Learn How to Recognize God’s Voice

Priscilla and Jerry Shirer join Matt and Laurie Crouch on TBN’s Praise to discuss how to hear the voice of God. Listen as Priscilla teaches not only how to hear God, but why it’s so important for you to learn to communicate with Him in your daily life.

“Disciplined runners consistently clear their heads and focus fully on the journey ahead.. .because their passion and zeal for the goal supersedes the strain. The goal beckons them onward. Passion doesn’t negate weariness; it just resolves to press beyond it.”
― Priscilla Shirer

So really the first step, especially if you grew up in an environment where this concept is sort of unique and different and new for you.
It’s to believe that as a, as a privilege of being a son or a daughter, you can hear from God, it is the deception of the enemy to cause us to think.
We have to have a seminary de degree.
We have to have some special hotline connection with God, like somebody, we may admire that we as regular men and women can’t hear from God.
That’s what the enemy wants you to think. He doesn’t want you to know it’s your birthright.
And so believing that you can is the first step to hearing God praise comes to you today right here in beautiful southern California.
Our guests are Jerry and Priscilla Shire. Priscilla.
Um Our gift offer this month in part is your book Discerning The Voice of God. Today.
We’re gonna unpack that. So why is this subject matter? Something that is really important.
It is important because this facet of our faith is what separates our faith from every other so called faith on the face of the earth.
That our God lives, he’s alive and he speaks to us, we have an actual relationship with him and that, that’s so casually thrown around this whole relationship thing.
But what good is any relationship?
If nobody’s talking to each other, if there’s no communication, if there’s not, um a connectedness that is ongoing and continual.
So this issue of discerning the voice of God, first of all believing that he does speak.
But second of all, trusting in the fact that as his kids, we have the privilege to actually discern and dis uh have a distinction of his voice between all the other voices that also want to get a word in edge wise.
That’s something that really can change and transform the trajectory of your entire Christian experience. OK.
Let’s, let’s lay a little bit of the ground rule in your, in your world where you’re our guest today, you and Jerry, uh Jerry jump in any time you want to, you’re much bigger than I am.
You can do that any time you want.
And you know, you’re a miracle worker that you got him on the show.
Jerry doesn’t come on now.
Are you just gonna have a good, we’re gonna, we’re gonna discern the voice of God.
Let me ask you a question in the Priscilla Jerry world. Uh Does God speak audibly?
Does he only speak through his word? Does he speak?
How, how, what are the different ways that you certainly know of that God speaks to you.
Um I’ve never heard the audible voice of God. Babe. Have you something? I have not. No, no, not yet.
But I think there is something internal in you that you, that you feel the presence of God.
And it lines up with scripture which confirms, OK, this is what I’m hearing. That’s right.
So the Holy Spirit of God Alumin scripture, the book is alive and he causes the the old presets of scripture to have a now and a newness that applies and intersects with our personal experience.
So as Jerry mentioned, the Holy Spirit in us confirms and corroborates and connects with the, the the word of God and causes it to intersect with our experience.
So that, that verse that has something to do with David and Goliath all of a sudden, it’s not about David and Goliath, it actually applies to what you’re facing right then in your life.
And you understand it as a directive straight straight from God.
And then there’s the conviction, you know, the conviction of the Holy Spirit that, that green light of in peace that says, go that, that yellow light of warning and uneasiness that says hold up a minute until you get clarity and then that red light that is a straight up no, there’s no peace, there’s confusion, there’s dissension.
That’s the Holy Spirit’s way of telling you no, don’t go there. There’s a better. Yes for you.
If you’ll just wait and be patient.
Have you ever heard the still small voice of the Lord in a phrase and an impression, what describe some of what is in discerning the voice of God, how, how the Lord speaks or how this conversation unfolds with you?
Yes. Well, most of the time, most of the time God speaks to me through his word, it is exactly what I described.
It is reading through a portion of scripture.
And on that day, it’s like the Holy Spirit has taken out a highlighter and it has highlighted this verse.
You have seen a million times before.
But on that day, it leaps up off the page and it grips you.
That’s the only way I can really describe it is that it grips you in the depths of your soul and causes you to pause for a moment because it, it seems to be literally speaking to something that’s happening in your life.
Most of the time that that is the voice of God, we have discounted.
I think the power of scripture because if we say we want to hear from God and we never actually read the love letter that he wrote to us.
We don’t want to really hear from God and we rarely will because the canon of scripture is not only it not only provides the boundary into which everything God says to us will fall because He’ll never say anything that manipulates the scriptures or His character as we building in the scriptures.
So it not only gives us the boundary but it also provides for us the number one mechanism through which we have the privilege to hear him in the first place.
Beautiful. You know, we’re discussing uh with Priscilla and, and uh her not often see husband Jerry uh uh Jerry.
Thank you for being on, by the way. Give me a little, you go.
All right, I’m glad you’re here right now.
Um The um our part of our love gift uh monthly love offer, monthly gift offer here uh this month in March.
Um is your book Discerning The Voice of God.
Let me, let me tell you um a little bit about the way A I believe the way the Lord has communicated to me.
I have been sitting uh or standing in a place before and from one moment to the next uh you know, I, I hate to be so secular but remember that, remember that, that moment in on TV, back when we were kids.
Do you remember? Remember um the I dream of Jeannie where she’d kind of be like that, you know? Ok.
So uh I have from one moment to the next, I mean, this is like one heartbeat to the next heartbeat.
I’m remembering some kind of conversation that was a longer conversation for instance, and I felt like that was something that got communicated to me.
A big subject matter, communicated to me in a blink.
So what the voice of the Lord sometimes feels like to me is like, I’m remembering a conversation, not like I’m talking and, and going, hello Lord.
And he says, well, hello Matthew. It’s nice to have you here with me today.
Yeah, it’s been, you know, ok, so I’ve never had any kind of an experience like that at all.
