God Is A Talker! - Week 1: Introduction

I hope you're doing good. My name is David. If you don't know who I am, that's who I am. And I know that some of you laugh about that, but we have so many new people that it's just amazing how I can walk in the hallways on Sundays and I feel like I'm a visitor at a church. I've been, I'm a guest here, I guess. And so I just wanna let you know, my name's David. I was the senior pastor here for 16 years and handed it over to Kyle and Kyle's doing an awesome job. And I moved into the position of teaching pastor. And so I've written one book and got it out and finished. It's called Stand and I'm writing the second book right now and I'm about halfway through it. I keep saying that because I get stuck. I'm stuck on chapter eight. It's gonna have 15 chapters. I'm writing the fact this afternoon. I worked on it some more for a couple hours. And we're gonna be walking through in this time we're together in what I've titled the book, God is a talker. And so I'm just gonna walk through this. And so I'm today is just gonna be kind of an introduction to this and we're gonna learn over this time together how to hear the voice of God. And we're gonna learn that it's not for the select few, it's not for the preacher to prepare a message. It's for life every day for every believer.

If you've given your life to Christ, I promise you, you're going to really grow and how to hear God's voice to know it's God and then how to allow him to really guide you in every day life. And so we're gonna be doing that in here. And let me just start off by telling you a story that happened in 1991. Now, I had gone on some mission trips before this time. I had even took and I always say kind of leaked up into Canada one time and then kind of leaked down into Mexico one time. But other than that, I had done all of my mission work had been done in the United States until 1991. I went on a mission trip to Brazil. And so I flew from Atlanta, Georgia to Sao Paulo and landed in there. And I remember I'm on the flight with a lot of people and some speaking English and some not. And so I get off the plane in Sao Paulo and it was like, wow, this is different. I mean, at that time, 1991, it wasn't quite as English as it has come later. But all the signage was in Portuguese and I don't know Portuguese. And so I went walking around and finally I smelled coffee and I thought, well, you know, you can't mess that up. I don't know if I make Brazilian coffee but I'm gonna find some. And so anyway, I get there and the sign up there was nothing but written in Portuguese.

And so I'm like, okay, this could get bad, you know? And I see a word that had the look of American. And so I just said, I want that one. And at first I said, I would like that. And it looked like Americano was what it is but it looked like that. I said it and the guy just looked at me and I realized suddenly that he didn't speak English and I definitely didn't speak Portuguese. And so I said that one right up there and so he fixed it and I get off. And I get on another plane and I go to the next city to Bello is the next city I went to. And on that flight, I mean, I definitely stood out like a foreigner and really looked tourist, if you will. And when I get off the plane there in Bello at that time, we didn't have a gate you go into necessarily. You just, they just opened the door and had a ladder kind of thing that went down steps and we just walked down the stairs. And the missionary I was going to meet there, he was there along with about five Brazilians and they come up on the tarmac with us then. You know, it's not like it is now but you could just kind of wander around, I guess. And so they came up and one of them was Pastor Manuel and Pastor Manuel walked up and he gave me when he's big old bear hugs and he's about that tall and grabbed me and then he stepped back and he said in his broken English as you could say,

welcome to Brazil where we speak Portuguese, the language of heaven. And I kind of stepped back and laughed a little bit kind of like you did, but you know, I had never thought, what language are we going to speak in heaven? I just assumed it was English and everybody up there would learn English, you know, over time, you know. Now the other side of that was I was overwhelmed with the realization that nobody spoke English except my interpreter. So guess what I did. I mean like I did learn some words, Bonio if you know what that is. Bathroom is what that would be. It's kind of important to learn. I didn't know any others and so for a week I was completely dependent upon my interpreter to translate everything. Let me tell you where I find most believers. I find most believers, in fact probably many of you here. You feel like a foreigner. When it comes to hearing God's voice, when it comes to knowing that as you're reading Scripture that God's talking to you as you are you know whatever you're doing as somebody comes up is God talking to me or not me and and we feel like foreigners and as a result we wind up finding ourselves wanting to grab hold of a translator for somebody to to translate for us and and so we live a life that we weren't ever meant to live. We miss so much of what God has for us and and so as we think about that and listen I know we're gonna I'm gonna talk about all the dangers that we can look for. We'll be looking at that as we go through this. Don't worry about me not saying that but let me tell you what I've learned and this is what I've seen especially in the West and especially in America and especially among evangelicals. As we've literally created theologies telling you that you don't need to go think you can hear God's voice. We have literally wiped out prophecy by and large and listen there's enough loonies out there calling themselves prophets that we we give the excuse that well we don't want to be like that and and honestly what we've done we have built so many walls up from hearing God's voice that we've walled him out and matter of fact I just kind of say it like this the fence built

