Chapter 8 – Loving Thin Air
One of the fine arts of teaching is discovering the line between teaching your students new and difficult topics that will challenge them, and trying to teach them something that is beyond their grasp that they just don't understand. When I was still teaching I saw this line crossed on more than one occasion and probably crossed it a few times myself. I recall one incident in particular, however, that will serve as an excellent analogy for the remainder of this chapter.
Math was not the strong suit of a vast majority of the students at the inner-city high school at which I taught. Well over ninety percent of the students tested far below grade level in math scores. The head of the math department was a very gifted mathematician who badly wanted to pass on her lover for math to her students. It was her firm belief that every student at our school was as talented as the most gifted students at any school in the country. She believed that they had just never been given the chance to show their ability. Her motivation was admirable if not the results.
She became thoroughly convinced that every student that graduated from our small high school should know calculus. If the students from the more acclaimed schools were learning calculus, then so would ours. She began a calculus class for all of the seniors in our school. The problem is we are talking about students who were intelligent in many ways, but woefully inadequate in math. They simply did not have many of the math skills necessary to be successful at calculus. Most of them did not even have a good grasp on their times tables without a calculator. It's difficult for a student to master calculus when they can't quickly tell you the product of "8 x 14." One teacher, in particular argued vociferously that calculus was beyond the current ability of these students, but she was quickly dismissed amidst the euphoric thought of being able to brag in academic publications that a group of inner-city students were mastering calculus.
Yet, I admit I was surprised when she began to crow excitedly at each staff meeting how well these students were doing in calculus. They were reportedly enjoying it and many were doing well and earning good grades. They progressed through the various lessons and were apparently beginning to master calculus. I was quite surprised and impressed. I had, evidently, under-estimated both the teacher and the students. They were not only learning calculus, they were using very complicated graphing calculators and other high-tech equipment for math labs. They had, we were confidently told, mastering calculus.
One thing that was unique about our school was that every student was required to keep and present a portfolio of their work before they could graduate. They would present work that included a research paper, a science lab, and a math lab for a panel of five that consisted of teachers and administrators from other schools, community leaders, and parents. For those who had taken calculus, their math lab had to be a presentation of a calculus problem or lab. The point of the portfolio defense was that the students really had to know what they were doing in order to present their work to these people. They also had to be able to field questions regarding their presentation to the panel.
This is when serious problems began to appear. The calculus students prepared their math labs and presentations but word quickly got around that they were having big problems. The students were giving the math portion of their presentations well enough but the wheels fell off when the panel began to ask questions. It became painfully clear that the students did not know what they were talking about. They couldn't answer simple questions of why they did what they did to solve the problem or how they might apply this skill in real life. They could demonstrate no ability to answer any questions that posed some change in one of the variables in the problem.
Most of them did rather miserably during the math portion and failed that part of their presentation. The calculus problems were abandoned as the students had to go back, prepare math problems of a different type and re-present their math portion to a new panel a few days or weeks later. The calculus experiment had failed miserably.
What became obvious over the next few weeks was that the students had never really learned calculus. They had been shown how to do certain steps and plug numbers into a formula but they never really understood the concepts behind what they were doing. They were shown roughly how to do it, but never why they did it. This resulted in students who followed along with the teacher who falsely assumed that they were learning calculus. When asked to take that knowledge and actually apply it, however, they could not.
It would be like a student who had learned to copy city names from atlas onto a blank map and color the page, but who had never mastered the concepts of directions or latitude and longitude. The student could copy and make a map look nice but they wouldn't have learned really how to make a map. In the same way, these students had learned to copy the problems that the teacher put on the board but they were never challenged to really understand why they were doing the steps and procedures and so, ultimately, they didn't understand what they were doing. This meant that they had no ability to apply calculus to new situations.
I say all of that because I have seen an alarming similarity in many of the young people in our fellowship over the years. We often train kids in the facts of the Christian faith and the practices of the Christian community, but that does little for a personal relationship. Faith and practice are an integral part of the Christian walk, but it really boils down to having and maintaining a relationship with God. It can be challenging enough to have and build relationships with other human beings, let alone a spirit like God. God is spirit and that means that having a relationship with Him is different than having one with a human being. Humans can be touched, heard, and felt. We can't physically touch God. We can't generally audibly hear God. We can't physically feel God.