Every time I felt like volumes of information get communicated in a, in a, in a snap of a finger and then it just feels like you’re remembering when we’re done with this conversation today and we’re out of this studio, we’ll be able to remember this conversation and we will be able to ultimately think back on it.
That’s, that is a way the Lord has communicated.
I have heard the still small voice say one word to me or two words, one time Hill Song channel, six months later, the Hill Song channel was on the air.
OK. Uh We’re sitting here today, Laurie and I, um you know, have often heard the story, but just, just because of what we’re talking about and I wanted to set a little bit of the stage and by the way, what a thrill to have you guys.
Seriously. I mean, it’s like I’ve known your parents and I was like, what’s the matter with us, man?
I mean, so we met actually at TD Jakes Church not long ago, uh behind us and made us laugh through the whole, I’m sorry for that.
I was cutting up and thank you for, thank you for that because they were like, ok, when is this gonna be over?
You realize you’re making fun of a TD jake service?
It was a fantastic kids in church for three hours.
They were, they were glad Matt was Uncle Matt was like, and just so that they wouldn’t freak out.
I gave him a little money to, you know, kind of bribing them anyway.
Uh So for me, one, ok, so one of the, the things that I think is pretty interesting about discerning the voice of God.
Again, it’s our love gift. Uh This month gift offer this month is my mom and dad were working for somebody else in the sixties.
It was a TV station and after one very successful night, they were leaving the parking lot and the Lord said, I’ve released you from your work here.
Now, my parents believe it was almost like one of these moments where you look in the back seat, make sure that somebody not in the back seat, but they were in their car and my dad didn’t recall it as being an audible voice, but it might as well have been because he looked at my mom and said, you’re not gonna believe what the Lord just said to me.
And she said, no, I will. He said the same thing to me. He’s released us from our work here.
Very, very unique thing. They quit that job. I’m 11 years old.
My dad doesn’t go to work anymore.
This is, you know, here in southern California in the early seventies and then, uh, a few months later praying, the Lord said, had to say these words somehow because my dad heard call Angel Lerma was a gentleman that owned a TV station here in.
So he called and he said, uh, he said to uh Angel, he said, uh I’m just calling you today, checking on your channel.
And there was a long pause on the phone, Paul, I just came from the board room.
We just had a board meeting just now. We just voted to sell this channel. Did you know that?
And he said, no, sir, I didn’t know that.
But based on that, I’d like to come see you.
By the end of that day, there was a deal worked out, which was the birth of TV.
N which was this channel here in Los Angeles.
Channel, 40 channels actually changed now because of digital, but that was channel 40 back in the day.
So here’s the, here’s the thing.
We’re sitting here today because of a couple of moments that the Lord was wanting to communicate to someone to see if they would respond to it.
Ok. So now 40 something years later, we’re sitting here, there’s 31 television networks on the air in 13 or 14 different languages.
And we are literally ultimately uh now communicating to the globe as we’re sitting here. OK.
So if everyone can realize it’s kind of an important subject that we’re talking about. OK. OK.
And so if everybody moved on something that God spoke to them, there it is, you know, take another generation, what would that become, what God had done if we would have obeyed that?
And we’ve had that, we’ve had that in our, I’m thinking about when we first got married, babe, where you’ve had these, these moments where like you said, there is almost like a huge conversation that has already happened and the wealth of it, it just downloads to you in an instant.
Um And, and one of those things happened when we were married for our very first year of marriage, what happened?
We were at a uh a family reunion on my father’s side of the family.
And uh I remember one of my cousins said, Jerry, do you realize that if you and Priscilla don’t have any boys, the Sharon will die with you?
I’m like, and I looked around and I’m like, wow.
And at that moment, I felt like Laura said to me, you, you have nothing but boys.
Wow. And so I looked at Priscilla and I told her what I said, you have nothing but boys.
We have nothing but boys. And uh I remember when our first son was born Jackson, a boy.
Uh the second son, Jerry junior a boy. And it was so funny.
The third child, everybody, you know, oh, the way she’s carrying it, it’s a girl. It’s a girl.
I’m like, no, it’s not. It’s a boy.
And everybody asks me how confident was I, that I knew that I was a boy.
And I told him years ago, the Lord told me I had nothing but boys because what he’s doing is starting a new generation of Shire men.
And uh I remember being in the delivery room and uh uh when, when, when Jude was coming out and his head was out, uh I said, oh, I bet you $1000.
That’s a, that’s a boy. The doctor said we haven’t seen everything yet.
I said, if that’s a girl, she’s gonna be with me for the rest of her life. That’s a boy.
But you know what, and, and some of the details of that, that you have to know is that some of the, well, most of the men in Jerry’s legacy um did not live well.
They didn’t honor God, they didn’t stay with their wives, they didn’t honor their kids nothing.
And so in that moment where he felt like the Lord said that to him, he really felt like the Lord was saying, I’m doing this on purpose.
I’m going to, I’m going to change what it means to be a shire man um through this legacy and he looked at me just barely into our first year of marriage and said, we’re gonna have boys.
God’s doing this on purpose and here we are 18 years later with our three boys.
And so we have high expectations that God’s got a plan for them.
Um And you don’t have your plan for any more kids. We actually do not. No.
She says, you know, she always says she always says from this stage, our youngest is jude because that’s as close as she can get the revelation because it is finished.
It, it is finished. That’s the end of the line right there. Oh gosh. Ok.
So start us out on. Um because I know so many people wonder, oh, you know, how can I hear God’s voice for ourselves?
And I know or trust or trust it, how can I trust God’s voice when I do hear it?
Is that really Him? Is it me? Is it?
Well, let me, let me just start by putting a little grace over this entire situation.
The reality is that sometimes you do not know until hindsight that what you heard was the voice of God.
