Hearing God's Voice: Part 2

          I wanted to break down these journals down into a couple blogs. It has been a month and a half, a lot has happened and I want to make sure I get it all down.

10/13/2012 - "[During our week on Hearing God's Voice, our speaker, Christian Foxx, spent many hours praying over us months before speaking and felt God speak to him. He wrote down what God told him and passed it on to us. This is what Foxx got for me]: 'You are a leader. But what are you leading people to do? John says our words have the power over life or death. Will you lead people to life or down the road of death. Jonathan [other speaker] saw a picture of your head and noticed your ears were growing. Asked the Lord what that meant and He said He's increasing my ability to recognize and hear God's voice. He wants to show me His true nature because He was misrepresented. He wants to show me His Father's heart. I saw the word Father clearly for me.'
          I'm not sure what to make of a couple of the parts. Not feeling like leader is one. Struggling to hear God's voice is another. I really didn't understand what he meant when he was talking about when he said God was misinterpreted in my life. One night I just grew incredibly frustrated about it and began venting to a friend. I grew up in a church. I grew up in a Christian home. I am a Christian. I know all the bible stories. Who is he [speaker] to say I don't know God? Then I realized it was my pride. My pride had put God in a box. I thought I knew who God was. God gave me this image the other night of the earth. It shrank down till I couldn't see it. Then the the sun appeared. The sun slowly shrank as my viewpoint panned out. Soon the galaxy slowly shrank down till it was only the universe. I saw millions of galaxies. But it didn't stop there. Slowly the universe shrank to the size of my fist and then Heavens surrounded it. God said in my mind, 'I am bigger than all this.'
          I was floored. It completely blew my mind. I was humbled beyond belief. I also realized I thought I was independent; to an unhealthy level. I would push people and their help away because I considered that 'my job'. I wouldn't want to accept money or anything that would benefit me because I had always provided for myself. God showed me how wrong I was. In being prideful and independent I wasn't depending on Him. I'm growing still but slowly God is breaking me done and building me up for His Kingdom."

10/24/2012 - "In lecture the other day, people were praying for one another who were dealing with very specific issues. I wasn't struggling with any of those things so I was sitting in the back and praying to myself. A friend of mine came up to me and said he felt that God wanted him to pray for me. He asked if I was dealing with anything that needed prayer for. I was a little bewildered, I couldn't think of anything at all and said I didn't know. He prayed over me anyways and then left. Five minutes later, another friend came up to me and said the same thing, they felt God wanted them to pray for me. By now I was a little ruffled, I had no idea what they were talking about. I wasn't dealing with anything. Thirty minutes later at lunch, I was telling a friend about what happened and she looked up at me and said, 'Ironically, I woke up last night and felt the need to pray for you.' At this point I was pretty flabbergasted. I was like this is ridiculous, so I went to the prayer room and was like okay God, what do you want to tell me?
          Ephesians 5 and Philippians 2 popped into my head. I turned to the first one, but without realizing it turned to Galatians 5. Verse 5:15 sprung out at me, 'If you keep on biting and devouring each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other.' I was like huh, that's pretty intense. Then I realized I was in the wrong book and turned to Ephesians, but while reading it I glanced over at the page on the other side. 4:29 leaped off the page and grabbed my attention. 'Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building up others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.' Philippians 2:14 also said, 'Do everything without complaining or arguing.' Everything I read revolved around my tongue. It is something I struggle with tremendously. Even in a joking manner, I must resist the urge to tear someone down. Matthew 15:18 says, 'but the things that come out of the mouth come from the heart, and these things make a man unclean.' This is what I am going to strive for."

10/26/2012 - "During worship tonight, I was really struggling with hearing God's voice; fearing I had lost the ability. A friend came up to me and said, 'don't worry,' and walked away. There is this leader who is speaking on the Holy Spirit and the Trinity. She has the spiritual gift of hearing God's voice in a powerful and clear manner and then relaying it to the people it relates to. She is pretty much a spiritual mail man. So she came up to me during worship and laid her hand over my heart and this is what she said, 'God does not see you as vain. You are not a vain person. You have been woven so specifically full of energy. People will see you walking down the road and say, that's a normal looking guy and will be shocked that you're a Christian. Then she shocked me. She said, 'it's okay to have a cigar every now and then. He doesn't want a behavior modification he wants your heart. All he wants is for you to sit in His lap so He can enjoy how He made you and carefully designed you. And then He'll listen to your requests."

          Before I go into this story, it is very similar to what happened in Acts 2 where the Holy Spirit came upon the disciples at Pentecost.

10/27/2012 - "Today we were baptized in the Holy Spirit. We all repented of our sins and then waited on God. I suddenly started praying for people. They would pop into my head, smiling and I would ask God to walk with them through their struggles. But my prayers were different than normal. I began speaking faster and faster until my words were almost a blur. As soon as I finished praying for them, they would disappear and a new person would pop into my head. If I stopped praying and that image stayed in my head I'd keep praying and then it'd disappear to be replaced with a new person.
          Then a picture of an old tree burned itself in my mind. I would open and then close my eyes but the image remained. It was a massive tree, very old, with thick, white bark, branches lifted up to the sky. My body went numb and I, without realizing it had my arms outstretched. From my finger tips to my elbow, the best word I can use to describe the feeling was wooden. I had this feeling that I must not move my feet; they had to remain planted. A wind came in through the building we were staying in and my upper body started swaying back and forth. I felt God say, 'open your eyes.' So I did and all around me I saw people lying down on their backs or kneeling down, praising God. I have no idea what that represented, but God will reveal it in due time.
          While I was seeing and feeling these things, a friend felt God leading him to pray for me. When he laid his hands on my head, he saw an image of my heart pulsing that appeared to be splintered like rough bark. But then slowly it began to smooth over until all the splinters were gone. He had no idea what I was seeing while he prayed over me.
          After that I had something between a vision and my imagination on steroids. I saw myself in a field of yellow daises as far as the eyes can see, so dense you couldn't see the ground. I looked the same as I am now, but I felt like a small child on the inside. Not in a bad way, just a child. I was leaping and spinning as I ran through the field, when I spotted a cliff side. I sprinted towards it full tilt where I threw myself off the edge. Laughter burst from my mouth as I hurled through the sky straight towards the sea below; feeling no fear, just excitement and joy. I hit the water and began swimming. All of a sudden, massive sea turtles appeared and began swimming besides me. I felt no need for air as we swam around each other in the depths of the ocean. My heart leaped into my throat when out of the depths rose a massive castle. Th only way I can describe the way it looked was a sea castle from the Little Mermaid. It radiated light. I swam into the castle and saw a majestic throne in this massive hall. God sat on the throne. I looked up at Him and feeling like a child, 'can I sit in your lap?' He looked at me and said yes. I curled up on His lap and just sat there enjoying His presence. After a while I got down and asked, 'can I dance for you?' Once again He said yes. Time went by and I stopped and got back into His lap and just enjoyed His presence.
          I opened my eyes and walked out of the lecture hall, shocked. I had never experienced anything like that at all. I didn't know what to make out of any of it. God had spoken to me in a deep and personal way that I didn't know was possible."
          God has rocked my world in ways I did not believe possible. The things I saw and experienced I did not think God still did. My life has been forever changed.