Love Opens Your Spiritual Ears

          I think we all know that a “Hard Heart” is what causes us to be “Spiritually Deaf.” So maybe we should find out what causes a hard heart and avoid that condition entirely. Makes sense, right?

A hard heart comes from unbelief.

          Hardness of heart comes from a misuse of our free will. We refuse to submit our will to the Father, we are in unbelief, pride, and selfishness. We actively choose to disobey or ignore God’s word, thereby departing from God, compromising the relationship, and violating our conscience. If our conscience isn’t clear, our confidence in God s compromised.

Hebrews 3:12 Beware, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God;

1 Timothy 4:1-2 Now the Spirit expressly says that in latter times some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons, ² speaking lies in hypocrisy, having their own conscience seared with a hot iron,

          A hard heart will not yield to, or acknowledge the truth. It makes us and our desires the center of the universe instead of God. Understand this:

THE SMALLEST WORLD YOU WILL EVER LIVE IN, IS THE ONE THAT YOU ARE THE CENTER OF.

          In Mark 8 Jesus spoke to His disciples about the characteristics of a hard heart:

Mark 8:17-18 But Jesus, being aware of it, said to them, “Why do you reason because you have no bread? Do you not yet perceive nor understand? Is your heart still hardened? ¹⁸ Having eyes, do you not see? And having ears, do you not hear? And do you not remember?

         In these verses, Jesus gives us the symptoms that are descriptive of a hard heart:  (1) unable to perceive, (2) unable to understand, (3) unable to see, (4) unable to hear, and (5) unable to remember.

          A hard heart is characterized by a lack of discernment and an inability perceive spiritually. A hard heart will keep a person from totally grasping spiritual things. They might see what the Lord is trying to show them, but they can’t get a hold of it in a way that they can apply it to their life.

          We can reverse the condition of a hard heart. We have the power to determine what our heart accepts or rejects. We must control our will to control our actions. It starts with obedience. Obedience is the “love language” of God.

John 14:23-24 Jesus answered and said to him, “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our home with him. ²⁴ He who does not love Me does not keep My words; and the word which you hear is not Mine but the Father’s who sent Me.

          It’s not a hearing problem, it’s a love problem! Love can only be known by the actions that it prompts.  It is acts of obedience that show our faith and love for the Father. If we have a problem hearing God’s voice, we probably know the area that we are in disobedience, but if our heart is too hard to be clear, we can pray like the Psalmist:

Psalm 139:23-24. “Search me, O God, and know my heart; Try me, and know my anxieties; ²⁴ And see if there is any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.“

Psalm 26:2 Examine me, O Lord, and prove me; Try my mind and my heart.

         If we are sincere about obeying God, our spiritual ears and eyes will be opened and we will begin to see everything and everyone different, including our self. Having our spiritual eyes and ears opened is a condition of the heart. When our heart is tender and sincere before the Father, we gladly obey. He can then use our hearts as a conduit for His life and love to pour forth from.

Proverbs 4:23  Keep your heart with all diligence, for out of it spring the issues of life.

Thank you for visiting truthpressure.com. I hope this has been a blessing to you.

JC

~ Developing Our Spiritual Ears ~

John 10:27 ~ My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they
follow Me.
One of the greatest days of my life was when I discovered that God speaks to His people personally. I thought I had “arrived” at that point, because I had already made up my mind to do what God said. Unfortunately, I found that when you learn to hear God’s voice you then become a genuine threat to the Devil and he goes to work on you to disrupt and confuse the hearing process.
Before we dive into some of the things I have learned to fight this attack on our spiritual hearing, I want to share a brief testimony on when and how I discovered that God speaks to His people. This is important, because before you learn to hear from God, you must first be absolutely convinced that He will talk to you.