And the reality is that there is grace and mercy to cover our missteps and that the Lord in his graciousness toward us, his knowledge of our frailty and our humanity for the willing heart who desires to do his will, even when we make mistakes, he allows them to become our greatest teachers for hearing him correctly in the future.
He does not hold it against us because we’ve missed stepped along the way.
So, um uh just grace for those of us who have ever heard God wrong and I wish we could get it.
Get it right. One of the people I sort of interviewed when I was first writing that book many, you know, over a decade ago, uh now I interviewed He Henry Blackerby who wrote Experiencing God and I, you know, had my notebook out my pen, I was gonna take a seminary class from Henry Blackerby.
You know, and I said, how do you know when you’re hearing God?
And he gave me lots of incredible answers to that question. But really, he summed it up this way.
He said the more, you know, God, the more clearly you can hear God.
There was really nothing for me to write down because it boiled down to Priscilla. It’s simple.
He said, the more you know Him, the more clearly you can hear Him.
So the reason why we go to the scriptures, the reason why we have quiet time.
The reason why we fellowship with other believers who are gonna help us remain encouraged in our faith is because we’re just trying to get to know God when you know His character, when you know the nuances of what he does say and what he wouldn’t say because of how he spoke to our forefathers because of how he handled circumstances previously with people in the scriptures who were going through some of the same scenarios we’re going through.
Now, when you see his personality and his character, then you know, when you hear the voice of fear, uh uh that don’t sound like my God.
When you hear the voice of your ego, pride, jealousy, divisiveness, stepping in all that stuff that in our flesh is also trying to get a word in edge wise.
We can quickly quickly pinpoint the voice of a stranger because if we know God, the more clearly, we can discern and divide his voice from a stranger.
Ok. Now you talked about seeking God’s provision and his blessings on our life.
And then knowing who, who, what his character is, talk about that because I found that fascinating. Yes.
So God’s blessing. Um And I believe his provisions are corroboration of His word to us.
So in other words, while in the Old Testament, there were external means as a primary way for folks to hear God in the New Testament.
And now in this time frame as well, we have something they didn’t have, we have the Holy Spirit.
So the primary way he has speak to us is that he speaks to us has changed.
But his goal hasn’t, his goal is still for his kids to hear his voice.
So he’s chosen the Holy Spirit of God to be the, the way that we hear and know what it is that His will is for our life, but he still uses external means.
His provision, his blessings, his aligning of providence. Some people would call it luck or coincidence.
No, it’s the aligning of God’s handiwork in our life to confirm that what we’re sensing on the inside is indeed how he’s aligning the direction for our life to just FB Myers a great deal alone should put it this way when a big 747 is getting ready to land on a runway.
Well, well, the plane better not just be looking for one light somewhere to land, better, not just look for two lights somewhere to land, there better be several lights that are, that are lining a runway.
So that that 747 knows exactly where to land, the bigger the decision that you have to make, the more you need to trust in the mercy of God’s external confirmation that aligns for you where to land that plane in your life.
Um And, and so that’s important that we have external blis blessings provision.
Coincidence that really shows us the sovereignty of God aligning. I’ll give you an example.
I was just telling you guys before we started um er that I, that I started to, to look at this just starting the voice of God book, the material that we’ve been privileged to be able to develop through the years on the topic.
And I just started, you know how the Lord puts layers of maturity on a message, the more you grow in him, aren’t we so grateful that he lets us grow and mature and learn from our mistakes.
And I thought I was just starting to feel like, you know, it might be time, especially with the, the video series that we’ve done in regards to this, it was taped 11 years ago.
So it kind of looks dated now and I thought we might need to do something different with that.
At some point, this was gonna be my lazy year where I just kind of sat down and didn’t write too much.
Um But at the same time, I started to sense that on the inside, maybe we need to do that.
At some point, one of my publishers called to say, you know, let’s redo the discerning the voice of God Bible study.
Then the publisher of this particular book called and said, hey, you know what, maybe we’re gonna put an reace this and go ahead and freshen up the material here and the new insights that the Lord has given you.
So there were two things, two lights there that kind of corroborated what I was already sensing on the inside.
And then Matt Crouch called and said, you know what Priscilla, we think that we would love to offer this to, to people who want to know how to discern God’s leading.
That third light was the confirmation for me that what it was I was sensing on the inside.
The Lord was very clear, clearly giving me a light bulb to let me know this would be his direction for me, which ultimately means that discerning the voice of God is a, is on the heart of God.
Ok. So I didn’t call you publisher, your publisher didn’t call us.
We didn’t, you know there was, there was, yeah, there was no person kind of trying to stir that, you know, soup there.
Uh And so this is uh the month of March.
It is our gift offer this month and what a great story to be able to basically hold this book and let you know that uh we want this coming into your home and that’s why it is chosen.
That’s why we have Jerry and Priscilla here and we’re gonna be unpacking this.
Let me, let me tell you what the kindergarten course to hearing and discerning the voice of God is you, you know what the, yeah, the for, for, for the, the kindergarten entry level person uh a number of years ago um when laws were different um today.
Um If we’re hiring somebody here at Trinity Broadcasting, we can say, by the way, you’re, you know, TB N is a Christian organization might have noticed.
Um Are you a Christian? We can say that that is, but there, if you wind the hands of clock back about 30 years, you couldn’t say that you couldn’t make somebody tell you whether they were a Christian or not in, in the application process is a different rules.
Well, my dad, uh, when he, uh, in the early days, somebody called and Trinity Broadcasting is, you know, under the authorization of the Federal Communications Commission, we have employees here that make sure we stay in tune with those policies and procedures and rules and all that kind of stuff.
We have different sets of employees that do lighting and sound and this and that.
But my dad was, of course the general manager and, and somebody called and my dad’s on the phone.
Uh Mr Crouch, you have to be a Christian to work at your channel.
He had the phone in his hand and he went and wanted to say yes.