It is difficult enough for adults who have been a Christian for years to really nurture a consistent relationship with God. It often takes years for us to figure this out. As we grow more mature in the faith, however, we tend to forget that fact. Just as the students at my school were told to learn calculus, they didn't really have the foundational skills and knowledge necessary to practice calculus, so it is when we encourage kids to have a relationship with God but don't teach them the basics of how to do that. They learn to mimic our relationship with God, but they often struggle with what it means for them to have their own personal and active relationship with Him.
In surveying the youths of the local church this concept could be clearly seen. When asked if they understood what it took to be a Christian, the response score on the 1 to 5 scale of agreement was a solid 4.6, indicating that they certainly have the head knowledge required to be a question. The response was quite different, though, when asked if they knew "how to have a personal relationship with a spirit being like God." The average score for that question was 1.8. What this means is that too many kids are learning to be Pharisees. Jesus' main point of contention against the Pharisees is that they had a great deal of knowledge but their hearts were distant from God. They knew the facts but did not have a personal relationship. It is necessary, as we have already discussed to arm our children with knowledge of both the secular and Christian view of the world, but without a personal relationship with God, mere knowledge about God is not enough. We must teach them to have knowledge of God rather than just knowledge about Him. Let's be clear here. I spent much of the last chapter stressing the need for knowledge of God and the Bible and I stand by that. It is just that it must move beyond that. The point of knowing about God is to learn to know Him and have a relationship with Him. It is vital to teach children both knowledge of the Bible and how to use that knowledge to develop a deep, lasting, and healthy relationship with Him, so that they may worship God in both spirit and truth (John 4:24).
The primary problem with having a relationship with God is that it is unusual. We simply don't grow up having relationships with spirits anymore than we are born with knowledge of calculus. Understanding a spirit being is a foreign concept that must be learned over time. It reminds me of the classic book, Flatland, by Edwin Abbot, a book first published in 1884.
The book Flatland describes ". . . a two dimensional world (Flatland). The narrator, a humble square (named A. Square), guides us through some of the implications of life in two dimensions. A. Square dreams of a visit to a one-dimensional world (Lineland), and attempts to convince the realm's ignorant monarch of a second dimension. The narrator is then visited by a three-dimensional sphere, which he cannot comprehend until he sees the third dimension for himself."[i]
The concept of the book can really be adapted to help make the point of how difficult if can be to comprehend God and have a relationship with Him. The two-dimensional A. Square cannot, at first, comprehend a three-dimensional sphere. In the same way, it is impossible for us to fully comprehend God. Paul wrote the church in Ephesus that he wished that they could begin to grasp "how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ" (Ephesians 3:18). Could it be that Paul is intimating that God somehow consists of four dimensions? This would make Him no more comprehendible for us than the three-dimensional sphere was for A. Square.
A being simply cannot really understand a being of greater dimension through mere explanation. The being could be apprehended but not comprehended fully. Imagine that you were a two-dimensional being like a circle. You would only be able to come in contact with the perimeter of other two-dimensional beings. You could never fully experience their inner-area because there are only two dimensions. A three-dimensional being, however, could be around, above, and through your two-dimensional self with little awareness of it on your part. That three-dimensional being could get closer to you than you could ever get to any other two-dimensional being. Yet, it would be a very different experience for you. If the three-dimensional person were to put two fingers through your two-dimensional being, you would only experience this three-dimensional person as two holes as he passed through you. You could apprehend aspects of that being but never fully comprehend Him.
So it is for us and God. We can experience aspects of God and apprehend Him to a certain degree but we cannot fully comprehend Him. Having a relationship with God is of a different nature than anything a young person is used to or has done before. We can give kids a great advantage by doing two primary things. The first is to let them know that learning to have a relationship with God is a doable but not a simple task. I have talked to countless kids over the years who have been incredibly relieved to discover that they are not stupid or unspiritual because at fifteen, they don't really know what it means to walk with God. I was saved at twenty-seven, and it took me two or three years before I really began to understand the process. Many kids began to feel doubt that they are even capable of walking with God and are often embarrassed. They think, like I did, that everyone else has it all figured out and they are just incapable of connecting with God. I had nearly resigned myself to the fact that I would never learn to love God and have a close walk with Him. It took a good friend of mine to teach me how to begin to develop my own walk with God. That leads into the second thing we can do to help kids in this area.