to keep out the counterfeit ended up keeping out the king. What if I told you that tonight that in the morning God is ready to talk to you. You don't need more education you just need to learn his voice. I mean think about this when was the last time you sat down expecting God to say something to you not about you but to you. You know I never really thought about it that much I probably if I put on there who I'm dedicating the book to it'll probably be to my mother and all. Many of you may know Anne but she was the one who after I met Kathy and we started dating we got married and I began to listen to her walk around be around her as a matter of fact I'm coming up on in a couple of weeks September the 20th I will celebrate 40 years 45 years having been saved. I got saved on September the 20th on a Sunday morning in 1981 and and honestly being with Anne she just taught me how God just talks to us and it was so I don't want to say innocent is not even naive it was just so pure that I thought well that's what happens when you get give your life to Christ and so I just wandered into it and it wasn't until later on whenever Christians I wouldn't even say that way Christians Christians began to complain that I talked about how God told me this and how God was saying that and how this morning I was talking with the Lord and he was saying this and we were talking about that and they looked at me like I was speaking Portuguese and that's the lie that I pray and we're gonna break it's reason why I'm writing the book I'm writing it for people who have wound up putting themselves on the bench rather than in the fight because we feel like like, well, I just don't. My prayer is that by the end of the semester, when we finish, that you'll not only be hearing his voice, but you will enter into the fray. And you'll go to begin just seeing that hearing God's voice is just the normal part of everyday life for the believer. And so if you have your outline and you wanna write this down,

this is something that I hope, I said this actually when I wrote this down earlier, I put it personal and I thought, you know, I need to make it where you can write it down, but nothing will have more impact on your life than conversations with your king. Nothing. And when I first wrote it down, I just wrote it down this way. Nothing has had a greater impact on my life. And daily conversations with the king. And we're gonna talk about that. We're gonna talk about what that is. That's not weird, that's not strange. It is here in America, but it's not strange in the kingdom. It is the intention that God has for every believer. And so again, if you've given your life to Christ, just know this, God wants to talk to you. And He wants you to hear and learn His voice and He's gonna teach you if you're letting. So let's go on and let me just give you some things here that, and these are things you know, but it's kind of, this is introduction night, so just trying to get us ready. But the first thing I just want you in your outline if you wanna write this down is the reality that God is a talker. I have several pastor friends of mine that now use that statement. They've heard me say it and they're like, I like that. But God is a talker.

He has not gone silent. He's not the quiet type. He's not the one that is seated in heaven just kind of like, you know, hey, I don't have time for you. And He's not worried more about keeping the planets in orbit and spending time with you. He created you for conversation, for relationship. John chapter 10, verse 27. Listen to what Jesus said. Now, why don't you just listen to this and just hear it? Jesus said, my sheep hear my voice. And I know them and they follow me. Did you hear what he just said? There are in these five words, these first five words, my sheep hear my voice. Did you hear what he said? Let that soak in, don't just read it like, oh, yeah, I've heard that verse before. Let it soak in for just a minute. Go beyond here and down into your heart and listen to what he's saying, that first he's saying this, Jesus is talking. My sheep hear my voice. Guess what? That means he's talking. You're not gonna hear the voice of someone's not talking. And secondly, that his sheep hear him. That ought to just blow your mind. That ought to change everything about the way you approach your Bible,

