April 28, 2025 • 35 mins
How Does God’s Audible Voice Really Sound? Insights from a Modern-Day Encounter
Some people talk about hearing the audible voice of God. What does that sound like? And should we expect to hear it?
On this episode of the God Conversations podcast, we’re talking about the “audible” voice of God, why God rarely speaks this way and what our expectations should be for how the Spirit speaks.
Our guest has heard the audible voice of God five times and has plenty of insights from his story. Patrick Hegarty is a pastor of a church in Brisbane, Australia but also heads up a a national church planting organisation. He’s also authored several books on spiritual formation and renewal.
In this episode, you’ll hear about:
- Patrick’s back story, raised in an atheist environment and becoming a Christian at age 19. After 20 years of working in business and “avoiding God’s call,” Patrick changed careers and became a full time minister.
- Patrick’s experiences of God’s audible voice. Patrick describes it as feeling “almost normal,” since it involves the God you know in everyday life. When God speaks out loud, it is almost like the Spirit is shouting in the moment, but as you reflect, you realise no-one else heard it.
“God’s voice is normally very disruptive. I’ve never found God to speak at a convenient time!”
- The God conversation that inspired Patrick’s book on leadership and discipleship such that he finished 90,000 words in just three weeks.
- Patrick’s God conversation in Kenya. Patrick was on a ministry trip surrounded by poverty and devastation in the biggest slum in Africa when God spoke out loud: “I remember these people, I want you to remember them.” In Patrick’s words, it was like “listening to heaven while looking into hell.” As a result, Patrick started a charity in the area that continues to this day.
As I was looking down in the valley – the biggest slum in Africa – I saw toddlers looking in a stream of rubbish and sewage for food. I had my ears listening to heaven and my eyes looking into hell. Suddenly I heard the out loud voice of God. Everything else went quiet. “I remember these people, I want you to remember them.”
- The difference between God’s “quiet” voice and God’s “loud” voice. Patrick sees the audible voice as God’s way of making a point that would otherwise be difficult to make. At the same time, the out loud voice is not necessarily the preferred form, since God wants to speak in our everyday moments. The quieter voice also tends to call us to actively seek and listen to God. Like a game of spiritual hide and seek, it’s in the seeking that we build the spiritual muscles we need. The outside voice has to be the exception, while a quiet voice is a mark of intimacy.
We should always seek the person not the experience.
- Advice for hearing God’s voice. Patrick says with a smile, “buyer beware.” God’s voice calls for transformation and action!
Next Steps
Join the journey to hearing God’s voice. Start your free 7-day God Conversations devotional today!
Pray, promote and give. God Conversations is donor-funded and made possible through the generosity of people like you! Become a partner today.
Equip your church to hear God’s voice. Join our community of ministry leaders for monthly insights and a free preview of 50 Days of God Conversations resource.
About Patrick Hegarty
Patrick has worked for over 20 years in a broad range of Christian movements. Having authored several books on formation and renewal, led and planted churches, and taken over 10,000 people through courses and spiritual retreats, he has seen God do many incredible things across the globe.
Patrick leads Kenmore Church in Brisbane, founded the Connexa development incubator, and is currently launching M4 Australia, a national church planting organisation. Find out about his work on spiritual formation at thegrowthtrack.com.au.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
God Conversations with Tanya Harris.
I think there's another. Teresa and someone asked her.
When does God speak to you and. She said whenever he wants.
How could I know if God was speaking to me?
And how could I know that that was actually just me thinking
about I just had some bad pizza?I just thought it was normal to
dream and have experiences and she said to me.
I actually have a relationship with.
(00:22):
Jesus and he talks. To me and it just blew my mind.
And then hearing the Lord speak again very clearly and just
saying this, this is where I've called you to love himself.
Jesus said we'd recognise his voice.
It was never meant to be a one way conversation.
Some people talk about hearing the audible voice of God, but
(00:43):
what does that sound like and should we expect to hear it?
Personally, I've never heard theout loud voice of God.
I wish I had. But on the show today we have
someone who has experienced the voice of God out loud five
times. We're going to talk today about
what God's audible voice sounds like, why God sometimes speaks
(01:07):
this way, and what our expectations for hearing the
Spirit should be. Hi and welcome to the God
Conversations podcast. My name is Tanya Harris and I'm
a pastor, practical theologian, author, and the founding
director of God Conversations and Ministry that equips you to
recognise and respond to God's voice.