And the discerning voice of God at that point was literally, he couldn’t say the word yes.
So he went, yeah, and tried to say yes again and couldn’t.
And he said, hold a second, put the call on hold and said, you know, just kind of went what you know, Lord and he clicked the button back and went.
Well, sir, I suppose you don’t have to be a Christian to work at our channel.
But you might wanna be uh you know, much like if you were applying for a Spanish language channel, you might wanna know how to speak Spanish.
And the guy went well, that makes a lot of sense. Ok?
I get that, uh oh, by the way, if he’d have said yes, I was gonna file uh you know, against your license at the Federal Communications Commission.
So my dad’s, you know, hit over the head with a ball peen hammer from the Lord.
That moment was that was God having a conversation by literally not allowing him to make a mistake.
And see, here’s the thing that I love about the story about your dad and the story about your parents at, at the very beginning of this, what I love is their willingness to not push past those moments of restraint when they sense the that that warning, that conviction to not put the call on hold, but then pick it back up only to get that yes out that they wanted to, that he wanted to get out.
And that’s the problem with most of us, that rebellious streak that we all have that when we sense that conviction, that warning, don’t say that to your spouse.
Not, not right now. That’s not the time to say that to your spouse.
You had to say the spouse thing.
The thing is, you know, when you’re in heated fellowship with your spouse and you, you know, sometimes as wives, we get ready because we know what we’re gonna say is gonna shut this whole thing down and we’re gonna win this battle, we plan to win the battle.
And then we feel that warning, that conviction, that’s not, that’s not going to be healthy for the, the longevity of your marriage.
The question is when we sense that, will we push past it and say what we wanna say anyway?
Or will we submit to the leadership of the Holy Spirit?
And the moment it might seem a little bit uh limited losing. Yeah, it might seem like you’re, you’re losing.
But really the outcome of obedience is always freedom and victory. And it’s hard to see that from this perspective.
But if you trust God, if we trust God, then when we sense that conviction of the Holy Spirit to not say this to not buy this to not eat all of this to restrain ourselves.
It’s because there’s freedom and victory that he’s trying to lead us to OK?
So I’m gonna personally hold you to that when the butter cake is, is served a little bit later.
So there’s this thing called butter cake that both of you that both of you talked about, OK.
We ain’t gonna be talking about the Holy Spirit when the butter cake is on the.
So when it comes to this kind of discerning the voice of God, we’re unpacking this all hour with Jerry and Priscilla Shire.
Um uh Let, let me, let me just, let me, let me say this one thing when it pertains because I want to jump off of something you’re saying about marriage.
Um I was running one day and the Lord said, I didn’t call, you seem to be pointing at me.
OK? This is like a daydream.
This isn’t like, you know, I mean, it’s like you’re just trying to, I’m not sounding weird because I don’t want to sound weird.
Uh but it felt like the Lord was pointing at me with one finger, you know, I didn’t call you.
I called you and then he had two fingers pointing and Laurie was next to me in this kind of daydream and I knew I was running and I was on the side of the road and all that came home and told her and, and let me tell you something that got more important the years later that this happened 20 years ago because I’ve always loved her.
But the idea that he didn’t call me, he called me, I didn’t call you.
I called you and she’s there. So I wouldn’t be the me that God sees without her.
And so that’s a good man right there.
So all I have to remind him of that on it. No, no. Honestly, she doesn’t.
I’ve always known that, you know, so let me tell you bickering in marriage pales to comparison of just making this one statement.
If the Lord said that to me and he did or I felt, you know, again, it, it wasn’t this conversation, then if I divorced her, I wouldn’t be divorcing her.
I’d be divorcing my destiny. Now, when in, in, in light of that? Who cares?
You know, what, what kind of, what kind of got it?
Yeah, let’s go there immediately.
So, so the i, the idea that, um, you know, the voice of the Lord changed my dynamic about what marriage was 20 years ago or so, uh I’m different, you know, I’m different.
Why is it important to hear God because it changes, you change me? That’s right.
And it does change you, you know what it does, you know what it does?
It ruins you for church as usual.
It ruins you that regular old mundane Christian red to keep the devil away. Sit in church.
Go because my mama went, my grandmother went. This is what we do.
All of that goes away because you’re hungering for what you know, you’ve experienced before actually sensing the voice of God, his presence near you, listen, sometimes hearing God is less about having a specific word and more about just the nearness of His presence just knowing that he’s near.
I’m talking about where your physical body responds to the presence of God.
There are times when you know He’s near because he’s omni present there times where he manifests himself in a way where that the hair on the back of your neck stand up, kind of goose bumps.
Yes. And in those moments, once you start sensing the nearness of God in that way, you’re ruined for all just doing stuff because it’s what you’re supposed to be doing and you want more of that.
And I think what a lot of people need to understand and he also speaks through his silence.
Oh, very much so, you know, I’m not saying anything, you know, think about the years in the world where, where, you know, from the Old to New Testament, he was just silent and his silence means stay still.
Don’t move. I got you. Does somebody your size ever feel goosebumps? Does that ever happen to you ever?
It, it, you know, you know, I’m, I’m gonna have goose bumps right now.
Oh, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, yeah. How much time we have left in the show?
They, they’re needing to get out. Ok. Um And by the way, uh we’re gonna unpack this.
So get right back into the subject matter. It’s important subject matter.
Even the idea I weigh the publisher and all that kind of stuff.
This is a, this is on the heart of God right now.
This is the people being dis Sais with the mundane.
Yeah, we are are wanting to hear God’s voice wanting to know, you know, I don’t, I mean, you know, not what to, to eat today necessarily but needing to know to help their kids to, to their jobs there, you know, in every area of your life I believe God is speaking or wants to speak or wants to have a say yes.
And I, I wanna say too that just that sense of dissatisfaction that, that someone may be feeling that we all feel when we’re gonna be launched into the next level in our relationship with God.
