Good morning, Chair City Church. Happy Fourth of July weekend. Hope you got some time of rest, relaxation. At these last few days, we are doing a series called Spirit and Summer, and it's a way to help you lean in rather than lean back when it comes to your faith this summer.
Today I wanna ask you a question. I wanna ask us a question. I want you to ask yourself a question. How do I hear from God?
How do I hear God? Most likely if you believe in God, it's a question you've asked yourself at one time or another. There are certain voices we hear that really stick out to us. For me, it's like a Morgan Freeman or an Asala Vista baby.
I mean, I did that probably really terrible, but I think even some of you would get it. That's Arnold Schwarzenegger. And we recognize those voices. But I want you to note today that there's a difference between recognizing a voice and knowing a voice.
When I hear my dear Christie's voice, it's not just noticeable tonations or sound waves. It's personal, it resonates within me, within my heart, in my mind it moves my emotions. Now, though for many of us, the way we recognize God's voice, the way we become comfortable recognizing God's voice, is the way we recognize a popular voice like Arnold Schwarzenegger or a Morgan Freeman. And in this way, we are able to quickly respond, so as to receive what we need or want our asking God for.
I want you to think about this today. Rather than recognize God's voice, for you and I, it's important to be able to know God's voice. When I say here the voice of God, I'm not talking about the audible voice of God. I mean, that's possible, but extremely unusual.
I'm talking about promptings to our spirit. When we lean into God and we have this deep discernment or conviction or leading a guidance, God often communicates more than not to us in the depths of our souls. He pops up and takes residence in our thoughts, God, the Holy Spirit. And this is a wonderful happening in our lives.
It's a privilege, it's a blessing. And then things can tend to get complicated, not on God's part, but on our human behalf. And it has something to do with how we again are listening for God's voice, maybe perhaps more from a recognizing mode than a knowing mode. And we could start to pursue God, or looking to hear God in a way that sort of looks like us, you know, tossing up a prayer, crying out in a desperate way.
And then we try and concentrate to hear God, to give us that answer, to that request, to answer that question in a time of trouble. But what if knowing God's voice was about how we draw closer to God, was about how we dwell in his presence as we seek to know God's voice, as we want to know how to hear from God? If we did this, then knowing God's voice would be relational, not transactional. The difference between recognizing and knowing is the relationship, a deep personal relationship with the went through God.
This is a kind of a depiction, an illustration in the Bible in John chapter 10, and Jesus is speaking. And it tells us that God is the shepherd, and we, you and I, are the sheep. When it comes to knowing God's voice, it's important to know who we are in this shepherding and sheep relationship. Let's read John chapter 10, verses 3 through 4.
It says, the gatekeeper opens the gate for him. Jesus is speaking, and he's sheep. Listen to his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.
When he's brought out all his own, he goes on ahead of them, and he sheep follow him because they know his voice. So you see here, the sheep knows the shepherd's voice because they are close to one another. Sheep knew the voice of the shepherds so well that they could be guarded by the shepherd, even when they were amongst other sheep that were from a different fold, and being led by a different shepherd, even in midst of all sorts of noises and clamor from different humans and animals, they would recognize the voice of their shepherd, and they would move towards their shepherd and follow their shepherd. They say the sheep are so familiar, even so till they say sheep are so familiar with the voice of a shepherd, that even if someone tries to imitate, in a way that would fool you and I, are human ears, that the sheep are not fooled, they could tell that's not our shepherd.
And why is that? Because sheep need a shepherd, and they were designed to hear the voice of a shepherd. And we, you and I, we need God, and we were designed to hear the voice of God. I want you to get that this morning.
You would design and create it to hear God's voice, to know God's voice. And I think that tension comes when we struggle to see this happen. And maybe the issue here that's contributing to the struggle is in the basis, the foundation of our relationship with God. And maybe most of our conversations with God are more transactional than relational.
You're not pausing, let you ponder that. In a good way, not a discouraging way. I mean, in a good way, in a way that you're glad that you're cultivating such thoughts, and you're becoming aware of something that could be life changing, that you're right there, it's right within your grasp. I think this issue develops because you and I can tend to have a better relationship.
We're leaning more on being closer to other voices, besides God's voice. There are so many voices in our lives. I mean, it's getting really loud out there. It's crazy.