about the way you approach God, about the way you approach prayer, about everything about the Christian life. Sadly, religion has sucked the joy out of Christianity and what it means to walk with God and what it means to hear his voice and how he wants to talk with us. I just say it like this, if you wanna write this down. God doesn't merely speak, he communicates. He's not giving just directives. He's developing relationship with you. So I just wanna say this in starting off as we going. If you say, well, where are we going? Well, here's where we're going. God has never stopped speaking and you are not a foreigner in the conversation. He's not stopped speaking. I mean, the God who said, let there be light is the same God who is today speaking his word. So just know that, let that soak down in your spirit and let God talk to you and know that he's ready and warning a conversation with you, not just on the big things, and I want you to please hear me in the other times when I've taught and other things that I've taught here. And when I did Genesis last year and when I did our earlier and I did the bookstand and did some of those, I talked about the fact that our culture has defined many of the ways that we read the Bible, many of the things that we believe about the Bible that our culture, it's not biblical, it's cultural in the way we come at it, and we do the same thing with hearing God's voice. We come at it from a skeptical side instead of the innocence that God wants us to come in. And I want to help you with that. I want to help you know and hear his voice.

My prayer for you is that there's going to come a day, many of you are already here, but many of you aren't yet. You can't wait to get up in the morning and hang out with the Creator. And I know that sounds for some irreverent, but I want to tell you, I believe he's that big, that he is so big that every molecule in the universe is held together by him, and he's so big that me, a child of God, can set here and he wants to spend time with me. And he wants to spend time with you. That's the God that we serve. So let me go into the second thing we're going to be looking at. Oh, by the way, on the back of your outline, I know that I talk about this. It's the most often quoted statement of Jesus in the New Testament. It's quoted 15 times. And I know that whenever I say that, people just kind of go like it's no big deal. That's a big deal. By the way, you know what the second most often quoted statement, you do. I've said it before that Jesus made it. We have recorded in the New Testament. Anyone who wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up his cross and follow me. So this easy beliefism, let me tell you, I didn't come from Jesus. It crucified life that we were talking about, inviting in Christ. That is, but he says it five times. We have it five times recorded. That's the second most often quoted statement of Jesus is, he has ears to hear, let him hear. I put all 15 of them on there, on the back, if you want to just have them there. It's interesting to me that to all the churches in Revelation that he spoke to, he says a lot of different things to him, but there is one statement that he makes exactly the same. I've said this before, it's in the Greek. I've read it in the Greek in all of the seven churches and it's exactly the same Greek. He has ears to hear, let him hear what the Spirit is saying to the church. So whether you take those seven churches as just seven literal churches, which they were, or you take them as seven ages of the church or seven types of churches, those are all the different ways people look at them. It doesn't matter how you do it. Either any way you take it, it's the same. God's a talker. Let me go into the second thing and that is, number two, is intimacy. God has secrets to share. Well, people don't like to hear that. They're so afraid of that. And honestly, I would be too, if it wasn't for the fact that Jesus said that. Let me just read a couple of things. First of all, again, back at John 10, 20, 70, he said, "My sheep hear my voice and I know them and they follow me." In other words, he says, "You're going to hear his voice." But look at what he says in Matthew. In Matthew chapter 13, we have in there where he talks about the various soils and he's telling things, saying things in parables and the disciples get with him. In other words, the wisdom I crowd get there with him,

if you will, and they're sitting there and they're saying, "Why do you talk in parables to the bigger? Why don't you just tell them all the same thing? Listen to why Jesus said he talks that way." He says, "And he answered them, to you it has been given to know the secrets, the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given." There's a lot of religious people that will never, ever, ever know the secrets of the kingdom. A lot of people that claim to be Christians that will never, ever, ever know them. But if you've given your life to Christ as a child of God, I want you to know Jesus has secrets he wants to is where secrets are shared. In other words, there's things about me that nobody on this earth except for one person knows, and that's Kathy. And sadly, she knows more than I wish she knew about me. And why is that? Because we are married, and we have that intimate relationship. You think about your friends. I don't know many people. Now some people do it, and they're just weird. I'm just going to say they're just weird. But some people just broadcast all their secrets, and I'm like, "That's just stupid." But for the vast majority of, in fact, all sane people, let me just say it that way. We don't share those things except with friends, and only with close friends, and only really close friends. And Jesus, to His close friends, said to you, "It has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom." Paul, in talking to the church in Corinth, you know, you've heard me teach this before, but he had been in Athens. We know that in Acts 17, Acts 18, 43-mile journey. He goes those 43 miles to Corinth, and when he gets there, he made a decision not to go into an intellectual conversation, to bring the gospel to the people. He said, "I came to you claiming to know nothing except Jesus Christ and Him crucified." And he goes on and he's talking about those things. He shares this in 1 Corinthians chapter 2, verse 7 to them. He says, "But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed before the ages for our glory." Now, you've heard me say this, "But I just want you to write it down, and that is God doesn't hide His secrets from you before you." He's not hiding secrets from you. He's hiding them for you. I think about it whenever my boys when my grandkids were little, and we've got a video of one of them, I've shown it here before actually, but it's a video of my son Brian and his wife, Lindsey, and they're taking woods who at that time, he's 10 now, but he was about two and a half to three. You know, he's at that age where the Easter egg basket looks like it's about that big, you know,