The Day I Heard God

It was November 1988 and I had been saved about two weeks. I had almost no interaction with other Christians for those two weeks because after I was saved, I left town on a job. During those two weeks I had read a paperback New Testament at night in the hotel room where I was staying. It was the only Bible I had ever been exposed to and I was reading it like a starving man.
When I returned home I sought out the people who had prayed the prayer of salvation with me and I had a million questions. I wanted to know more about this wonderful thing that happened to me called salvation. I was dramatically changed and delivered from a 4 year meth addiction. it was a radical conversion.
They invited me to a bible study that night and when I showed up, the house was full of people who were engaged in this discussion about how God had spoken to this one individual a few days ago. As I listened skeptically, one by one they all related stories of how God had spoken to them. I thought they were ALL NUTS!
My Idea of God was somewhat shaken by all this conversation and I wanted some answers. I had to know if this was real or just a bunch of weirdoes that went off the deep end, so I politely asked, “what exactly do you mean by God spoke to me?”
A woman named Diane explained to me that God does speak in our hearts, and that we can learn to hear His voice. She went on to add that every night for one whole year she would lay in bed at night and pray, “God, you are my Father and I am your child, and I should know my Father’s voice, so I am asking you to speak to me.”
Many more words were said and a lot of instruction was given, but what she said stuck with me and I could not get it out of my mind. To help me in my new faith, the group gave me a brand new Amplified bible. I was so excited! I had never seen the Old Testament before and was looking forward to exploring it.
On the long drive home I was wrestling with all this new information about how God speaks to people and I just couldn’t bring myself to accept it without experiencing it myself. So when I got home, I went to the bedroom, dropped my new bible on the floor next to the bed, kicked off my cloths and laid down staring at the ceiling.
While laying there in the dark, I decided to put this woman’s method to the test. So I prayed, “God if you really do speak to people I have to know it for myself. So I am going to lay here until You talk to me if I have to lay here until daylight.” I was dead serious!
I was not prepared for what happened. Immediately I heard this strong voice inside me say “Samuel 3.” I sat up on the edge of the bed and turned on the light trembling. I can’t explain exactly how I felt. I was a little shaken, a little scared, but I knew one thing for sure, that did not come from me because I did not know what “Samuel 3” meant.
As I was sitting there on the edge of my bed, wondering if that was God that spoke or just my overactive imagination, I looked down on the floor between my feet and saw the new Bible. At that point in my life, I had never read one word in the Old Testament, but I picked it up and turned to the table of contents thinking this might be a scripture. When I saw the books of first and second Samuel, I was completely shocked! I felt like my heart was about to pound right out of my chest. I asked the Lord, “which one?” and that same voice came again, only this time it was not a strong inward voice, but a still small voice, and it said, “First Samuel 3,”
You may know the story. The prophet Samuel was just a boy. He was laying in his bed one night, (just like me) and the Lord came and spoke to him (just like me). The boy ran in to the priest because he thought the priest had called him. You see, Samuel did not know God’s voice either (just like me). This happened to Samuel three times until Eli the priest had to tell Samuel that the Lord was talking. God brought me to a place in the bible that I was experiencing at that very moment! He affirmed that He was my Father and that He wanted to speak to me!
It was at that point that I stepped over the line from believing that God is real, to absolutely KNOWING that God is real, alive, and speaks to His people. I was on top of the world! The creator of the universe had just spoken to me in such a personal way that even my pea brain couldn’t get confused about it.
For weeks I was in this euphoric place where I was constantly talking to, and listening to God. He was fathering me, and I was doing my best to be a good son. Then I realized that it was getting increasingly harder to discern God’s voice. I blamed it on not praying enough, not reading enough bible, sin, etc. and this is where most Christians miss it. Like me, they believe all of that garbage and fall into the enemy’s trap of deception and confusion. In this lesson we will look at some things that impede our ability to hear clearly from God.

The Frequency of God

When you tune in to a radio station you have to adjust the dial to a specific frequency on your radio if you want to have a clear reception. If the frequency is off by just a little bit, the reception becomes distorted with static and hard to hear. God has His own frequency that allows you to hear a clear, strong reception. That frequency is PEACE.
Your heart is the radio, but that radio has to be tuned in to the right frequency to pick up the reception. If you drive your car to the radio station and park it so the bumper is touching the radio tower, you still won’t pick up a reception unless you tune the radio in to the proper channel.
Don’t be fooled into thinking that just because you go to church and park your keister in a pew twice a week that you are going to be tuned in to hearing God’s voice. Your heart must be “tuned” to hear God’s voice.