(01:28):
Well, welcome to all our listeners to the show,
especially any new listeners that whether you've met me at a
church or reading a book or through the Internet, it's
really great to have you. Hey, just some really exciting
developments and updates in the life of God conversations.
Right now I'm preparing to go onthree big international trips.
(01:51):
So I think England, Germany, Switzerland, the Czech Republic
is in there. So I'm very excited to be
meeting some of you soon. But apart from that, we've
recently launched a brand new book, God Dreams, How to Hear
God's Voice in Dreams and Visions, and along with that, a
small group online course. I'm super excited about these
(02:14):
two resources because to be honest, this is a really
neglected area in the global church today.
There's just not a lot of good understanding and teaching about
it, even though it's God's most common way of speaking in the
Scriptures. So the resources, the book and
the course are for people who may have had God dreams, but
(02:34):
also for people who are longing to hear God's voice more
clearly. Perhaps you've never had a dream
from God at all, but you've justrealised, hey, this is how God
seems to speak a lot in the Scriptures and God still speaks
that way through the Spirit today.
So we talk about lots of different topics, what the Bible
says, what psychology and science says, what we can learn
(02:55):
from them, and then also how to interpret the symbolism and the
picture imagery that we and see in our dreams.
It's not as difficult as you think.
There's a really interesting verse in the Bible.
It says that why do you complainthat God doesn't speak?
God does speak in a vision or a dream of the night and we don't
(03:15):
notice it. So these two resources are to
help you to notice it, to reallyrecognise what God's saying.
So if you're super keen to checkthat out, come come visit us at
godconversations.com. And we're very excited that you
can access those resources there.
So onto our topic today. This is a fabulous, a
(03:37):
fascinating topic. Our guest has heard the audible
voice of God, not just once, buthe says about 5, maybe 6 times
and he's here to share from his story.
He's a friend of mine. I visited his church recently in
Brisbane in Australia where he'sbeen pastoring there, but he's
(03:59):
also done a lot of other things as well.
He heads up a national church planting organisation and has
authored several books on spiritual formation and renewal,
which is how we crossed paths inthe 1st place.
So a big warm welcome to our guest today on God
Conversations, Pastor Patrick Hegarty.
Welcome Patrick. We are talking all about the
(04:20):
audible voice of God. You've had a few experiences
with that, but first of all, whydon't you introduce yourself to
our listeners? A little bit of back story.
How did you get to be doing whatyou are doing today?
Well, a bit of a long story. You have a history as long as
mine. There's bound to be some terms
along the way. But I, I was raised in a non
Christian background, pretty much an atheistic background in
(04:43):
Sydney. But I became a Christian in at
the age of 19. And then I was studying
engineering. That led to being a, a business
owner and a, and a, someone who could do business start UPS.
So I got involved in that kind of thing.
So I was all all the way into the, you know, the corporate
world there until I hit about 40.
And then at age 40, I just realised it was time to stop
(05:06):
running from ministry full time ministry because I'd always had
a heart for the church world. Once I became a Christian, I, I
saw it as, as so valuable. So my wife and I made a, a
decision. I only took a few minutes to
sell the business and get in theministry.
Few minutes. To sell the business.
Oh my gosh, yeah. A few minutes and and 20 years
(05:26):
of of avoiding it so. So you felt like you had a cold
ministry way back in the early days.
Yeah, from the time even before I met Trish when I was about 23,
had a strong sense I was going to go into ministry.
But then life took me a completely other direction in
order to prepare me for ministry.
(05:46):
So it took me longer than most. It took about 17 years to get
get the preparation done. And that's why that's where my
ministry ended up coming from inthe end, because I, I spent a
lot of time trying to find out the reasons how God wants to
grow people, how he grows people, What was the process
he'd taken me through? And because I, I believe we
could do a bit of a better job of it if I knew what he was
(06:08):
trying to do and how he does that.
So I've just always been one of those, I guess it's the
engineering mindset. You want to find the biggest
problems in town and find the answer to them.
So that led me down that path for about 11 or 12 years.
And then I went into full time senior leadership leading my own
church and then planted the current church in Kenmore a few
years ago. It's super interesting to me,
(06:30):
Patrick, meeting you and we had a great chance to have some good
God conversations in Brisbane last month because that has been
a very similar journey for me. The path of spiritual formation
has definitely my understanding of it has come out of my walk
with the Holy Spirit. And I was fascinated to, you
know, flick through some of yourbooks because you talk about how
(06:52):
God leads us through a wilderness process and comes out
the other end in order to transform us.