and he's carrying it, and he's running and Brian, you can hear him in the video, and he goes, "Woods, come here, come here, over here." He goes, "I know what?" And he gets over, he says, "Look." And he points at it and woods like, I mean, it was like a shock. It was an Easter egg that had been hidden, not from him, but for him. And God has secrets that he wants to share with you. I'm not talking about weird kind of strange things. I'm talking about secrets about himself, about what he thinks about you, about how much he loves you, things he wants to share with you that you'll never learn unless you walk in intimacy with him, unless you get up close. Let me tell you something about secrets. Secrets are typically their whispered, and we're talking more about that as we get going. And God has a lot of them that he wants to share with you. But you're not going to find him keeping a distance from him. Religion always wants to keep God at a distance. In fact, we say that's making him more glorious, and I'm like, "No, it's not." My Bible says that God came near. The reason the Pharisees couldn't stand Jesus and they struggled with him so much was because he was near. He was real. And they liked God being at a distance. "Oh, that's his glory." And Jesus said, "Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father." So that's the second thing. Let me go into the third thing. We're going to be walking through this. We're introducing this whole thing, and it's more about clarity. And I just want to say this. There are strangers we need to avoid. I'll talk about this as we get going. It'll probably be, I don't know, lesson, I don't know, three or four. but be here all the other times. And I just say this, there are many voices that are speaking, no doubt. I mean, we got a lot of voices out there talking. A lot of voices that are saying different things. I told you about on my brazil trip that, how awkward I felt, I didn't feel like I was myself. I felt awkward because I needed a translator. I couldn't go anywhere without my interpreter. But that's not what God has for you. He hasn't called you to live a translated walk with him. He's called you to walk with him and know it's him and listen to him and hear his voice. I said this similar earlier, but it's the same thing is our constructed walls built to keep out counterfeits has ended up keeping out the king. We've there are counterfeits. We're going to talk about I'm going to show you all the main areas where they come from, the dangers we have to watch and know. But know this that don't sit back and say, I am so afraid of getting it wrong. I'll just let you tell me.

That's not relationship with God. It's not. That's the awkward feeling of a foreigner. Let me go into the next one. Number four, I get done pretty quick, I think, is maturity. God will teach you his voice. He really will. I'm going to talk to you about that. I'm going to talk to you about how he does it and talk to you about how you begin to learn it, how you grow in maturity. We're going to see that and as we go on, one of the things that I'll be sharing is what I call the three fences. In other words, if somebody comes to you with a word they say is from God or if you're reading Scripture and you come across something you think it's the Lord, how do you know we're going to be looking at all of that? How can you know if it's God talking to you or not and all those kind of things? But I say this that God has given us what I would say three fences that I think will help us. And I put them in your outline. I think, I think I did. I did. And the fences are real simple. Jesus is the foundation. 1 Corinthians 3, 11 says there is no other foundation except Jesus that we build on. In other words, if somebody comes with a word and it doesn't look like Jesus, it's not God. If it doesn't carry with it the character of the king and watch out. The second is Scripture. I just say, Scripture is the framework. In other words, every word of God that you receive, it is going to pass the Scripture test. It just is. And we're going to see that. We're going to be looking at that. We're going to be looking at how we can know and how we can know if it's a word from God or not and to know if it fits within what the Scripture teaches. And we're going to even see how, and let me just kind of say, I'll be talking about this in a few weeks, but how that even Satan attempts to use Scripture. In fact, whenever he tempted Jesus, you remember one of the temptations he told him to jump off the pinnacle of the temple. And he said that, and he quotes Psalm 91 to him. But Jesus understood that didn't fit within the framework of Scripture. In other words, anybody can justify any sin they want to live in and any justification they want to make for how they want to live their life and quote a couple of scriptures. Anybody can do that. So whenever I talk about it fits within the framework of Scripture, what I mean is the body of Scripture. It's going to fit within that. And then the third thing is the spirit and he's the facilitator. Jesus said that he would guide you into all the truth. He really will. If we'll let him, if we'll learn how to really receive that word from him and walk with him, he will show us. And I just want to say this, that we're all growing in this and we're all going to be growing. Some of us are different, we're different maturity levels along the way,