Your voices are pouring in. Friends and co-workers, family, social media, YouTube, the news, it's pouring in from all sorts of sources of the vices, TV, iPhones. I mean, and iPhones, I mean, news is popping in, information is just popping up, even as I'm speaking to you, in these last several minutes, perhaps you might've gotten a notification that this has happened here, this is going here, or you need to have this, or you need to know this. So many voices competing for our attention, wanting to influence us, wanting to have relationship with us in one capacity or another.
They want us to trust their voice. They want us to invest ourselves, our emotions, our minds, our futures in their voices. They stir us, they prompt us, they move us into a frenzy at times, externally, at times, internally. And we are all over the place.
And we are losing track of what is truly most important. We are losing track of what we should truly be valuing. Psalm 46, 10 says, "'Be still and know that he is God." Now, how do you do that? You say, David, where do I go?
It's my first step. And I say you start by limiting the less important voices in your life. Now, I'm gonna tell you now, if you struggle to do this, to lessen the influx of these less important voices, less significant voices in your life, then what's gonna happen is the most important voices in your life are going to be affected negatively. The most important relationships in your life are going to be affected negatively.
They're gonna struggle. If I allowed other voices in my life, regardless of the source, to be heard more than my dear Christi's voice, then it would negatively affect our relationship and our intimacy with one another. If we allow other voices in our lives to be heard more than God, then it's going to affect our relationship and our closeness with God. Knowing God's voice, God's voice is love.
God's voice is his word and God's voice is restoration. I hope that just infuse a ton of hope in you this morning. God's voice is love. It says in John 10, verse 9 through 17, Jesus says, "'I am the gate who ever enters through me will be saved.
"'They will come in and go out and find pasture. "'The thief comes only to steal, kill, and destroy. "'I have come that they may have life and have it to the full. "'Jesus has come so that you may have life.'" Verse 11, Jesus says, "'I am the good shepherd.
"'The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. "'The hired hand is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep. "'So when he sees the wolf coming, he abandons the sheep, "'and he runs away. "'The wolf attacks and the flock scatters.
"'The man runs away because he's a hired hand "'and cares nothing for the sheep.'" That man, that's the less important voice in your life. Verse 14, Jesus says, "'I am the good shepherd. "'I know my sheep and my sheep know me. "'And just as a father knows me, and I know the father, "'I lay down my life for the sheep.
"'I have other sheep that are not of the sheep, "'I might bring them also. "'They too will listen to my voice. "'And there shall be one flock and one shepherd. "'The reason my father loves me is that I lay down my life "'only to take it up again.'" You know, maybe, maybe you don't hear the voice of God because you are expecting, anticipating, of the understanding that it is supposed to sound sort of critical, maybe harsh, maybe in a tone that connotations or projects disappointment, maybe even a condemnation.
But God's voice sounds like love because God's voice is love, because God is love. Some of us see God or hear God as we filter it through our mind as a God who grades us, right? And hopefully we're passing, but it feels and it sounds more like we failed when we're trying to hear God's voice. And I do believe this is more of the recognizing than knowing.
In verse 15, Jesus says, "'I lay down my life for the sheep.'" Jesus is talking about laying down his life for you. He loves you. And yeah, he's gonna talk with you at times. God is gonna speak into your heart at times firmly, maybe bring conviction, which is a beautiful thing.
Just, you know, he'll talk to you in a way with firmness, but loving, sometimes it's gonna be the first step to knowing God, to join closer to God. There is God's voice and there are other voices and one of those voices, and maybe a voice that I've charged to work his way through other voices that are not of God, is your enemy, your adversary Satan. He speaks into your mind and he speaks about deception and lies. And if you're hearing voices and thoughts that are tearing people down, that are demeaning people, that are looking down on others, and it doesn't carry the tone of love, that's not the voice of God.
The Bible tells us that Satan comes to steal, kill and destroy here in the 10th chapter of John. What does that sound like? Well, it sounds like, you know, that is the car behind you, it's not to speed up, you slow down. It's a voice, you know, that says, hey, just put something out there, a post that's kinda angry or divisive, maybe veiled, but it's gonna be provocative, because you just need to do that.
That's not the voice of God. It's when you're in a group of people and you just feel like you just gotta pour out your opinion, knowing that maybe perhaps there'll be a disagreement with it, but you gotta make that point. That's not the voice of God. When we cheat or lie, it's not the voice of God.
