Discerning the Voice of God through His Word

Discerning the voice of God can be difficult sometimes. It is easier when we are reading God’s Word. This daily devotional looks at how growing in knowledge and love helps us discern God’s Will.

Nuggets

By changing our character to be like God, we know what His truths are and can determine right from wrong.
Knowledge leads us to understand God.
Paul thought discernment was wrapped up in loving God more.
The word of God is living because we are constantly learning more than we previously knew and learning more in-depth what we previously knew.

Devotions in the How to Discern the Voice of God series

Let’s Put It into Context #1

Discernment means we can evaluate the situation and recognize right from wrong. Applying that would mean that we gauge a situation and know how God would like us to act.

That is what discernment is, but we can’t just leave it at that. It isn’t just about doing what is right or wrong.

It isn’t an academic knowledge of reality and existence. It isn’t just a head knowledge of Who God is and what He has done.

Most importantly, we are called to know God. Knowledge is organizing truth in the mind.

But like we keep saying, our faith can’t just be head knowledge. It has to be heart knowledge.

It is knowing, believing, and submitting to God so that we can secure salvation. Salvation is deliverance from evil and the consequences of sins to replace them with eternal life and good.

God isn’t into a works-based salvation. He wants us to change our character to be more like His.

Let’s Put It into Context #2

We have to know obedience from sin.
What the scientific false teachers are trying to tell us is that we only have to be concerned with what we see and do.
Science has several laws that tell us what always happens under certain conditions – until science meets miracles.
The scientific false teachers want to tell us that prayer means nothing.
Disciples are told to pursue knowledge.
We are not to follow the world’s attempts to figure out how God does what He does.

We are walking through Alexander’s sermon to see what we can mine from it. The purple headings are going to be his words.

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The skilful (sic) workman must be able to distinguish between fundamental truths, and such as are not fundamental.

“And it is my prayer that your love may abound more and more, with knowledge and all discernment, so that you may approve what is excellent, and so be pure and blameless for the day of Christ” (Phil. 1: 9-10 ESV)

We do have to know God enough to gain salvation. Salvation is deliverance from evil and the consequences of sins to replace them with eternal life and good.

Disciples are called to change our character to be like God. In that way, we know what His truths are and can determine right from wrong.

Spurgeon took knowing right from wrong up a level. He wrote, “Discernment is not knowing the difference between right and wrong. It is knowing the difference between right and almost right.”

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Ouch. It is difficult to distinguish between dilemmas. But don’t we think sin is black and white? It isn’t.

One thing Spurgeon could be talking about is what Jones talked about — public opinion. We have those who think they know what Christianity is, but they aren’t truly following God.

Then we might see those who have the gospel right. They think, however, that they have to add things to it. During Paul’s time, it was wanting to add the laws back in for salvation.

The third kind of people Jones discussed were those who get everything God calls us to believe — except that Jesus is our Savior. Jones wrote, “A Christ who is not come in the flesh would be no Christ at all.”

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So, how are disciples of Christ supposed to change ourselves through spiritual discernment?

Discernment Grows as Knowledge Grows

Knowledge leads us to understand God. No, we are not going to perfectly understand God until we get to Heaven. We do need to understand what God calls us to understand.

Emmons felt that, instead of a perfect knowledge of God, we have a true knowledge. We know what God reveals to us is true.

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We have to know the truth to be obedient to it. Obedience builds character, which builds holiness.

Ballard noted we get this knowledge from experience and study. When we study God’s Word and then put it into practice in our everyday lives, we grow our knowledge of Who God is and what He does for us.

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Let’s go at it a different way. Gordon wrote that knowledge shows character, which shows love.

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Discernment Grows as Love Grows

Paul thought discerning the voice of God was wrapped up in loving God more. It is.

Love is the power behind spiritual knowledge. It facilitates discernment.

Martin felt this was because love saw spiritual things otherwise unseen. Those spiritual things are

“1. The truths of the gospel.
“2. God Himself.
“3. The precepts of the Saviour.
“4. The promises.
“5. Christian duty and responsibility.”

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That is understandable. Look at all five though lens of love. They are strengthened by the love.

Because it is based on love, we want to communicate with God. That means more prayer.

Sometimes, we think this love is supposed to be perfect — meaning we are supposed to be perfect. Hutchinson reminded us that would not happen here on earth. He wrote, “This love, although the bond of perfectness, is itself never perfect on earth. Here there must be a persistent going on to perfection.”

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I like the persistent going on to perfection. That means keep trying. If we fail, get, up, dust ourselves off, and try again.

Because we are going to fail.

The opposite of growing — stagnation — is not an option. Disciples are called to grow. That means we grow our abilities to discern situations and increase in sound judgment.

Parker reminded us that we are known by our actions. The growth in discernment has to be seen through our choices.

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Let’s go at it another way. If we don’t understand everything, we think it is perfectly fine for us to not believe in God.

It doesn’t work that way. We are never going to totally understand God because His ways are higher than our ways (Isa. 55: 8-9). We still need to believe in God.

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Rightly to divide the word of truth, we must arrange it in such order as that it may be most easily and effectually understood.

“For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart” (Heb. 4: 12 ESV)

Hmmm. How can a book be living? It is words on pages.

The word of God is living because we are constantly learning new knowledge and learning more in-depth about what we previously knew.

How can we read the same words over and over again and get something different out of it? Easy.

One of my Ladies said once that, this time while reading the passage, we aren’t the same person we were the last time we read it. We’ve had additional experiences. We’ve learned new knowledge and gained understanding in what we already knew.

So, when we reread this passage, it means something different to us.

Also, this read, God may be using it as a two-edged sword when He wasn’t last time. That is going to hurt because there is no free-pass side.

It has to be sharp. Spurgeon said that it has to “… cut the conscience, and wound the heart.”

Resource

Have you ever seen yourself in the Scriptures? Are you Mary or Martha? Are you Ruth or Rahab?

Are you David or Saul? Are you Paul or Jonah?

We have to think the Scriptures are talking specifically about us, regardless of the name used. That will made it easier for us to apply it to our lives.

We talked at prayer breakfast this morning how the lessons in Isaiah and Pastor Tim’s and Pastor John’s messages have been really hitting home.

But isn’t that what we should want? We want to get the sin out of our lives. We want it to be replaced by godliness and holiness.

Making the Connections

What Paul was getting at was we have to discern what is best. Sometimes, we are determining good from best.

We always have to determine what God is calling us to do. That is the best of any situation.

Making the Connections to Self-Discipline

The only way we can discern God’s character is if we know it. The only way we do that is to seek Him.

Searching for and Seeking God

Hearing His Word (Rom. 10: 17).
Reading His Word (Rev. 1: 3).
Praying to Him (Heb. 4: 16).
Studying His Word (Ac. 17: 11).
Meditating on His Word (Ps. 1: 1-2).
Memorizing His Word (Ps. 119: 11).

How Do We Apply This?

We need to buried in God’s Word in order to gave Him reveal Himself to us.
We need to use His Word to help us discern the best options.
We can use His Word to fight our battles.
We should use His Word to eliminate the sin in our lives.

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Choosing between good and better can be challenging. We have to know God so that we can discern His voice.

Holy Father. You will guide us every step of the way. We just need to listen to You. Help us to grow closer to You. Amen.

What do you think?

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