The second thing is to teach them specific aspects of walking closely with God. I believe there are things that adults can do to explain how to have a relationship with God that will enable students to develop the skills to learn to love God and walk with Him.
There have certainly been a glut of excellent books over the years covering how to deepen a relationship with God, but it seems that somehow, much of this has not seeped down into our youth. I will certainly not attempt to describe all the areas we could talk about in teaching a young person to walk with God, nor will I attempt to do this in any sort of detail. What I do offer here, however, is a brief consideration of three of the most important aspects of developing a personal walk with God.
Recognizing the Presence of God
There is an old story about a group of young and energetic squirrels that were on a quest to find a forest. Every day they woke up and spent the entire day searching for this fabled forest of which they have heard so much. From the moment the brilliant sun rose each day and struck their face, gently waking them with its soft heat, they tirelessly searched for their goal.
This involved an incredible amount of walking. They even employed several high-tech devices but to no avail. After several weeks, they decided a new tactic and began to ask other creatures in their area. Where was the forest? The problem was no one else seemed to have any better idea than they did.
Finally, they heard that there was a wise old owl that knew almost everything. It was nearly a half day's walk to the owl, but they went there with great anticipation. As soon as they got there, they couldn't get the words out fast enough. Breathlessly they blurted out, "do you know where the great forest is?" The reply of the owl greatly surprised them. "Boys," he said, "you have been in the great forest all along." As it turns out, they had been living and searching everyday in the great forest, they just never realized that it was all around them.
The same can be said for the presence of God. We are always in God's presence; we just don't always realize it. Often when I am at church I hear people talk about anticipating God's presence during the service. It is true that, in a sense, God is present in a special way during a worship service of believers, but the fact is, we are always in God's presence.
As I sit here typing this, a golf tournament is on the television as kind of a background noise. Normally I would rather watch the grass grow, but I am one of those people that will watch a major tournament if Tiger Woods has a chance to win. Right now he is running away with the PGA Championship. It's amazing, though, how when I concentrate on typing I don't even hear the noise from the TV any longer. In fact, if I think about it, there are a ton of noises of which I have completely blocked out. When I think about it, I can hear the gentle noise of the central air conditioner being pushed through the vents. I can hear the sounds of my older son and his friend playing a game in his room. I can faintly hear our neighbor kids playing out in their yard. If I really concentrate, I can even hear a few birds outside and the occasional car driving by. The noises were always there, but I don't even notice those things unless I take care to notice them.
Hosea 6:6 tells us that God desires that we know Him. His primary concern is not about the things we do, although those are important. He wants us to have a relationship with Him. Just as I have a tendency to not notice the many noises around me, so we tend to become oblivious to the fact that we are always in the presence of God. He is never far from us (Acts 17:27). Perhaps no group of people in the church is more unaware of God's presence than our young people. They, of course, have been told that God is always there, and He sees and knows everything we do, but they don't really live that way. They live more like the squirrels running around looking for the forest even though they are already there. They are in God's presence but haven't been taught how to practically be aware of it or practice it.
Kids need to be taught that God is constantly present. This is not some sort of cosmic threat meant to scare them into proper behavior. It is a reality. We don't have the kind of relationships with God that He desires because we too often relegate Him to the status of background noise. Often, all we really need to do is to be aware of His presence. God will do the rest. If we make the effort to notice Him and think about Him and live a life worthy of His presence, He will not hide Himself from us.
There are two great stories in the Bible of people learning about the omnipresence of God. In 2 Kings 5 we find the account of Naaman, an important military figure in Aram, who had contracted leprosy. On the advice of a servant girl, he went to Elisha to be healed. Elisha humbles Naaman by refusing to see him personally. Instead he sends his servant who tells Naaman to wash seven times in the Jordan River. After initial hesitance, Naaman does it and is healed of his leprosy. Naaman comes back and is now allowed to see Elisha. He tells Elisha that "Now I know that there is no God in all the world except in Israel" (v. 15). This is a huge admission because everyone else in the world at that time was a polytheist. He is starting to get it, but not all the way. He asks Elisha for as much dirt as two donkeys can carry. This is rooted in the ancient belief that gods could only be worshipped in their own local territory. Naaman wants to pay respect to the God of Israel but thinks he must take dirt from that area with him in order to worship properly. He is also worried about some of the religious customs that he might have to take be a part of when he returns home. Elisha tells Naaman to "Go in peace" (v. 19).
