How to hear God's voice in everyday life.

 How to hear God's voice in everyday life.

Rev. Chris Nuttall

 

"Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, 'This is the way; walk in it."

 

‘Pardon’, ‘Excuse me, I didn’t quite catch that’, ‘You what’, ‘Speak louder, I can’t hear you’.

These are all phrases that we have heard and have most probably said as we go through life.  All the hub-hub and noise that constantly bombard us make it difficult to hear sometimes.

It is the same with God.

We struggle, sometimes, to hear him and even more perplexing to me is that we probably do not recognise his voice at all.

The main difficulty we all have is that God is not a physical presence that we can speak to face-to-face or just call on a telephone.  He is supernaturally omnipresent, around us all of the time helping us and guiding us throughout life’s ups and downs, but it is sometimes difficult for us to hear what he is telling us.

I think most people expect a big booming voice to come down from the clouds and shout, ‘YOU THERE, YES, YOU, THE ONE IN THE STRIPED SHIRT AND BAGGY TROUSERS, THIS IS WHAT I WANT YOU TO DO’ and you bathed in a beam of bright light signalling you out from everyone else present.

Well, I suppose it could happen that way, after all it is God and he can do it how he wants to it, but what if we do not get the big booming voice or the bright shaft of light, how do we then know God’s voice is reaching us?

The primary way of him communicating with us is through the Bible.  This is his instruction book for us, and we need to know it, understand and love it for us to be able to be trained well enough to hear his voice.

Then again, he might be thinking ‘I really need this person to do this for me, but they do not know the word well enough yet so I will just give them a nudge and he sends the Holy Spirit where we need to pay attention to its convictions and impressions that he leaves on us.

Of course, he may not do this, he set up a situation where he uses other people.  Now these will not be just anybody, these will be people already versed and practiced within the study and use of his word; pastors, ministers and close god-fearing friends may have heard his voice, but the message is for you.  The other situation where you could hear his voice is through him setting up a physical change of circumstances, where one door closes and another opens.

In a previous post I mentioned about how I suffer from various illness and disabilities, and I have the great pleasure in living my life knowing that the good Lord allows me to wake up each morning.   For many years, even with all my illnesses and disabilities, I worked, helping the unemployed people of South Yorkshire.  Was I the best at what I did? No.  Did I enjoy what I did? Yes.  I thought for many years that this is what God wanted me to do.  I worked as an advisor; a key support worker and delivered countless training sessions.  I loved it but then, at the end of January 2024, it was decided that I was unfit for work.  Now, I know may people would think ‘Oh that must be great.  No more work; you can do what you want and not have to be bothered by the boss breathing down your neck’. 

I can tell you it is not great.  Yes, OK, I don’t have a boss telling me what to do and my body has been grateful for the rest.  However, the mind is a different story.  When you are used to going to work every day and trying your best to be the best you can be on any particular day, even when racked with pain, you are using your brain.  Even if it is the most mundane job in history, you are using your brain.  Then it stops suddenly, and your mind goes ‘Whoa’.

All the brain power that you have been using in your job just suddenly gets switched off.  For the first couple of days your brain may be like ‘this is good – not having anything to do’, but after that and you have suffered enough daytime television, your brain is like ‘Uh-uh, I need something to do’.  For me this was to spend time on my crafts.  I made notebooks, journals, colouring books and puzzle books.  I must have made over a thousand of them and they are all sat in my garage as I do not have the energy to take them to a craft fair to try and sell them.

I run on a very part time basis, a business where I am a celebrant offering both Christian and non-religious life event celebrations, but again, I have not had the energy to push this and have only done celebrations where I have been personally asked.  So, again, this not taxing my brain.  What was God’s plan for me? 

In September of 2024 I had the honour of conducting the wedding ceremony of my Mum and Stepdad.  It has only taken them 49 ½ years to make the decision to ‘tie the knot’.  As our church is a Baptist Church, people who want to get married there still have to go through the local registry office process.  After waiting the required 28 days and subject to no issues being found, the paperwork is sent through to the churches ‘appointed person’ who happens to be my mum.  The rules state that she cannot be the appointed person for her own wedding, so we drafted in the person that used to be it before my mum took over, which was really nice for us as a family, as it was she that oversaw my own wedding.

As a result of my mum being the current appointed person, and I am the one usually drafted in to conduct weddings at the church, she has heard a lot of the poems that I write for use during such occasions, and I wanted something different for her wedding.  Luckily for me, I came across an AI app, that would put music and vocals to song lyrics that I had written.  It only took 27 attempts before finding the version that I liked the best, but it went down a storm at the wedding, with people laughing and singing along to the lyrics that were displayed on the big screen.

Right, this is good, this is what God wants me to do.  Make Music.  Great, or is it.  I have now produced and released three albums of Christian music – ‘Victory’s Call Vol 1 and 2’ and ‘Victory’s Call at Christmas.

Some of the songs have been used in our church services, which is great, but is this what God wants me to do?  I do not know!

I’ve started a You Tube channel called ‘Rev Chris Nuttall – Fuel for your fire’ and have uploaded several videos to my channel.  I’ve had a few subscribers, but certainly not enough to make any money from it (I would really love to be able to come off Universal Credit and start to financially provide for my family again) and then I have this ‘blog’ site.  Are people reading this?  It is too early to tell, and I need to promote it more, but is this God’s plan for me – to become a ‘creator’ for social media etc?

The answer is, I don’t know, but I hope so as I do find it very fulfilling, and I would have not been able to do any of this if I was still working full time.

It is giving my brain something to do, so is this the opportunity that God has laid before me?  Is this one door closing and another opening?  I pray that it is.

I have the time now to also spend time in stillness and silence and listen for Gods voice.  This is the final thing I suggest you do to hear his voice.  Take time every day to just sit in silence and stillness.  This can be so difficult to in a world that is now 24/7.  The constant busyness of our lives makes it almost impossible as barrel our way through life of work, family and friends.  Ask yourself this question: when did you last have time to be still and silent?  If you’ve had that opportunity, great, do more of it, but if you get to the end of the day, get in bed and just fall asleep, in time for the alarm clock to wake for the next day’s busyness, you need to do something to alter that routine for a more positive one.  Now, I’m being totally honest with you here, I am not one for all this meditation and Yoga and stuff like that.  If that is you, great keep doing it as it is for you.  If you are not doing anything like that, can I suggest something?  Go to bed a little earlier than you normally would, only by ten minutes or so and before you do your nighttime routine for getting ready for bed, just sit, be still and be quiet.  Can you hear God’s voice?  Is his message coming through now that all that busyness of the day has subsided?  Can you hear him?

Do not be disheartened though if you do not hear him the first, the second, third, fourth, fifty-fifth night of you doing this.  He knows you are listening, and he will tell you when he wants you to use those unique gifts and talents that he has given you for the furtherance of his Kingdom here on Earth.

Remember what John says in chapter ten verse 27 ‘My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me’.

He knows each and every single one of us, personally, powerfully and truthfully.  He will never tell us to do something that we cannot handle, even if we think we cannot do it, he knows we can.  Just listen to his voice and what will be, will be.

 

Amen and may God Bless each and every one of you.