The morning when I heard the voice of God

Let me tell you about an amazing experience I had early on Monday morning, March 19, 2007, just after six o'clock in the morning. God was actually speaking to me. There is no doubt that it was God. I heard the words in my head as clearly as when the memory of a conversation flashes through your mind. The words were in English, but they had an absolutely self-contained ring of truth to them. I know without a shadow of a doubt that God is speaking today.

For some reason I couldn’t sleep. I was at Shalom House in northern Minnesota for a couples retreat for our staff. It was about five-thirty in the morning. I lay there wondering if I should get up or wait until I was pulled back into sleep. In His mercy, God lifted me out of bed. It was almost dark, but I managed to find my clothes, get dressed, grab my briefcase, and slip out of the room without waking Noel. The main room downstairs was completely quiet. No one else seemed to be awake. So I sat down on the couch in the corner to pray.

«"Come and see"»

I prayed and pondered, and suddenly it happened. God said : "Come and see the works of God.". I had no doubt that these were God’s words. At this very moment. In this very place in the twenty-first century, in 2007, God was speaking to me with absolute authority and self-evident reality. I paused to let myself realize this. There was a sweetness to it. Time seemed to have no meaning. God was there. He had me in his sights. He wanted to tell me something. When God draws near, the rush stops. Time slows down.

«"I know without a shadow of a doubt that God still speaks today.".

I was wondering what he meant by «"come and see.". Will He take me somewhere like Paul to heaven to see the unspeakable? (2 Corinthians 12:3-4)? Did it mean «"come and see"», that I would have a vision of some great act of God that no one had seen? I don't know how much time passed between God's first words: «"Come and see the works of God"» and the following words. It doesn't matter. I was enveloped in the love of His personal communication. The God of the Universe was speaking to me.

Then he said as clearly as words that had never crossed my mind:  «My works are wonderful for the sons of men.". My heart leaped, "Yes, Lord! You are amazing in your works. Yes, for all people, whether they see it or not. Yes! Now, what will you show me?"

The words came again. Just as clearly as before, but increasingly specific: «I turned the sea into dry land, and the river was passed over on foot. Therefore let us rejoice in Him.[Bozi]»!  Suddenly I realized that God was taking me back thousands of years, to the time when He dried up the Red Sea and the Jordan River. His word was taking me back in history, to those great things. This is what he meant when he said: «"come and see"». In His words He brought me back to those two glorious deeds before the sons of men. These were «"amazing deeds"», which He spoke about. God Himself spoke about the mighty works of God. He did it for me. He did it with words that sounded in my head.

«"Holy moment"»

A strange awe came over me. A palpable peace came over me. It was a holy moment and a holy corner of the world in northern Minnesota. Almighty God came down and gave me silence, openness, and a willingness to hear His voice. As I marveled at His power to dry up the sea and the river, He spoke again: «"My eyes are upon all the nations; let not the rebellious exalt themselves.".

It took my breath away. It was very serious. It was almost a rebuke. At least a warning. He could just as easily have taken me by the collar of my shirt, lifted me off the ground with one hand, and said with an incomparable mixture of rage and love, «Never, never, never exalt yourself. Never rebel against Me.».

I sat and stared into nowhere. My mind was filled with the universal glory of God. «"My eyes are upon all the nations.". He told me that. It’s not just that He said it. Yes, that’s wonderful. It’s that He told me that. It was the words of God that were in my head. They were in my head just as much as the words I’m writing right now. They were so clear, as if I remembered at that moment that my wife had said, «Come down to dinner when you’re ready.» I know those are my wife’s words. And I know those are God’s words.

«"He's still talking"»

Think about it. Look at it. Stand before it in awe. The God who watches over nations—just as some people watch over livestock, stock markets, or construction sites—this God still speaks in the twenty-first century. I have heard his words. He has spoken to me personally.

«"When God draws near, the rush stops. Time slows down.".

How did it affect me? It filled me with a fresh sense of God’s reality. It further assured me that He is at work in history and in our time. It strengthened my faith that He is for me, cares for me, and will use His universal authority to watch over me. Otherwise, why would He come and tell me these things?

This has strengthened my love for the Bible as God’s Word, because it is through the Bible that I have heard these divine words, and because of the Bible, I have similar experiences almost every day. The God of the Universe Himself speaks to my mind—and to your mind—on every page. We hear His words. God Himself has multiplied His wonderful works and thoughts toward us, and no one can compare with Him! I will declare and tell about them, for they are greater than can be told. (Psalm 40:5).

And most importantly, they are accessible to everyone. If you want to hear the same words I heard on my couch in northern Minnesota, read on. (Psalm 66:5-7). There I heard them. Oh, how precious the Bible is. It is the word of God. In it God speaks in the twenty-first century. It is the true voice of God. In this voice He speaks with absolute truth and personal power. In this voice He reveals His unsurpassed beauty. In this voice He reveals the deepest secrets of our hearts. No voice anywhere and ever can reach so deep, can lift so high, and can carry so far as the voice of God that we hear in the Bible.

It is a great miracle that God still speaks through the Bible today with greater power and greater glory, and greater assurance, and greater sweetness, and greater hope, and greater guidance, and greater transforming power, and greater truth of Christ than can be heard through any voice, in any human soul on the planet, that is not of the Bible.

«"Unreasonable surprise"»

That is why the article «My Conversation with God» in «Christianity Today»" sounded so sad to me. Written by an anonymous professor at a "famous Christian university," it tells of his experience listening to God. God said he should give all of his royalties from his new book to the education of a needy student.

What saddens me about this article is not that it is untrue or that it was not true. What saddens me is that it really does make it seem as if extra-biblical communication with God is something incredibly wonderful and faith-deepening. At the same time, the incredibly glorious communication with the living God that explodes personally, powerfully, and transformatively into a receptive heart through the Bible every day is simply ignored.

«"Bible – "It is the very voice of God. In it he speaks in the twenty-first century.".

I'm sure that's not what this theology professor meant, but what he actually said was, "For many years I have taught that God still speaks." , but I couldn't personally testify to this. I can only do this anonymously at this time, for reasons that I hope will be clear» (emphasis added). Of course, he does not mean what he seems to mean: that only when you hear an unscriptural voice like «The money is not yours» can you personally to testify that God still speaks. Of course, he does not want to diminish the voice of God in the Bible, which speaks today with power and truth and wisdom and glory and joy and hope and wonder and help ten thousand times more strongly than anything, that we can hear outside the Bible.

I am saddened by what is being said here. The great need of our time is for people to experience the living reality of God by hearing His word for themselves and transforming it in Scripture. There is something incredibly wrong when words we hear outside of Scripture have more power and influence for us than the inspired Word of God.

Let us exclaim with the psalmist: «Incline my heart to Your testimonies» (Ps. 119:36). «Open my eyes, that I may see the wondrous qualities of Your law!» (Ps. 119:18). Grant that the eyes of our hearts may be enlightened, so that we may know our hope, and our inheritance, and the love of Christ, which surpasses knowledge, that we may be filled with all the fullness of God. (Eph. 1:18; 3:19).

God, do not let us be so deaf to Your Word and so unmoved by its ineffable, obvious perfection that we celebrate lesser things as more exciting, and even consider this inappropriate amazement worthy of publication in a national magazine.