In nearly the same area, over 800 years later, Jesus meets a Samaritan woman at a well in a scene recorded in John 4. She wants to argue with Jesus about the proper place to worship God. This is because the Jews and Samaritans could not agree on where God should be worshipped. Jesus tells her, "a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. . . . Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth" (John 4:21, 23-24).
The point of both Elisha and Jesus is that God can be worshipped anywhere. God is never limited to one place. We often make the same mistake that Naaman and this Samaritan woman made. We tend to limit our worship to God to an hour on Sunday morning at church and maybe an hour in the morning in some quiet place in our house. We fail to see everywhere we go as sacred and everything we do as an opportunity to worship God in thought, word, and deed. There is never anywhere that God is not present. It is a matter of our awareness of His presence.
There are a couple of simple little ideas that we can give young people to help them be aware of God's presence. One easy concept is to teach kids to choose an object that they will see several times throughout the day. A clock is a really good example. Tell them that every time they see a clock to think about God. This will probably take several weeks of reminding them to do that until it becomes second nature, but it will happen, and it's worth it. Every time they see a clock, (or another object or event that they have chosen like every time they take a drink of water) tell them to take a minute to ponder God's existence and pray for a few seconds. This can be done as they walk down the hall or sit down in class or whatever they are doing without being a major disruption in their life. It will teach them to be aware of God's presence, though. It is amazing how doing that several times throughout the day will focus us on God and His presence. Suddenly, God becomes more real in the life of the young person. A young man or woman who is constantly aware of the realness of God's presence is a young person that will be far more equipped to handle life's challenges.
Perhaps this seems like a silly idea, but it is not with scriptural precedence of a sort. There were many things that God commanded the Israelites to do in order to be reminded of God throughout the day. Look at these words from Numbers:
"The LORD said to Moses, "Speak to the Israelites and say to them: 'Throughout the generations to come you are to make tassels on the corners of your garments, with a blue cord on each tassel. You will have these tassels to look at and so you will remember all the commands of the LORD, that you may obey them and not prostitute yourselves by going after the lusts of your own hearts and eyes. Then you will remember to obey all my commands and will be consecrated to your God.
Numbers 15:37-40
They were to have tassels on the corners of their garments so as not to forget about God and His way of life. Part of human nature is that we need constant reminding of the things that are important to us. We need to remind ourselves constantly of God's presence.
The second simple idea to help kids focus on God's presence is to help them learn to practice God's presence when they pray. Often times, when we pray, we get so caught up in what we want to say that we forget to be aware that we are in God's presence. We actually enter into the holy of holies when we pray. Just this knowledge can help a young person be far more aware of what they are doing when they are praying. They are not sending up a cosmic telegraph that will be read later by God when He gets some time. They are actually in the very presence of God. A good way for young people to do this is to actually set a chair in front of them when they pray. Tell them to imagine that God is actually in the chair as they talk with Him. This is not meant to reduce the majesty of God in any way. It simply helps them to remember that they are speaking to God as surely as they are talking to you when you explain this concept to them. There are, obviously, many other ways to become more consistently aware of God's presence. Discover them together. Talk about it; make it a family project as you go on a quest to be aware of God's presence without ceasing.
Talking to God
Talking to God, or prayer as we call it, is one of the most important things that a Christian will ever learn to do. Volumes can and have been written about the art, practice, and discipline of prayer. For our purposes, however, I will mention only one small area of prayer that is lacking in the lives of many of the youth that I have worked with and talked to over the years. It boils down to being real with God.