1 Kings 19:11-13 Then He said, “Go out, and stand on the mountain before the Lord.” And behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind tore into the mountains and broke the rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; ¹² and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a still small voice. ¹³ So it was, when Elijah heard it, that he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood in the entrance of the cave. Suddenly a voice came to him, and said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”

God was showing Elijah a very important principle that was recorded for posterity. When enemies and circumstances are pressing us and seem to have the loudest voice, He can always be found in stillness.
It doesn’t take long to go from the highest of highs to the lowest of lows, but as Christians we are called to shine through it all. The enemy knows that if he can cause enough static he can keep us from being clear on God’s plan for our life. The more he can disrupt and interfere with the communication between us and God the less successful we will be in fulfilling our created purpose. That is what Satan is after, your purpose.
Your created purpose is son-ship. In the Garden of Eden, Peace with God was lost, and therefore the father/child relationship was broken. Jesus restored Peace, and through Him we now have the Father/ son relationship restored. When we begin to walk in the fullness of our son-ship the enemy is rendered powerless. This relationship between you and God is ALWAYS Satan’s main target. If he can keep you from being Fathered, he can keep you from becoming like your Father.

Many Voices

When trying to hear from God, we must be able to filter through all the other voices that are speaking to us. If you have ever been in a crowd of people where everyone is trying to talk to you at once, you know that it is very difficult pick out and hear just one voice. That is when you raise your hands and yell “ONE AT A TIME PLEASE!” Often we need to do that spiritually. We take one voice at a time, one thought at a time, and bring it into captivity to the obedience of Christ.

^{2 Corinthians 10:3-5} For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh. ⁴ For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, ⁵ casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ,
Cutting through all the thoughts, bad reports, symptoms, and strongholds of wrong thinking is the spiritual battle that we are engaged in. This never stops. The enemy, our carnal nature, memories of bad experiences, and just life in general are constantly speaking to us. We must learn to find that quiet peaceful place in the presence of God that His voice can be clearly distinguished above all the clamor.

Worship is the best way to make this happen. I’m not talking about your worship service at church once or twice a week, although that is important. I’m talking about you, all alone in your bedroom, when no one else is looking, worshiping God from your heart. Desiring Him enough to spend time with Him alone, telling Him how much you love and appreciate Him. Pouring out your heart and being open and vulnerable. No effort you make toward God will ever go unrewarded. If you draw close to Him, He will draw close to you.

James 4:7-8 Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. ⁸ Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded.
Christians tend to focus too much on resisting the Devil. Constantly praying about the devil, binding, loosing, rebuking. Don’t spend time resisting the devil, spend time submitting to God. This is the best, and only way, to resist the devil. By submitting to God, you have automatically resisted the devil. You now fight in His strength and not yours. You acknowledge that Satan is a defeated foe, that the victory has already been won. Now take your stand and enforce the victory by submitting to your Father.

STOP FIGHTING A FIGHT THAT HAS ALREADY BEEN WON FOR YOU!

Willingness to Obey

One of the biggest thing that prevents people from hearing from God is unwillingness to obey what He says. If you ask God for something and you are not willing to hear a “no,” He may not even talk to you about it because He knows your mind is already made up.
There is a popular teaching that’s been around for years called “The five love languages.” It teaches you to identify and recognize your spouses needs so that you can better meet those needs and prevent tension and strife in your relationship. Well, God has a love language, and that love language is obedience.

John 14:16 “If you love Me, keep My commandments. ¹⁶ And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever

John 14:21 ^{He who has My commandments and keeps them, it is he who loves Me. And he who loves Me} will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and manifest Myself to him.”

John 14:23-24 Jesus answered and said to him, “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our home with him. ²⁴ He who does not love Me does not keep My words; and the word which you hear is not Mine but the Father’s who sent Me.
These three passages are from one chapter in the Bible. Jesus is trying to prepare His disciples for a life in the Spirit. He is giving clear instructions about how our love for God is to be expressed. He is also teaching them that this is the key to having God manifest in your life.

Isaiah 1:19 If you are willing and obedient, You shall eat the good of the land.
Willingness and obedience are a cornerstone of the Christian faith. It is the number one way to express love for your Father. Love is the fulfillment of the Law. It is THE New Testament commandment. (Mark 12:30) It is THIS love that makes your faith work.

Galatians 5:6 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but faith working through love.

Read more about how to develop your spiritual ears Here

~ How To Develop Our Spiritual Ears ~

          The Lord asked me recently, “How does faith come?” I immediately said “faith comes by hearing Lord.”  (quoting Romans 10:17). The Lord then asked: “How does hearing come?”  I must admit, I didn’t have a quick answer for Him, but I was reminded of all the scriptures that state: “he who has ears to hear let him hear,” and many other scriptures that said, “They had eyes that see and could not see, they had ears but could not hear.”