Sometimes that dissatisfaction makes us so upset and so frustrated because we just want to know the answer.
We want to get to the answer. But the dissatisfaction itself is a sign of God’s spirit working within you.
And the dissatisfaction, the journey that it is going to lead you on the lessons that are meant to be learned, they’re going to be learned because the dissatisfaction sent you on a journey.
The journey itself is not a waste of time discerning.
The voice of God is never something you’re going to arrive at.
It is never something you’re going to be successful at.
It is going to be a journey with God as you walk in the rhythms of grace, you will be on your deathbed, still wanting to know whether or not you have clearly heard the voice of God because we are human.
He’s mysterious. He is God. And aren’t we glad that He’s not just a big version of us?
I don’t want God to just be a big me.
I want God to be so far beyond my imagination that I can never arrive at the knowledge of Him that I have to constantly and consistently be growing well, because it takes faith.
That’s, it takes faith to say, ok, you know what that, that’s why I always say if we step out in faith, kind of no matter what it is.
But if we walk in faith, how can we ever fail in that? That’s right. That’s right.
If we’re believing that we’re doing what God’s called us and we can in our Yeah. Yeah.
Even when we’re, when we’re unsure and we’re unsteady in, in, in the book, I list several of these, but I’ll tell you just a couple of them.
I believe that He allows us to have the mercy of confirmation.
I call them the five MS of hearing God when you sense that God is imparting something upon you, um impressing conviction um uh just a uh a push towards something or away from something.
Ask him for the mercy of confirmation. He knows you’re just a human.
He knows that you need to make sure that his fingerprints are on this assignment before you move forward.
I believe that He honors the sincere request of his Children.
When they say Lord, would you just do something to confirm? Not, not because it’s the primary way you speak.
I think you’re speaking. Would you confirm that by some external means to point me in the right direction?
And then one of the other MS is the Ministry of Eli. Do you remember the little boy Samuel?
He had an older wiser guy in his life named Eli, who was the one who pointed out to him that the voice you’re hearing is the voice of God.
You need to have a wiser, more mature believer in your life who you admire, not the car, they drive the house, they live on, live, live in the success that they’ve achieved.
But the ongoing conversational relationship they have with God, the victory, you’ve seen them experience in your life, you go to them and you say, here’s what I think the Lord is saying, would you pray through this with me?
I listen, I’ve got those people in my life, the majority of the things that we have done in ministry as a couple we have not done.
Um I’m talking about big things that would have marked our lives and our children’s lives.
We have not done before we have call, called people that we are submitted to the authority asked them, would they pray through and give us their wise counsel before we took a step?
So we’ve submitted ourselves to the ministry of Eli. We’ve got Elis in our life. OK?
We’re talking about discerning the voice of God.
We’re gonna be talking about unpacking it with Jerry and Priscilla here all hour long uh this book.
Why don’t you uh wind back and go back to the original moment that you started thinking about writing this book.
What was happening in your life? What was going on?
How did this subject matter start forming books for most people are painful to write uh except Max who says it’s easy, which is, this is not fair.
Uh That, that’s not even, yeah, and it’s not easy for me to write books.
And so most of us would, would, I’ve never written a book. Probably won’t.
But the idea it would be painful because it’s hard for me to write a letter.
So, um, this, this had to be a period of life in your life where you were gonna drill down, you were gonna get into this, why this book, why this subject matter when you wrote it specifically because of what your wife described a few moments ago as a dissatisfaction with my Christian life, the way it was, I grew up in a incredible, wonderful um spirit filled environment where my father who started the church that I still attend to this day when I was one year old, they have been faithfully pastoring for 40 years.
And if anybody can preach the word of God, it is Tony Evans.
Let me tell you he is one of the most gifted communicators of God’s Word.
And I was talking to your wife earlier today and telling her that the reality is I had parents that lived the thing.
I’m so grateful, integrity and character. That’s what my parents had.
And so I gleaned so much of what the word of God was, who it described God to be what he did in the Old Testament and the New Testament, I knew all that but felt dissatisfied because if he did that for them, then why am I not experiencing that?
For me, there was an unrest in my heart. I wanted more.
I wanted to see and experience this God of the Bible.
And it is that dissatisfaction that sent me on a just a personal journey that connected me with people who were in different streams of the faith.
And instead of closing them out, I invited in what it is that God was teaching them and the ways that he had demonstrated himself to them.
And by just listening, listening and gleaning and inviting from the breadth of the body of Christ, I began to realize that there is so much more than our little box of our little stream presents to us that there is more that can be that doesn’t take away or water down what we have.
But on the firm foundation of where that God has already laid in our life, there are deeper depths and there are higher heights.
And so I just try to walk on the journey.
And I’m so grateful to the Lord because he um honored my quest by again, not allowing me to be at a place where I’ve arrived.
I’m in a place right now. Here I am. I wrote that book.
I think when I was 31 or 32 here I am at 42 years old and I’m at a place right now where I’m revisiting this whole concept because I’m needing to say, Lord, I’m at a place right now where I feel like you’re silent or either my heart’s hardened and I’m not hearing.
So once again, Lord, I need to retrain my spiritual ears.
I’m praying and saying, Lord, would you heighten my spiritual senses? You know, just like we have five physical senses.
We’ve got spiritual sentence. Lord senses.
Lord, I need my radar to be up so that I can detect your presence and hear your voice.
And I’m gonna need you to make my detectors sensitive again. Lord, and I’m entrusting that to your spirit.
So it’s an ongoing um thing that is born out of those moments of unrest in our life with the Lord.
The greatest gift ever. It’s the greatest gift. It means there’s a new level he wants to take you to.
So I’ve been trying to keep myself from getting frustrated by those moments and just go with God. You know.
So then then at, at some point though, how is your life different?