Many teens get as nervous about praying as they do delivering a speech in front of their social studies class at school. They somehow get the impression that they have to pray in a certain way and cover certain topics. I have often heard cute little acronyms like A.C.T.S. used in teaching young people how to pray (Adoration; Confession; Thanksgiving; Supplication). There is a time and place for formulas like that, I suppose, but it tends to give burgeoning young Christians the impression that prayer must be done in a specific way or they have failed. Kids definitely need to learn reverence and respect while praying, but they also need to learn to be real with God. This is what is so memorable about David's prayers recorded in the Psalms. He constantly kept it real with God. He never minced words about praising God or questioning God. He bared his soul to His God.
This is the very thing that I see lacking in the lives of many of the young people that I have talked to and worked with over the years. I have had, a lot of kids over the years, for instance, mention that the idea of loving God is something they have a very hard time grasping. I ask the question and get the same response virtually every time: Have you been honest with God, told Him that, and asked Him to help you love Him? The response usually begins with a stare of shock, followed by a question along the lines of: It is okay to do that? I always respond by asking them, "You don't think He knows that already?" Many teens don't seem to realize that they can be honest with God when they don't love Him, or don't understand Him, or disagree with, or are angry with Him. If they can't learn to be honest with God about their own relationship with Him, how will they learn to rely on God for anything else? Their relationship will always be a shallow one.
This attitude of being real with God can change a lot of things in the lives of young people if they can only learn to do it. If they're not feeling like praying one morning, pray and tell God how they're feeling and ask for His help. If they are more attracted to a certain aspect of the world than the things of God, be real and tell Him about it. When we are real with God and bare our souls, he will give us what we need.
Listening to God
When I was coaching basketball in high school, I almost always asked new players one question: "what do you want to know from me and what should I know about you?" There were generally two types of responses. Some of the kids would spend the rest of our conversation talking about themselves, and telling me all the things they thought I should know. Others were far more interested in asking me questions about the team, the other players, and things that they needed to know and could work on before the season started. I was always far more impressed with the players who wanted to hear from me more than those who wanted to spend all the time talking about themselves. I learned a great deal more about the players who asked a lot of questions and listened than I did about those who talked the entire time.
Similarly, one of the biggest mistakes that I believe the current Christian community in our fellowship is that we don't, as individuals, spend enough time listening to God. What then happens is we pass this same oversight on to our children in most cases. There are certainly many ways that we can hear from God. The primary way is through the Word of God. We can also hear from God through fellowship and advice form the people of God. Those are good things, but what we are talking about specifically here is time spent quietly and literally listening for God to speak to our heart. When asked in our survey to respond to the statement that they "spend specific time during prayer listening for God's voice," every single response was a "1," indicating the lowest possible level of agreement.
This is quite a shame, in my humble opinion. One of the best things that I have learned in my Christian life is to hear the voice of God speaking to me. It was a process for me of learning to hear and distinguish God's voice, but it has been immensely worth it. The two primary aspects that I have learned and have taught to many young people over the last few years has been, where I am most likely to hear from God and how I can distinguish God's voice from the others that compete for my attention.
Discovering where we are most likely to hear from God is an exciting journey. It turns the monologue of prayer for which so many of us have settled, into an exciting dialogue where we can actually hear from the Holy Spirit of the living God. I have learned over the years that it is different for each person. We cannot do any more than guide our children on their own journey to discover how and where they can best here from God.
I have discovered for myself that I best hear from God while I am praying on nice long run. I love to get up each morning around 5:00 AM and go for a nice, quiet run. It is during these times that I hear God speaking directly to me more than at any other time. I have gained so much invaluable insight and guidance from God during these times. I have given many lessons and sermons over the past few years and make no bones about the fact that I feel that a large majority of them were given to me directly during these times with God. When I leave for a morning run with no idea of what to teach for my next lesson and come back an hour later with a complete lesson that came into my mind in the matter of a few minutes, I am not foolish enough to think that I came up with that by myself. I am not that smart.
I have learned that God speaks to me about many things not just to give me lessons. Sometimes He shows me areas I need to surrender to Him, or something I need to do to serve someone else; there are many different topics that we talk about. It has so enriched my life, however, to learn how to listen for God's voice rather than just talking and asking Him things. I have learned to just shut up sometimes when I am with God and listen to Him. How foolish would it be to meet with the biggest expert in the field in which you work and then talk the whole time you are with them? It would not even begin to be as foolish as it is to only carry on a monologue with God and never give Him a chance to talk back to our heart.