and I'm going to show you how you can have other people around to help confirm some and how you can go on that journey, and we'll do that together along the way as well. And then the last thing, and this is probably, I know Kyle said this to me back, I don't know, a few years ago now, I guess. He said, David, he said, 'cause, you know, again, I just have people that say that I say, that the Lord was talking to me more than probably I should. And he said, here's what I tell him. See, whenever we're talking about you, he said, this is what I tell him, is that whenever David gets with the Lord, he expects to hear God talk to him. Can I tell you that if I walked in, if I go home tonight, I walk into our house. I sit down in there with my wife, Kathy, and she doesn't say a word to me, and I don't expect her to say a word to me. We've got a problem that's in with our relationship, right? I've had times where she didn't talk to me, huh? (congregation laughs) But I knew it was because of something was wrong. But when there's nothing wrong, I walk in expecting conversation. I'm not talking about mind-blowing conversation. Sometimes it's just talking about the day. And you know what? I found that's the way it is with walking with God.

Sometimes he just talks about just normal stuff, little stuff, talks to me through his word about different things. But as we're talking about this, this is what I want you to see, is that it's God pursuing you. You need to get that in. Religion, it always does this. Religion always says, you've got to pursue God. Now, I'm not saying don't. What I'm saying is, I say it this way. It's not you pursuing him, it's you positioning yourself to be with him. In other words, when I get up in the morning, I did it this morning, when I get up in the morning, when I get up, I'm going to fix me a cup of coffee. I'm going to sit down in the chair, always sit in, I'm going to sit down and put my little lap table on me. I'm going to get my iPad that I've got right here. I'm going to set it down. I've got it already set up. I push a button and up comes the Bible on one side and my journal and the other. And I'm going to read God's word because I'm expecting him to talk to me because I know that he's the one wants to meet with me more than I do him. And as we sit in there and all his passages are coming

and different things, sometimes he just talks to me about general stuff. Sometimes it's other than that. Let me just see about what he, what we talked about this morning. Let me see if I can find it here real quick. But just, you know, of course been in Job, by the way, we just moved over to Ecclesiastes. So, but today, this morning, just spending time with the Lord this morning says, this is something just me and the Lord talking about. So in Ecclesiastes chapter one, verse 11, it says, he said this, we don't remember what happened in the past and in future generations, no one will remember what we are doing now. I know that sounds kind of a downer, especially to the American, but I just said this. If what I do is to be remembered by those in future generations, then my efforts are meaningless. If that's the only reason that I'm writing a book is so that people in the future will remember my name, it's meaningless. Let me just put it down even more sobering. I know that my great grandchildren will not know me. They're just not going to. That's my flesh and blood. We've gotten in our culture this idea that, oh, I want to make a name for myself and that is not from God. And so, I said in reality, my great-grandkids

will not know me much less others. And I just talked to the Lord about that. So I want to live my life today for what he wants to do through me today, not worried about whether anybody remembers it or not. God just wants to invest his kingdom through me today. Paul says in 2 Corinthians chapter 6 verse 3, says, "We live in such a way that no one will stumble "because of us and no one will find fault in our men. I want to daily live with a conscious awareness of how my life and actions affect others." That's – and me and him had a long conversation about that, about living for his glory and knowing that today, how I live my life matters. People are watching whether we like it or not. And so, as you're thinking about these kind of things, just know that he really wants to talk to you, and he wants you to talk to him, and obviously it matters to God. And so, that's what I want this to do, is I want you to think about this week and your own personal walk. Where have you settled when it comes to walking with God? See, nothing more than an ATM machine do you? You go to take withdrawals whenever you need them. Or maybe, is your time with God basically a negotiation table? You're trying to work out deals so that you can get your way, trying to see if you can market your way into getting him to do what you want. Or maybe, is your Christian life basically on autopilot? It doesn't have to be. It really doesn't. I mean, it really doesn't. So, what I want you to do, this is your homework for this next week, and boy, it's going to be tough. So, I mean, I don't know if you can do it or not, but I'm going to ask you to do it.