How is your life better after you hit that dissatisfaction point, started writing this book.
What has changed in the 10 years for you personally?
Because there could be somebody viewing going, you know, this is really too deep of a subject for me.
You know, I got kids to raise and I got two jobs and I got this and that I, I don’t have time to put into the OK.
How can we make sure everyone understands this book.
The contents of this book, the subject matter of hearing God’s voice is something that will change their life.
So take your own journey, talk to us about that.
If we feel like our life is too big and too filled with the busyness of kids or business or life right now, to be concerned about this topic, that just seems so the theoretical and sort of out there, Then those very reasons are the reasons why more than anything you need to discern the voice of God.
All the things that you love the most, your Children, your spouse, your business, your ministry, all the things that are closest to you without guidance, uh and leading from the Holy Spirit without knowing what it is that God wants you to do, you will not be able to, to handle those things.
I won’t be able to handle those things correctly.
We’ll miss out on some of the biggest gifts and biggest surprises and big, biggest miracles that He wants to present to us because most of those hinge on us, hearing a word and having faith enough to step out on the journey, just like your parents.
Let me tell you what I’ve gained. Here’s what I’ve gained.
What I’ve gained is that now at 42 years old and I say this, I say this, uh you know, I’m stepping carefully when I say it, but at 42 years old there are very few things that the Lord could ask me to do that.
I would not quickly and immediately step out to do them because I have, I have such a track record with God now, even with my mistakes, but I have such a track record with God now.
And I think my husband can attest to this.
But I’m one of those people that if I sense the Holy Spirit is calling me to do something because of the track record of seeing his faithfulness, time and time again, step in for me.
When I, I stepped off, what I thought was a ledge and it didn’t look like it was good, but I had a word from the Lord and it confirmed in his word and by leadership in my life.
So I just went ahead and I did it anyway.
And I watched him catch me and I watched him take me to a place that I never could have gotten in my own giftings or my own talent or my own skill.
You watch him do that enough times you get to the place that when God asks you to do it again, you you can’t wait to step off the ledge because you’re another word.
Let’s go. I’m so excited to see what’s next in the journey.
So I get excited now about hearing a word from God.
I, I don’t allow myself to become discouraged when I feel like he’s silent, I assume that, that means the last word I had.
Stay, stay with the last word. Stay right there being obedient to the, do me a favor.
Uh, just, uh, let’s, let’s for somebody that still is going.
Yeah, that’s good for you folks that are on television.
You don’t know what it’s like out here, you know, and all this and, and, you know, you’re all up there in your suit and you’re all looking good and smelling good and all that kind of stuff.
It’s really rough out here. Think of the people in, you know, foreign part, you know, parts of the world of Indonesia and, and, and, and Africa that are watching tonight.
They’re just, they’re struggling to get by. Ok. What a talk to them. Yeah. Well, yeah. Would it happen?
Think of, think of them in, in regard to that and if you would look at them and maybe pray for them, Priscilla, let me just say this first of all.
And I wanna talk to those people, please. I’m the youngest of three.
I grew up in a single parent home.
My mother had to sack groceries, work for tips to put food on the table.
But I remember at night I couldn’t sleep and get up.
I saw her praying on her knees for her. It was how bad she wanted it.
I tell people all the time how the prayers of one woman changed the entire generation.
So, yeah, and so God speaks to us, no matter what ailments we have, no matter how devastating those seasons of life are where we feel like we are completely overwhelmed.
We don’t have what it’s gonna take to sustain our current needs.
And we’re wondering if God hears, we’re wondering whether or not our prayers matter.
We’re wondering whether or not He is ever going to speak into and change and alter our circumstances.
But one of the greatest gifts I think from scripture is not his voice, it’s not what he can do give us.
It’s just him seek him. He will disclose more and more to you in terms of his will, his plans for your life, his gifts, his blessings, those are a benefit of just having him.
And you need to know that he will never leave you.
He will never forsake you no matter how devastating things might become.
Um And I know there are some very real practical needs.
And so I want to pray for those right now.
I wanna pray that the Lord will ma manifest himself to you in a tangible way that will keep you hope filled, encouraged and excited to continue your relationship with the Lord.
Uh Despite external circumstances, Lord Jesus, I pray for my sister and brothers all around the world.
I’m asking right now in Jesus name that you would bring encouragement, you would replace discouragement with encouragement.
Lord I’m gonna ask right now in Jesus name that you would build up somebody’s faith today by man investing yourself in their life.
Lord, I’m asking you to speak to them a still small voice. Lord.
Or let the scriptures fall open to a page of, of, of your word Lord.
That is so evidently so clearly for them that they will never doubt again that they have not heard from you and experienced you.
Lord. I’m asking that the church they attend would be on fire with your spirit that every time they and the others that go there would walk through the door, they would have a tangible sense of your presence with them.
Lord, I pray that your word would be alive.
I pray that the assignment of the enemy against them, against their Children, against their spouses.
Lord, that those assignments would be canceled and that they would see those assignments replaced by your grace, your love and your mercy washing over them and their experience.
Lord meet us, speak to us. Lord, we need a word from you.
And so we ask Lord that you would bring your word to your people and speak clearly so that we can hear, lift the veil from our eyes.
Thank you Lord. Cause the veil that is over our ears, the hardness of our heart.
Lord to be softened and to be removed so that we have tender sensors that are able to detect your presence.
We need you Lord. And so we ask you to speak, it is in jesus’ name that we pray.
Amen. Amen. Beautiful. Wow. Wow. Wow. Wow. I love what you said about your mama.
You know, the need for God. So many of us, we need something new in life. We need God.
And, and I think that dissatisfaction leads us to a place of seeking, you know, and I think being a seeker is one of the greatest things that could ever happen to us because there’s a lot of people sitting in church that aren’t seeking God anymore.
But there’s a lot of people out in the world that haven’t found God yet.