The big question that young people ask me, when I talk about this topic leads into our second point. "How can I know that God is speaking to me and how can I distinguish His voice from others that compete for my attention?"
In John 10, Jesus spoke some very enlightening words for those who are pondering the topic of hearing from God:
'I tell you the truth, the man who does not enter the sheep pen by the gate, but climbs in by some other way, is a thief and a robber. The man who enters by the gate is the shepherd of his sheep. The watchman opens the gate for him, and the sheep listen to his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes on ahead of them, and his sheep follow him because they know his voice. But they will never follow a stranger; in fact, they will run away from him because they do not recognize a stranger's voice.' Jesus used this figure of speech, but they did not understand what he was telling them. Therefore Jesus said again, 'I tell you the truth, I am the gate for the sheep. All who ever came before me were thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not listen to them. I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. He will come in and go out, and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.
John 10:1-10
Jesus assumes here that we will make a practice of listening to His voice to a degree that we will be immediately able to separate it from other voices. There are so many other noises and voices competing for the attention of our young people. These other voices are numerous: Satanic voices, their own voice, the voice of their friends, your voice. Their heads can become swirling masses of 'do this' or 'don't do that' that come from all kinds of sources. Obviously one of the jobs of the Christian parent is to help them discern which voices to listen to and which ones to ignore. The best way to do this is to teach them to learn to distinguish God's voice so that when the shepherd calls, they will, like sheep, be able to immediately recognize His call and answer. The fact is that of all the other voices that will compete for our children's attention, God's is the only one with an agenda that is aimed at what is best for them at all times. Why would anyone not want to hear from that voice?
Let's put it this way. If your best friend were to come in the room, would you recognize them immediately? Of course you would. If someone else walked into the room claiming to be your best friend, would you be deceived? Not likely. Yet, imagine someone who did not know your best friend. Would they be able to determine the genuine article as immediately and with the same ease with which you did? They would not? The reason is that you know your friend. They do not. When we don't know God's voice, we are susceptible to hearing from any number of voices posing as our own thoughts. As John 10:10 warns us, many of these voices are dangerous as they are intended to steal, kill, and destroy us.
The very first standard in recognizing God's voice is knowledge of the Word of God. The best way to learn to recognize God's voice is to know His Word. If anything comes to our child that does not match up with the Word of God they need to know to reject it immediately, no matter how logical or reasonable it may sound. "But even if we or an angel from heaven," says Paul in Galatians 1:8, "should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be eternally condemned!" We must know the Scriptures to know when a voice is leading us away from God and the truth of His Word. God's voice will only clarify or enlighten Scripture; it will not give us new knowledge or violate any biblical principles.
For our purposes here it is not necessary to attempt to distinguish our own thoughts from those of Satan or peer pressure or any other voice. I have found, however, that all of these "voices" in our head sound just like our own thoughts. So, how can we teach our children to discern the voice of the shepherd and to know it? Author Gary Moon, in Falling for God, suggests that there are four different aspects of hearing a voice in our thoughts through which we can recognize and distinguish God's voice.
The first area is the nature of the approach of the voice we are tuning into. God's voice is leading and inviting. It is never a driving or pushing voice. If a voice is loud and pushy and demanding that we listen to it, it's probably not God's voice. God never forces Himself on people. His voice is quiet and invites us to listen. If we choose not to focus on it, He will not demand that we listen. God's voice will come only when it is invited and wanted. I believe that we must ask God to speak to us and listen carefully for when He does. Other voices tend to enter our thoughts illegally. We didn't invite them in and can't seem to get rid of them once they are there. That is not God's voice, it comes from another source.
