by ExPostFacto because: (no reason given)

If you can hear me my friend, you can hear God, if you belong to him.

With Love,

Your Brother

reply to post by Myrtales Instinct


You know, you mention baptism. I have this feeling many people believe they are saved when they get dunked under the water by a priest. My experience is that the act of getting dunked under water is not what saves us. It is rather merging spiritually with GOD. I do not claim to know what exactly the holy spirit is, but my distinct impression is that the holy spirit is living within us. It is that determination we get to do the right thing. When we merge with the holy spirit those decisions become easier as they are part of who we have become.

Originally posted by jmdewey60
reply to post by ExPostFacto

 

However, the end times is a spiritual battle occurring right now between truth and deception.

Glad to see someone who realizes the end is in the present tense.
In a way, the people who think the end time is a future event have forfeited the battle.

Amen to that. Its happening right this second and many have become so corrupt in their hearts they do not even realize it. The evil one has already been exposed. I can see it. Interesting thing about the evil one is that it will be revealed to believers. Believers will see the evil one exalting himself over everything. The evil one, is revealed, and truth is fighting it right now. How can someone who is deceived recognize they have been deceived? Only the people that know the truth can see the deception.

As is very common, the christian confusion of mixing the method with the outcoming result of that method has reached its standard "answer first, 'facts' later".

Being accused of mockery (not my intent, only a demonstration of circular reasoning) I can as a pastafarian put on my spaghetti strainer, which functions inversely of a tinfoil hat by amplifying divine communication, and 'talk' with the great noodlemaster or the flying spaghetti monster (which one of them being available at the moment) and claim I have 'heard' something.

The (absense of) logic is perfect. My spaghetti strainer-methodology is 'proved' by what I 'hear', and what I 'hear' must be valid because I use the 'valid' method of putting a spaghetti strainer on my head.

PS Just in case someone gets the idea, that this thread only is a 'question' on what's 'heard', OP contains positivist claims, which I respond to.