Are we commanded to listen for God in prayer?

 I opened a can of worms on Facebook the other day with a post about the practice of listening to or for God in prayer. I should have anticipated that a brief post on the subject might offer more confusion than clarity, but that possibility didn’t dawn on me at the moment. Several friends of mine commented on the post respectfully and thoughtfully, and I’m glad they did. Their effort to start a conversation has given me a chance to reflect on the subject, and I’ll offer the first fruits of those reflections in this post.

 

For anyone who did not see my Facebook post, here is what I said: “Where have we gotten the idea that we're supposed to listen to/for God in prayer? Can you think of a single passage of Scripture that commands us to do this, explains how to do it, or clarifies what to expect from God when we do it? Instead, passages on prayer tell us to make our requests known to God, to offer thanksgiving and praise, to confess our sins, etc. In other words, prayer is when we express our thoughts to God. God's communication to mankind is found in the Bible.”

 

As I reflected on my friends’ comments, I had to ask myself, “Why am I having such a strong reaction against the idea of listening to God in prayer?” Two possible reasons stood out to me as I thought about it. First, I feel there has been a growing trend to make this practice part of the essence of prayer—in other words, to say that a person really is not praying unless they take time to see if God will speak to them in that moment. Now of course everyone agrees that each instance of prayer doesn’t have to include all the elements that might make up your prayer life as a whole, but I think more and more people are saying that you must not merely seek to speak to God in prayer, but you must also seek to hear from Him—otherwise, you’re really not praying. I have reacted strongly to this idea because in passages that explicitly teach us about how to pray, I find a conspicuous absence of teaching on the idea of listening for God. More on that in a moment.

 

Here’s a second possibility that I must humbly consider at greater length. I am currently taking a class that critiques occult beliefs and practices from a biblical perspective, and this class includes discussion of all the various ways that occult practitioners seek to communicate with spiritual beings or “the higher power.” I am trying not to see an occult bogeyman behind every tree, but I must consider whether I am overly sensitive to such concerns right now. As every student knows, when you focus intensely on one subject for several months, your opinions can become out of balance. As time passes, you often re-gain a more balanced perspective. Am I out-of-balance at the moment? I think humility would demand that I consider this, and so I will try to consider it, though I am aware that my reaction against listening for God in prayer goes back before I ever started this class.

 

A few clarifications

Perhaps it will be helpful if I clarify a few things before I ramble on further. First, in my original post, I meant to comment narrowly on the idea of listening to God in prayer. I didn’t intend to comment on the various ways in which God might guide us to make certain decisions. One commenter mentioned the avenues of wise council and circumstances. I would certainly affirm that God does lead us through such means. Another commenter asked if I meant that God can only teach me, comfort me, and convict me by reading the Bible. No, I would say that those things can happen even when I’m not reading the Bible. Sometimes they happen through other people teaching me, comforting me, or convicting me. Sometimes the Spirit simply brings things to my mind in a more direct way, though I would say that the Spirit makes use of the knowledge of Scripture that I’ve gained prior to that moment.

 

One commenter brought up the testimonies of Muslims who say they’ve had a vision of Jesus that leads them to hear the Gospel. Though that’s a bit of a different issue than a born-again person praying, I’d like to mention that I don’t discount those testimonies. I don’t see a Scriptural reason to deny that Christ would do that, so I rejoice that He seems to work with people whom Christians have been somewhat slow to reach with the Gospel.

 

I’d also like to clarify that I won’t pretend like I can explain the various experiences that people have that they attribute to the Holy Spirit. I will simply say that we must not assume that we cannot err when we interpret our circumstances. I think we are far too quick to assume that we know exactly what gave rise to our experiences and that we know exactly what our experiences signify. Can’t we all attest that we’ve misunderstood our experiences before? I think we need to submit them to a more objective standard like the Bible.

 

A conspicuous absence

My greatest concern with the notion of listening for God in prayer comes from the fact that I don’t believe I, as a church-age believer, can find any explicit or implicit command to do it or any teaching on how to do it if I should try. I certainly don’t find enough teaching on the idea to elevate it to the status of being an essential element of prayer. As I say this, I’m thinking of passages like Matthew 6:5-13 (which includes the Lord’s Prayer), Philippians 4:6, Ephesians 6:18, 1 Timothy 2:1, Colossians 4:2, and 1 Peter 5:7. In passages like this that are meant to tell me what to do in prayer, I find no mention of the idea of listening.