When that voice is located a flirt with someone else other than your spouse, this is not the voice of God. A voice that says you're better than someone because of your wealth, because of your race, because of your position is not the voice of God. When a voice says you're not worthy of love, this is not God's voice. No, but that is Satan's voice.
A voice that brings destruction, divisiveness, and death. Yet God's voice brings life, because God's voice is love, and God's voice is His word, His living word, the Bible. John chapter 10 verse four says, won't he have brought out all his own? He goes on ahead of them, and he's she following him because they know his voice.
And in John chapter 10 verse 27, let's jump ahead a bit. Jesus says, my sheep, listen to my voice, I know them, and they follow me. And Jesus is saying this with like clarity and with confidence. I know them, they know my voice, they follow me.
This isn't like maybe, this is certain. We can know God's voice with certainty. And what helps us to do this is by reading the Bible, by becoming familiar with and understanding the Bible, by being comfortable with opening up the book and just reading the scripture, that is God speaking to us. God speaks most clearly, and He's most accessible through the Bible.
See, the revelation of God in scripture is really greater and should have greater bearing in our life than any of our own personal feelings than our personal revelations. Let's not subject God's word to our personal feelings and our revelations, or let us subject ourselves to God's written word, inspired word, that's speaking into our lives. The Bible should be our final authority. The Bible is true and trustworthy.
This incredible, these incredible words were written by over 40, were written by over 40 authors, in a span of over 1,500 years, 40 over 40 people, over 1,500 years across three different continents, and the message teaches the same thing. It's the same message. And that message, all of what was written and supported by thousands of ancient manuscripts and over 23,000 archeological digs, the Bible is trustworthy, as God's word. The Bible is timely and timeless, and that word is here for you in such a time like this.
And I wanna talk to you about reading the Bible, when you read the Bible. I want you to consider this, and this is just powerful. It really sort of speaks to it in a way, I don't know, my posture, my mindset, when I am reading the scripture. And that is we don't just read the Bible, the Bible reads us.
Hebrew says, book a Hebrew chapter four verse 12, for the word of God is alive and active, living and active, sharper than any double edged sword. It penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow. It judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. When you hear that, are you encouraging judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart?
Does that make you, is that comfort you? That God's voice, his word, is reading you, assessing you? Bringing clarity, it's reading you and showing you where your thoughts are and what's happening in you? It comforts me and it should comfort you to know God's voice, to know that as you're reading that scripture, like a scan of some sort on your heart or your brain, that God's word is scanning us, showing us what's truly going on inside of us.
The Holy Spirit inspired the writers of the Bible. And that same Holy Spirit inspires us when we're reading it. When we're reading the word of God, God the Holy Spirit is inspiring us, He's enlightening us. When you read the scripture, you're inhaling what the Holy Spirit exhaled thousands of years ago for the word of God is alive and active.
And it's speaking to you and into your life today. This is relationship to know God's voice. You must know God's word. You don't have to be a scholar.
You need to be warming up to it. You need to be engaging in it. God's voice is love. God's voice is His word.
And God's voice is capable of bringing restoration. So John chapter 21, Jesus is interacting with Peter. And it's an time where Peter has denied Jesus three times. And he's done this as Jesus is hanging on a cross.
And verse 15 of chapter 21 says, when I had finished eating, Jesus said to Simon Peter, Simon son of John, do you love me more than these? And Peter says, yes Lord, you know that I love you. Jesus said, feed my lambs. Again, Jesus said to Simon son of John, do you love me?
Yes, Peter said, yes Lord, you know that I love you. Jesus said, take care of my sheep. Wow, the third time, three times, Jesus says to him, Simon son of John, do you love me? Peter has heard because Jesus asked him a third time, do you love me?
He said, Lord, you know all things. And you know that I love you. Maybe that's you today. Maybe you're just steeped in uncertainty today.
Maybe you feel so far from God. Maybe you feel so unworthy. Maybe it's because you're hearing so many voices that are coming from within you, that are coming from the outside, so many voices that were planned and programmed and designed to try and get your attention, to influence you, to bring you to one position or another position, to get you to move in one manner financially or emotionally, to get you to click this or post that, or engage this or watch that or share this, one voice or another, but none the voice of the one true God. And all those voices in different ways, perhaps, in your totality, combined, or making you a lot more confused, a lot more unsettled, a lot more vulnerable to the enemy, a lot more anxious, and a lot more feeling distant from God than closer to God.