God hasn’t found them that are seeking. You seek and you’re find it, you know.
So I think that’s a, that’s a good thing.
If you’ve got um Children that are seeking God, you need to pray for your kids, that God brings that person or something into their lives, that, that draws them to God because I think that’s a very open season of their life was when they’re seeking God.
Totally. How do you know? Um So, so I know that a lot of um people want to hear God’s voice but they won’t stop talking.
Right. Tell us how I’ve never been my problem to stop talking.
Yeah, we have turned prayer into this one way monologue where we’re just, you know, just feeling like we have to fill in the no of the silence, any quiet spaces, we’ve just got to fill them in with our next request or the next thing that we want to say, and you’re right, we don’t leave room for God to get a word in edgewise.
But one of the authors, I remember reading Bob Sergey, I believe his name is.
He said, uh nothing happens when I speak. But when God speaks, worlds come into existence.
So why in the world wouldn’t I wanna leave time for Him to speak?
And what that practically looks like is, yes, vocalize your prayers to him.
I literally have kind of begun the habit of even writing some down just writing down what it is that I wanna say that Lord, yes, we have the privilege of bringing our needs and our request to him.
But there ought to be at some point where you just pause and you say, ok, Lord, is there anything you wanna say to me most of the time?
He’ll speak to us just through his word, through whatever you’re reading in your bible time that day, he knows how to match up what you’re gonna be reading today with what the needs of your life or your future are that you might not even be aware of yet.
So in his word, that is how most of the time he speaks back to us.
But oftentimes it’s just an impression. It’s just a Bible verse from that you learned in Sunday school years ago.
All of a sudden it comes back to your, your mind.
Now take that as God speaking to you or the name of a friend you haven’t talked to in years.
Take that as God saying, pray for this friend right now, those little impressions, those little inklings, you know, Deuteronomy chapter 30 says God’s word is not so hard that you’ve got to send someone above the heavens to go find it for you or through the seas to go and get it for you.
God’s word is in your own heart.
It’s in your, it is as close as your fingertips, all of that stuff that we discount as our own ideas.
Oh, that’s just coincidence. Most of the time for the believer for the one who is seeking God’s will and his voice most of the time, that’s God’s word.
Take it seriously, write it down, ask him for confirmation, treasure his word and see if he doesn’t show you how important and palatable it is in terms of the experience that he has planned for you.
We are talking with Jerry and Priscilla Shire, discerning the voice of God.
You know what’s, you know, it, it, it couldn’t be any more important this subject matter.
I mean, the very fact that the four of us are sitting in a studio uh doing this broadcast is because discerning the voice of God came to Paul and Jan Crouch 40 something years ago and TB N is his thing.
This isn’t something that the Crouch family built.
Uh this is something God did and, and the idea, um you know, that’s why it’s almost comical when people try to rise up against something that God did.
It’s just kind of, kind of funny, you know, it can be irritating for a season but it’s, it’s almost comical.
Uh because uh if we thought that this ministry and as it is now fully in its second generation were up to us, we quit.
It’s not up to us, it’s God’s thing.
And so we have that same firm foundation of understanding and, and oftentimes people will say, well, you know, everything’s different for you and everything is different for these smiling faces on, on television.
You don’t understand what it’s like, you know, in the real world.
And, well, the problem is, is uh the Crouch family, the Shire family and you know, the Evans family were all just normal people till we heard the voice of the Lord.
And then that’s what changed. If there is a difference, it’s because of his voice.
There couldn’t be a more important subject matter for you.
Uh And Jerry, I’m circling back to you just for a second because of what you said.
So it, it’s not an economic thing.
It isn’t just, you know, uh executives that the Lord speaks to your mama, uh needed the voice of the Lord and apparently was struggling in a single family situation.
So it worked and it worked for your mama. Yes, you’re absolutely right.
I remember her coming home with her tips and, and says she made $40 in tips that day.
All right, I remember her taking out $4 you know, put it to the side because that was gonna go into the offering plate.
That’s an, I mean, I’m like mom, are you kidding me? You know, the Lord would understand.
She said she goes, no, it’s just she goes, it’s a simple obedience.
So it had nothing to do with that.
And then I remember her, like I said, getting up early praying, I remember there were situations I was in off in college that some of my boys and I we would go do something.
And there was this the, the, this thing in me like you know what, Jerry don’t go, you know what?
No. And that was the time my mom was praying for me.
So she has kept me out of so much situation through her prayers.
That’s why I said the prayers had the prayers of one woman changed the generation.
I mean, still today it’s so funny. Our boys would be like granny still praying.
She’d been there praying for 30 minutes. I’m like, yep, she’s still here praying.
I said she’s praying for you guys. So she’s praying even for this next generation, her grandchildren.
And so it’s just great. But yeah, it is not an economical thing.
It is, it is, it is something that you desire. Do you really want it.
Like I said, she used to get up early in the morning before the kids got up on her knees praying for her Children, praying for the day, praying for whatever.
So, you know, you make time for what you want and if you wanna hear the voice of God, you gotta make time for him.
Ok? Now we, we, the four of us grew up in an environment where this subject matter is normal.
This this this is understood. We get this.
There are people that grew up in the opposite, polar opposite of that and they don’t get it.
This book, you know, it, the title is discerning the voice of God.
How to recognize when God is speaking. OK.
So there could be, you know, why don’t you start with, you know, just uh speak to the people that are New Christians.
They didn’t grow up, they don’t have no examples in their life of this happening.
This isn’t normal and sounds sounds like it’s not right that we’re not right. OK. OK.
So uh just introduce the subject matter if somebody just doesn’t quite get it. OK.
So John 10 27 to me is the most concise and comprehensive verse in scripture about hearing God.
Uh It is when Jesus says my sheep, hear my voice, I know them and they follow me.
He says, you gotta be my sheep to hear my voice.