 

A few comments on my FB post mentioned some specific verses as possibilities, so let me comment on just a couple of them.

 

My sheep hear my voice—and other voices, too?

John 10 was mentioned in the comments as one passage that may speak on the question of listening for God in prayer. I think everyone reading this would agree that Jesus isn’t explicitly teaching about prayer in this passage, meaning that He didn’t make these comments with the express intention of teaching us how to pray. The remaining question, then, is if Jesus’ words imply anything about prayer. I do not believe they do.

 

Jesus is speaking to the Pharisees in this passage, who have just denied their spiritual blindness (9:40). The Lord goes on to contrast their leadership over the children of Israel (which is self-seeking) with His own leadership over His sheep (which is self-sacrificing). In this context, He states that His sheep hear his voice. By this statement, is Jesus encouraging us to listen for His voice when we pray? To me, that seems like a big stretch given that this conversation did not arise from an intention to teach about prayer.

 

If we take that statement to apply to listening for God in prayer, I think that move also raises a troubling scenario. Jesus also mentioned that the sheep hear the voices of strangers (10:5). If we move this conversation into the context of prayer, are we to conclude that as we try to listen for the voice of God in prayer there will be other voices trying to talk to us at the same time—like demonic voices, perhaps? This possibility is all the more troubling given that everyone I’ve heard who teaches on listening to God in prayer says we cannot recognize His voice right away—that we have to work to hear it and learn to refine that skill.

 

But here, Jesus asserts that His sheep know his voice and will follow him. There is no suggestion that hearing His voice is a skill that must be refined or developed. I think it is far more accurate to interpret this passage as an explanation of conversion—in other words, the sheep who hear Christ’s voice are unbelievers who are effectually called by God to salvation. They hear the Gospel, become convicted of its truth, and thus follow Christ. I am not convinced that there is an application to be made here for prayer. If you believe there is, I would like to hear what you make of the “voice of strangers” in this passage. Is it a demonic voice that tries to talk to you as you pray?

 

Romans 8:16 and the internal witness of the Spirit

One commenter mentioned Romans 8:16 and the activity of the Spirit that is mentioned there. I mention this verse because of an interpretive possibility that we have to consider—that this activity of the Spirit is not actually directed toward us, but is instead directed toward God the Father. It depends on how we understand the word “with” in the phrase “the Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God.” It is entirely possible that what Paul means is not that the Spirit speaks to us, but that the Spirit speaks to the Father with us or alongside us; that as we cry “Abba! Father!” (v. 15) the Spirit speaks to the Father to support and confirm our claim of being a child of God. If this understanding is correct, it would be the Spirit’s complement to Christ’s intercessory work that is mentioned in Romans 8:34.

 

Though the tenor of my whole discussion might suggest otherwise, I’m not denying the possibility of the internal witness of the Spirit—that in some way He provides internal re-assurance to us of the reality of our salvation. We may have to find that notion in another passage, however. But even if we take Romans 8:16 as teaching the internal witness, it should be noted that we are not told that we have to listen for it in prayer. Perhaps you think I’m just being far too narrow in my definition of prayer at this point. A fair objection! I’ll have to give more consideration to that thought.

 

Some other passages were mentioned that are certainly worthy of consideration as well, such as 1 Thessalonians 5:16-21 and passages that speak of waiting on the Lord. As I want to give careful thought to all the suggestions made, I must continue to ponder and consider some of those passages, and I am grateful that they were suggested. Perhaps I will try to write on them further at a later date.

 

Perhaps as you read this you feel some degree of pity for me, believing that I am missing out on a significant and meaningful part of a relationship with God. I’m not convinced that that’s the case, but if you are, you may feel free to pray for me. If you’d like to comment further on what I’ve shared here, please do so on my Facebook page as I do not have comments enabled here on my blog. Thank you to those who have challenged my thinking already.