And the more you're cultivating this and participating this and not lessening these voices, perhaps you're starting to feel a little unworthy. Perhaps you might be thinking and maybe even acting in ways that you feel unworthy. Perhaps it's kicking up all of these thoughts of things of the past and you feel unworthy. And I want you to be encouraged today.
And the encouragement for you is this, that God's voice, like no other voice, brings restoration. God is a restoring God. Jesus asked Peter, do you love me? Jesus doesn't ask Peter, Peter, I want you to tell me how you're gonna make sure that you're never gonna deny me again.
How am I gonna, how are you gonna make sure that this will never happen again? Jesus doesn't ask Peter, Peter, I want you to prove yourself to me, I want you to prove to me that you love me. Jesus doesn't ask Peter to promise that he's never gonna screw up or mess up again. Jesus just brings it to love.
Jesus just boils it down to love. Jesus just pours out and brings love and speaks love into Peter's life. And he's doing that to you right here today, this morning, that God, his word and his presence is just pouring love into your life right now. This awesome and this powerful voice of God is inviting you into an intimate relationship with him.
And it's when that brings restoration. If you pause and just take it in, you will sense and you'll feel the power of you being restored by the second. Peter goes on to write these words in the Bible. Years later in 1 Peter chapter two, verse 25.
It says for you, we're like sheep going astray. You, it's not only Peter's audiences and his readers, but you and I. You were like sheep going astray. But now you've returned to the shepherd and the overseer of your soul.
Peter remembered God's voice calls you back into relationship, back into restoration. Will you say yes to that voice today? Will you say yes to God calling you to him today? Here is voice, people of God.
Here is voice. If you do not believe in God, if you've don't have a relationship with God, here is that voice calling you. If you profess to be a believer today, here is that voice calling you to intimacy with him. Here is that voice calling you to lesson the other voices.
Here is that voice calling you to comfort, to certainty, to clarity, to victory, regardless of anything else. He is Lord, He is Savior, He is on the throne. He is King of Kings and Lord of Lords. And here is his voice, know his voice, recognize other voices, but know the voice of your God.
The Bible teaches us that we are sheep. The Bible teaches that Jesus is our shepherd and that is sheep we wander away and not wandering away is sin. When we choose away other than God, we listen to voices other than God. And we're lost, but God in His love pours grace and forgiveness into our lives.
Jesus said in John chapter 10 verse 11, I am the good shepherd and the good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. So all of that sin, all of that wandering, all of that listening and pouring ourselves into the listening and hearing and obeying the voices of others, it deserves punishment. It deserves horrific consequences, but Jesus laid down his life so that we would be forgiven of the ultimate consequences, which is damnation, which is apart from our heavenly Father. When we trust in Jesus, when we follow Him, we are saved and we are restored back to God.
We are reconciled to an intimate relationship with our heavenly Father. This is love, there's no greater love. Are you one of God's sheep? Today will you say yes to Jesus?
Maybe you don't know God's voice because you don't know God. But before you move on today, before you move out of that room, before you get up off that couch, before you do anything else in your life, today right now place your faith, your trust in Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, today decide I am choosing to know God. Today I will hear God's voice. Today I'm deciding to trust in Jesus.
And in Jesus' death on the cross for your, for my sins, and through his resurrection, I know that sin and death are defeated and that love wins people, love wins. Say this prayer within yourself as you're sitting there hearing this, God I need you, I am turning to you. God I want to hear your voice, speak to me, O God. Today I trust in Jesus as my Lord and Savior, amen.
If you've said that prayer, you have begun that relationship with God. You've begun that close relationship with God to knowing God. If you've come to this place at the end of this message, just look down and you'll see a link or a text number both will give you access to a form, it's a simple one, complete it, and take the time to do it and send it out to us. We will pray for you, others will pray for you and we'll send you out in the mail, a package, it's a great package to give you some traction and some support to this wonderful decision you've made.
If you're joining us for the first time, really again go to that link, that text filled out, let us know, it's so encouraging to know you're out there and again we'll send you a separate special package. This morning, today, tomorrow, here God's voice above all other voices. I miss you and I'm praying for you to God be the glory.