So you said New Christians listen that relationship, right?
There is the, the connector that allows you access to the voice of God.
So, so to me, the first step is actually believing that as an adopted son or daughter grafted into the family of God, that you have the capacity innately because you’re part of the family to now hear the voice of God.
It’s like um when we were growing up in our house, I don’t know about you guys, but we didn’t have access to a whole lot of cable television.
My parents didn’t get cable, they didn’t get, you know, whatever direct TV, all that stuff.
We didn’t have any of that stuff. And I, I felt a little mad about that.
I really wanted to have more channels.
My parents chose that we could really only watch the Cosby Show on Thursdays at seven o’clock and then a different world.
So it wasn’t until we were, we were getting ready to get married. I moved out.
Um I remember the day I had the cable guy come over, hook up the cable and after he did all that hooking up, he said, here’s the remote control, push the guide button and I pushed the guide button and I had never seen so many channels in my life on the screen.
I had no idea. All those channels were there. Now, all those channels didn’t just get created that day.
They had always been there. It’s just, I didn’t have the right hook up.
So that I could tap into them and bring them and draw them down into my experience.
The Holy Spirit is the hook up when you place faith in Jesus Christ.
Ephesians chapter one says the moment you believe you receive the hook up the Holy Spirit, now you are able to draw down divine channels.
It’s not that you create, hated him. No, they were always there. God speaking. He wants to reveal himself.
Now you have the opportunity to hear him.
So really the first step, especially if you grew up in an environment where this concept is sort of unique and different and new for you.
It’s to believe that as a, as a privilege of being a son or a daughter, you can hear from God, it is the deception of the enemy to cause us to think.
We have to have a seminary de degree. We have to have some special hotline connection with God.
Like somebody we may admire that we as regular men and women can’t hear from God.
That’s what the enemy wants you to think. He didn’t want you to know it’s your birthright.
And so believing that you can is the first step to hearing God and you wrote the book that is our March uh gift offer and the 800 number that’ll be on the screen watch this.
See it came right on 802 01 5200.
That number is specifically for this uh month the month of March 2017.
We uh want this information also frequency by Pastor Robert Morris. Those are what we’re offering this month.
The 800 number is on the screen.
That one is very specific for this book right here right now for you.
We’ve been sitting all hour with Jerry and Priscilla. Um We, how much time do we have left?
We got about four minutes. Um uh Why don’t, why don’t you kind of don’t get up from the set without saying something that is in this book that will help people.
Uh And so just kind of start giving your final thoughts in regard to the subject matter.
And uh the fact that this book is available right here right now.
Well, this is one of the most beautiful things about hearing God that I enjoy, um reminding myself of and that is that sometimes we, we wanna know the will of God for us.
We want to hear his voice, but we’re a little bit nervous about that because he might actually call us to do something we don’t wanna do.
You know, he might actually send us somewhere we, that we don’t want to be sent or he might actually call us to a season that we don’t wanna, we don’t really wanna be single anymore.
We don’t even, we don’t really want to be married anymore.
You might actually impress upon us something we don’t want and we’re nervous about that.
So um one of the things I love about the Holy Spirit’s work in us and this is in regards to hearing God, but his work in us is to sanctify us.
Sanctification is the process by which we are molded into the image of Jesus Christ.
It is the process by which our mind changes, our ambitions change our desires.
We start wanting stuff, we never thought we want, we stop wanting things.
We never thought we’d ever not want, want to, to separate ourselves from all of a sudden.
We find ourselves a nerve by jokes that we used to laugh at or company.
We used to keep, it just doesn’t work for us anymore. That’s the work of the Holy Spirit.
So in regards to discerning the voice of God, if anybody’s ever concerned or afraid, like I have been that, oh God might say to me something I don’t want the Holy Spirit.
What he does is turn your desires so that they are in alignment with God’s will.
So you actually want what it is that God wants you to want.
That’s what I believe the psalmist meant when he said that he gives you the desires of your heart.
He doesn’t give you what you want.
He actually puts desires in your heart so that you want what he wants.
Let me tell you uh a practical application of that.
Uh when we were first married and before we had Children, we lived in Orange County, California.
I grew up in Newport Beach, California. So um L A county was more like enemy territory.
We, you know, we, we didn’t really understand the big city of Los Angeles.
If you live in a suburb of Orange County, L A County L A is, is real different because it’s, it’s a real different environment and, and then the Lord called us to Hollywood.
So we packed up our little kids and we went to Los Angeles, bought a home in L A and lived there for 15 years.
Laurie told me that I’m so used to Orange County when I need grocery shopping, I’m gonna get my kids put them in my car.
I’m gonna drive back down to Orange County. How far was that? 35 40 miles?
And I’ll do my grocery shopping and then come back, we had planned that.
So we bought a house that felt like this kind of sanctuary up on the side of a hill and, and we were very protected and it felt really good when we were at home.
But we just were very, you know, the surrounding was not going to work for us within days.
The changing of our attitude and the Holy Spirit that we fell in love with this area.
We started, it was when God called us to Hollywood, he changed the very inside of who we were.
So the idea of when he’s going to call you, if you don’t like it.
Now, you’ll, you’ll, you’ll immediately like it. You’ll, you’ll immediately love it.
We lived up there, raised our boys for 15 years in L A county and only recently have come back to serve this ministry.
TB N as my parents were in their retirement age and now are in heaven.
So they’re in heaven now watching the fact that we’re still talking about God and we’re still doing the same thing that for 45 years TB N has been doing, you know, uh all of this and what we want for you.
This month, we want you to discern and to hear the voice of God. Get our love gift.
Thank you to Jerry and Priscilla Shire for being with us. We’ll see you next time. Bye bye.
Thank you guys at TBN.
Our mission is to use every available means to reach as many individuals and families as possible with the life changing gospel of Jesus Christ.
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God bless you.