          I began to see why people who have the “appearance” of faith and declare that Jesus is their Lord are having great difficulty in their Christian walk,  They don’t have a hearing ear … so faith never comes.

          The common teaching is that faith comes by hearing and hearing and hearing etc. And there is some truth to that line of thought. The thing that has not been taught is that there are different ways to hear and there is a difference between natural hearing and spiritual hearing.

 Romans 10:17 ~ So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.

Let me give you a more accurate translation of the verse to make it clear.

ROM 10:17 (paraphrase) ~ So then faith comes by what you hear, and your hearing comes from the Word of God that you act upon.

          Just because you have ears does not mean you are capable of hearing the Word. Your spiritual ears, your heart, can only be opened by the obedience to the word of God. That word will come from the written Word as well as the spoken Word by the Holy Spirit that dwells in you as a believer.  

ONLY THE WORD THAT WE ACT ON WILL DEVELOP OUR SPIRITUAL EARS.

OBEDIENCE OPENS OUR SPIRITUAL EARS TO HEAR MORE INSTRUCTION.

Throughout the bible, it is the disobedient and rebellious people who “had ears but could not hear.”

Deuteronomy 29:4 ~ Yet the LORD hath not given you a heart to perceive, and eyes to see, and ears to hear, unto this day.

Jeremiah 5:21 ~ Hear now this, O foolish people, and without understanding; which have eyes, and see not; which have ears, and hear not:

Ezekiel 12:2 ~ Son of man, thou dwellest in the midst of a rebellious house, which have eyes to see, and see not; they have ears to hear, and hear not: for they are a rebellious house.

 “Spiritual hearing” comes from the word of God that we act on. If we are in a place where we feel we cannot hear God’s voice, we should humble ourselves before Him and ask Him where we have been rebellious and disobedient. He will answer.

There are VAST realms of understanding and revelation that we will never acquire if we are not doers of the word. If we do not act on what we have heard, the Bible says we are deceiving ourselves. If we hear the word and do nothing about it, we become spiritually deaf. 

James 1:22 ~ But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.

Once we obey the Word of God, a wonderful cycle begins. Acting on the word gives life to our faith and develops our ability to hear from the Lord, which in turn opens us up to hear more, which gives us more opportunity to act on what we hear, which gives life to our faith ….  And the cycle goes on.  It is called spiritual growth.

If the Word of God is sown in our heart and we refuse to act on it (rebellion), the devil has the right to come steal it from us. This is the condition that we see in the parable of the sower.

Matthew 13:19 ~ When anyone hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what has been sown in his heart. This is what was sown along the path.

There are too many “way side” Christians in the Church today. The spiritual condition of the Church as a whole is poor, in part because of the inability to hear what the Lord is saying to this generation.

Matthew 13:9-13 ~ He who has ears, let him hear.” ¹⁰ Then the disciples came and said to him, “Why do you speak to them in parables?” ¹¹ And he answered them, “To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. ¹² For to the one who has, more will be given, and he will have an abundance, but from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away. ¹³ This is why I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand.

When Jesus called the twelve He said to them: “Come.” They acted on that word and continued to follow Him. Because they acted on the word, THEY HAD EARS TO HEAR MORE. Lets look at the rest of this passage.

Matthew 13:14-15 Indeed, in their case the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled that says: “You will indeed hear but never understand, and you will indeed see but never perceive.” ¹⁵ For this people’s heart has grown dull, and with their ears they can barely hear, and their eyes they have closed, lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and turn, and I would heal them.’

Lack of spiritual hearing is a heart problem, cause by unbelief. Unbelief can be manifest in many ways. By rebellion, disobedience, lack of understanding, spiritual laziness, pride, or selfish desires. No matter what form it takes, obedience is the cure.

John 14:23-24 Jesus answered and said to him, “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our home with him. ²⁴ He who does not love Me does not keep My words; and the word which you hear is not Mine but the Father’s who sent Me.

God has already spoken many things to us in His written word. Why would He be inclined to say anything else if we are not interested in what He already said? Find out what God has already spoken and act on THAT. This will give us ears to hear what the Spirit is saying.

Thank you for visiting truthpressure.com. I hope this has been a blessing to you.

JC