Learning to hear from the Lord

[Karl Peters]

The Lord had come into my life with three powerful words "Read Your Bible", and I did. It took me nine months and strange things had started happening. Lot of strange things. Still it was not the strange spiritual things, nor the three words "Read Your Bible", nor the have read the Bible that made the big change in my life. It was getting to know Him, and that began a month of so after I finished reading the Bible.

If happened on the freeway while driving to work one day. Because of the strange things that had happen I was thinking about God a lot, and that day I got to thinking about how we all tend to think God can hear from us even though we make a prayer silently inside ourselves. ?Yet who would put in a one way telephone line?? There fore if God could hear what I was saying to Him inside then He must be able to talk back to me the same way. That would only make sense. So I decided to test my idea. I realized that we are not supposed to put God to the test, but this seemed like an honest attempt to just see if He was there to talk to me.

I decided to make the test simple. I would ask God for what lane of the freeway to be in and analyze what thought came back to me. It did really make any difference what lane I was in anyway. So I proceeded with my test.

"Lord Jesus Christ what lane of the freeway should I be in?" , I asked Him with a thought in my head.

The next thought I got was "You're ok."

HUMMM - that was about as unclimactic as it could get. The thought seemed to be my thought, but why did the thought come across "You're ok." instead of "I'm ok".

I didn't understand it at the time but this little bit of logic, or should I say faith applied, turns out to be critical. Still, at that time it seemed pretty silly and unimportant - but I was just driving to work like always so you have to have something to do.

Therefore, again I tested the premise that God might be able to just answer me inside.

"Lord Jesus Christ what lane of the freeway should I be in?", and again the next thought I had was "You're ok."

Ok - now what to do? Was that God? Was that just me? The thought was "You're ok", sounding like it was from someone else - but it was my thought wasn't it? Well - that clearly didn't prove a thing.

Yet a couple of mile down the road, a whole bunch of big rig trucks we coming down the on ramp!! I was next to the slow lane on a 4 lane freeway, so I needed to get over to the left because all those trucks were going to slow things down a bit. OH - but I remembered that test. "Ok Lord, what lane of the freeway should I be in?". I thought almost jokingly.

"Get in the right lane", was the thought that came back to me.

My mind exploded! - "I DON'T WANT TO BE IN THE RIGHT LANE! I WANT TO BE IN THE LEFT LANE!!"

The next though I had was calm and said, "Well, do you want to listen to me or not?"

Well - now it was clear! There was me who wanted to get over to the left lanes and there was someone else, who being very calm, wanted me to get in the right lane. It made not sense to me, but sense I had asked God and getting in the right lane would only slow me down and I was running good time that morning, I decided I should get in the right lane.

When I did get in the right lane all the trucks came down in front of me, and every single one of them got over a lane to the left!! So that all the other lanes of the freeway slowed way down!! Yet in the right lane there was only one little car, with me in it, and I went by everyone.

This weird little event changed the way I live my life!!!!!!

It gave me the faith to believe that God was with me and I could seek Him and get answers from Him. Of course there is a lot more to know, and I am still learn over 20 years later, but knowing the He is indeed there to talk back and forth with changes your life!!!!

 

[Karl Peters]

Now after I figured out that I could hear from Him, from that incident/test while driving down the freeway, I started seeking His voice on all kinds of little things, like even what clothes to wear. This became very interesting!

I was a manager at a large retail chain, and He would have me wearing my very best clothes when I got surprised visits from the district and or regional manager, and my worst clothes on the days I had a lot of physical work to do. It got to the point that I could start to tell when I was going to get a surprise visit simply by the clothes He would pick out for me.

On morning in spring He told me to wear a jacket that I had not worn for a long time. When I got to work that morning it suddenly started to rain. The unique thing about that jacket was that it had a hood, so I had a hood over my head while making for the store. There were several other employees and none of us expected rain that morning. The other employees all got rather wet on their run to the store entrance.

One Sunday the Lord had me wear an extremely bright Hawaiian shirt to church. When I arrived I found the pastor was also wearing an extremely bright and wild flowered shirt. It looked and me and came over to talk to me. It turned out that He was wearing his shirt because he had just come back from a mission trip to Africa and had got the shirt there. The pastor was using the shirt like a prop for telling the church about their trip. So he asked me about my shirt. I told him the Lord asked me to wear it, but I had no idea why. The pastor knew why I was wearing the shirt when I did not know. I had only worn it because of the Lord. The pastor's shirt got hung up on the wall with some other things from their mission trip for some weeks afterwards to remind the church of the trip. It reminded me about the incredibleness of listening to the Lord.

 

[Wrangler]

The Lord had come into my life with three powerful words

I hear a Quiet Whisperer who often talks 2-3 word bursts, a rhythm I recognize as not my own.

 

[Karl Peters]

I hear a Quiet Whisperer who often talks 2-3 word bursts, a rhythm I recognize as not my own.

Yeah - that's sounds like Him!!!

He often comes across a bit strange in His approach - which as people would see in our testimonies - and in the reading of the Bible.

Ps 78:1,2 Listen, O my people, to my instruction; Incline your ears to the words of my mouth. I will open my mouth in a parable; I will utter dark sayings of old.

It is good that His thoughts are not our thoughts and His way are not our ways, because it helps us see that what we are getting is not our own thoughts and just something out of our own mind.