How does God speak? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.
This chapter comes with the heading of the #1 way God speaks. Now if you asked me, I would say God has spoken best by Christ and we see that revelation revealed to us in Scripture. We don’t have the incarnation among us now, but we do have the account of His journey on this Earth.
Let’s see what Newton says.
At the start, he says this:
Hearing God’s Voice accurately is a must in these trying times. To not know or recognize His leading can cost a person his or her life, literally.
Newton, Sheldon D.. Hearing The Voice of God: Discerning God’s Voice From All The Other Voices (p. 11). Sheldon D. Newton. Kindle Edition.
A must? Well, I seem to be doing just fine so far. Meanwhile, I know plenty of people who make disastrous decisions that go against the path of wisdom because they are convinced God is telling them to do something. You know, what would be really good is if we had some one source that was a depository of the wisdom that God had for us, maybe like a book….
Not a shock, but Newton goes to the passage of “My sheep hear my voice” immediately. Let’s see. If I went to that time period, I’m pretty sure everyone there who was in the audience heard Jesus speaking. Thus, everyone who was in the audience was one of His sheep because they all heard His voice. Right?
“But it’s not a literal voice!” you say.
Correct. The voice is the call to salvation. It is not a still small voice of the heart. Jesus never says anything like that and this text has not just been ripped out of context. It has been taken in a stranglehold and beaten relentlessly until the text will confess what HVG teachers want it to say.
Newton then goes to Romans 8:14 about being led by the Spirit. Of course, he doesn’t look at the text. He just wants to find out what the key saying is in the text and then put his idea of what it means to be led by the Spirit in there. I suggest we look at the surrounding context.
12 Therefore, brothers and sisters, we have an obligation—but it is not to the flesh, to live according to it. 13 For if you live according to the flesh, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live.
14 For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. 15 The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.”
If you do this, you see that being led by the Spirit is being put in contrast to living according to the flesh. This is not about hearing a voice to help you make decisions. It’s about being faithful to what we know in Christ and living a moral life.
Newton then rightfully says the #1 way God speaks to us is by His Word, but then looks at John 16L13 saying that the Spirit will lead us into all truth and then John 17:17 with “Thy Word is truth.” He then says the Spirit will quicken the Word inside of us so that we can live as we ought. If that is what he wants to say is the work of the Spirit, I have no problem with that.
The problem is that Newton doesn’t do what he says. He points us outside of the Bible to the idea that God will still speak to us today. If God is saying something to us today like that, then should that not count as Scripture?
Newton rightly says that any leading that goes against Scripture is not of God, but I have to ask why do I have to take something completely subjective like this and compare it when I have something that I do know comes from God? Why do I have to take a practice never done by anyone in Scripture and follow that when I have the Scriptures themselves? It’s as if Newton is really just paying lip service to the Bible but his main emphasis is on the experience. It would be better to write a whole book on how to better read and understand the Bible, but alas, more people think it’s preferable to just have God give you the answers.
Next time, we’ll see a problematic way God allegedly speaks with inward nudges.
In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)
Support Deeper Waters on Patreon!