I want you to pick a morning. Maybe tomorrow morning might be, but some of you may say, "No, I can't tomorrow morning." That's okay. Find a morning. Sit down, open your Bible, pull up a chair next to you. Maybe you're at the kitchen table, just pull up a chair. Invite the Lord to sit down with you. And sit there and talk to him like you're talking to a friend. You're not trying to convince him you're good or not. You're not trying to win his favor, you're just, he's your friend. Tell him while you're there, you came to be with him, not to study about him, but just to be with him. And then this is what I would encourage you to do, get you out of a piece of paper if you want, journal if you have one. I want you to ask God this question, "Lord, do you have anything you want to say to me?" And then sit for two minutes. Now, I know for us that's almost impossible these days. About 20 seconds is all we've got. And sit quiet for two minutes. Don't judge it, don't try to figure it out. Just sit there. And maybe if you say many and say a word, that's okay. Do it again tomorrow, the next day. I know this. I know that God wants to talk to you more than you want to listen to him. So if you'll set yourself to listen, he's talking. The last thing, just write this down. This is not a doctrine I'm trying to defend. This is an adventure I want you to step into. I'm not against theology.

I know I call it a lot of times. I call them theoreology because a lot of them are just theories. They're not really in the heart. Now there are doctrines that are definitely real and important. I had an interesting opportunity a few weeks ago. Some of you, well, most of you probably do not know this guy, but some of you. has written 91 books. He, 25 years, he was the pastor at Westminster in London, and he and I sat down and prayed together and talked together. He's 92 now, right? Still sharp as ever, and more we were talking. He prayed with him, prayed for him. He prayed for me. We had a great time together. He's written a new book and just came out a few months ago, I guess. It's called "Doctrines of Demons." He took a lot of flack. In fact, he's lost a lot of friends because one of the doctrines he calls out in the book is dispensationalism. The idea that the supernatural gifts have ceased, really cessationism is what he calls it, that they've ceased. Here's the thing I want you to hear. That is in the evangelical world, that is the teaching today. That's why prophecy is seen as weird. That's why goodness gracious, don't ever talk about tongues unless you want to run off a crowd. The sad part is because our cultures made it weird and made it where nobody talks about it. We've got a lot of people that have run into some things that they're calling prophecy in tongues, and it's not that. It's why I've taught on the supernatural world and why I've taught about the fact that ever where God's moving, Satan's moving, and we have to know those things. What I'm saying to you is God hadn't stopped talking. He's still talking today, and he wants to meet with you and talk with you. So again, I want to pray for us. You tell everybody who missed tonight that I cut off 15 minutes before seven. You just tell them. There are come moments I'll have to shut down. I know that. But what I wanted to do tonight was just introduce this. I wanted to be careful not to say too much because next week, I'm going to continue moving forward and show you how we think that God only talks to the pastors or whatever, preparing messages. We've got it exactly backwards. He talks to all of us because God's a talker. Amen. Let me pray with us. Father, I pray and you know we've talked about this. Lord, ever since I really felt you compelling me to write this book is that Lord, you want your children to know your voice. You want us not just belting

out meaningless prayers or pretty prayers or all that or avoiding them all together because we don't want to do. Lord, you're wanting to invite us into a conversation. The greatest privilege that we have as a human is to have conversation with our Creator. So Lord, I pray that you just guide us. I pray that as we walk through these next weeks together, Lord, that every one of your children here, even the ones that you talk too often, Lord, I pray that you'll confirm that even more, but I pray for all of us, me too, or that we will just grow in a greater intimacy with you and our spiritual ears will be open to hearing you even louder than before. So I pray that this week, Lord, and all of us here will have a moment, at least one, where we sat down. And Father, I'm going to ask you for all of your children here who've sat down and just asked the simple question, Father, do you have anything you want to say to me? Lord, would you tune there? next week more excited than ever. Lord you really are a talker. We give you the glory and pray all of this in Jesus name. Amen. [BLANK_AUDIO]