The second area of importance in listening to God is that of content. As stated earlier, God's voice will be in line with spiritual principles. God will not give us new revelation that differs from, significantly adds to, or violates what we already have in Scripture. God's voice simply clarifies on a personal level how we can understand and apply what is in the Bible in our lives. Voices that are not God's may make of pretext of using Scripture, but it will usually be a proof text or a twisting of Scripture. Remember, Satan used proof texts in trying to tempt Jesus in the desert. Satan's proof texts were, indeed, Scripture, but they were not in line with spiritual principles. The content of the voice of God will also almost always lead us to an inner solution, while other voices will often point to an outer solution. God's voice won't point towards other people or external situations. He will point us inward to see what we need to change or surrender in our own lives. It is also true that God's voice is merciful though just. Other voices tend to broadly condemn, show no mercy, and question our worth or ability. God's voice, however, rather than broadly condemning, will show us specific behavior. He will help us very specifically or will convict us of specific sin. God will never generically speak to us and tell us that we're not measuring up, or can't do it, or aren't good enough. His voice will speak to actual behavior and will lead us to direct action. This is not to imply that God will solve every problem or speak to us on every issue in our lives, but when He does speak, it will be clear, concise, and direct.
The third area of importance is in the relevance of the content. God generally speaks to the now. He may give us dreams for the future but it is almost always tied into something that we can begin or work on now. The relevance of God's content is generally practical and straightforward. He asks us to do little things, or gives us little ideas of how we can change or encourage someone. It is simple and definite, though. God is not about flash but about results. Being a Christian is not really about big flashy events or choices, it consists of thousands of small, mundane decisions that add up to form our character. In the same way, God usually leads us toward simple and direct things that we can do. It is not the voice of God that points toward the future with nothing to do in the present. God will not push us towards impractical, sensational, complicated, and confusing directions. These are the kind of things that often attract our attention, but we need to be very wary of whether or not this voice is from God or from another sources and simply appeals to our flesh a great deal.
The final area is the effect of the content. While other voices tend to leave us angry, worried, discouraged, or falsely and temporarily euphoric, God's voice doesn't work that way. If the result of a voice leaves us feeling hopeless or with our faith deflated then it is not from God. God's voice will never leave us despising or feeling critical of other people or situations in our life. His voice, even when challenging or convicting, will leave us feeling love, peace, joy and hope. He will leave us with our faith increased and our energy renewed. It will leave us with a deeper understanding of others and of situations in which we find ourselves.
Several times in the past I have had the opportunity to speak on this subject to groups of young people. There is nothing more invigorating than to have one of them come up a few days or weeks later, excitedly telling me, "I heard God speak to me today." That is a student who has moved out of the realm of theory in a relationship with God and into experience.
In summation, the main aspects of hearing from God are five-fold. First, we need to shut up sometimes and listen when God speaks. Second, we need to learn the discipline of staying close to God so that we will be ready when He does speak. Third, we need to know His Word so that we may recognize His voice. Fourth, we need to discard competing voices and "let the peace of Christ rule in our hearts" (Colossians 3:15). Fifth, and finally, we should remember that if we are not hearing God's voice, then it may well not be that He hasn't been trying to talk to us, but that we haven't been listening. There is a story about an old married couple that illustrates this last point quite well.
There was once an old man who had become concerned about his wife's hearing. He was convinced that she was not too many days removed being stone deaf. But he could not get her to admit she had a problem and see a doctor.
One day he had had enough and decided to prove his point. He entered their living room where his wife was seated, facing the fireplace. From behind her, he said in a clear voice, "Honey, I love you. Did you hear that?"
No response.
He walked halfway across the room and repeated, "Honey, I said I love you. Do you hear me?"
Nothing.
Finally he walked over, stood in front of her, and shouted, "I love you. Can you hear me now?
She looked up from her knitting and replied, "yes, dear, and for the third time, I love you too."[ii]
Conclusion
I certainly don't mean to imply in this chapter, or any other chapter, that all parents are failing in this. This is not meant as a condemnation, but rather, an encouragement to round out the many wonderful things that most Christian parents are doing. Some parents are doing well in this area, while others have not done so well. This is an area, however that almost every kid will struggle with at some point in their adolescence as they learn how to love and have a relationship with God.
It is important to realize that there is no one correct way to teach anyone how to have a relationship with God. It is a journey not an assignment. The best way to know and help them is to ask a lot of questions. Don't assume that they know what it means to love God, to have a relationship with Him, or to talk and listen to Him. The worst thing to do is to constantly encourage them to have a relationship with God and assume that they know how to do it. The more questions we ask, the more we can draw out their true feelings and discover where they are really at, and help them where they really need assistance.
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