And I use that same well, it's straight out of the Bible.
But having walked that in my ownlife and then talking with you
about it, you've experienced similar things.
And what we find is that the pattern of the Spirit is common
to all, even though the pathway can express itself differently.
(07:15):
So I, I understand a lot of where you're coming from.
Excuse me. The truth is that the Spirit
speaks to us to form us into disciples of Jesus.
The role of the Spirit is central to that process.
It's not separate. So all of our God conversations
come to that. But in particular, you've had a
(07:38):
special experiences of hearing what people typically call the
audible voice of God. And I am interested in this
question because I have to say that as a 21 year old seeking to
experience the voice of God, I fully expected God to speak to
me with this out loud booming voice.
(07:59):
And it never happened for me that way.
It was much quieter. But tell us about a time, a God
conversation where you heard theaudible or the out loud voice of
God. Yeah.
I guess it's, it's interesting to hear you frame it because I
guess it's a bit like anything that somebody hasn't
particularly experienced until you've experienced it, then it's
(08:21):
very normal. And I, I can't say that any
experience I've had of God feelsbeyond normal once you've had it
because it's still you there andit's still the same God you've
always known who's, who's with you.
So, and it's not like you enter into hyperspace or the twilight
zone or something like that. You, you, you are there with all
your senses, just as you were seconds before and, and the, and
(08:43):
the minutes after. So it's a very normal
experience. And, but to expect it is a, is
a, an interesting conversation. Maybe we'll get into later.
Should I expect that? But I'm like everybody else in
the I'm, there's nothing unusualabout me, but, and to hear the
voice of God and the way we'll describe it is, is an
exceptional experience. And like everyone else, I
(09:05):
perceive what God is doing and saying in a spectrum of ways
from sensing to reading scripture and all those normal
ways, varying degrees of claritywith 1000 different variables
that might affect that. But so typically for me, it's a
prompting of scripture within and particularly with an ongoing
season of relational closeness. So it's not like I suddenly pick
(09:26):
up the Bible and I haven't done it for 50 years and, and, and
I'm hearing God speaking to me. It's not like that at all.
It's more there's an ongoing developing season of relational
closeness there. And he speaks from within the
relationship that that's, that'smy normal day to day.
But my favourite, I love that, Ilove that, I love that
contextualising 'cause that is actually very, very true.
(09:49):
It's just in the course of our everyday life, very normal and
as normal as a human relationship.
In some ways life changing. But you're right.
The the earth doesn't shift, does it?
You know, some of my God conversations have happened
while I'm brushing my teeth or, you know, or driving in my car.
And it's just God's with us always.
(10:13):
It's just those moments. I always find it fascinating
when God chooses to interrupt, but also just in the course of
going to church and being in worship and, and reading the
Scriptures. That's so true.
I've never found it to be a convenient time.
I must say that there's never a moment when I'd go now would be
great. And he does that.
(10:34):
Come interrupt my life, come turn it upside down.
Help me to see things differently.
I'm actually quite happy seeing things the way they are.
Thanks God I. Find that his voice is normally
very disruptive. Ask.
Ask for that voice at your peril, because your life
normally will pivot from that moment.
Oh I know, I understand that completely.
(10:56):
I look back before I heard God'svoice and after I heard God's
voice and I go, oh, so maybe share one of a favourite God
conversation, a time you heard God's voice out loud.
Now if you notice, I'm using thephrase out loud 'cause I don't
like the word audible. Because audible by definition
just means able to be heard, andGod's voice is always able to be
(11:18):
heard or able to be understood. So I I'm not a fan of audible,
but I do think there is a difference when when I've
listened to people's experiencesof hearing this very loud voice,
almost like God is shouting. Tell us about one of those.
Yeah, I agree. It seems to be audible when
you're there and in the moment. But but as you reflect and you
(11:41):
realise no one else heard that, would you wonder whether it
would be helpful if they did? But perhaps not.
But but to you it it seems audible.
But because everything else for me goes quiet so all you can
hear is what God is saying and that that's my own experience
anyway. But my favourite story would
probably be the shortest. And I find the the the longer
(12:04):
God talks to you, the more disruptive it becomes.
So short can be good, you know. But I've been labouring for
about 9 months on a, a manuscript for my next book
slash course that I was writing.And then not that back then
there were about 100,000 words and people had a lot longer
attention span back then. But I'd spent about nine months,
I've gotten only about 13,000 words written.
(12:26):
It was a very important topic. It was on leadership and, and
the Spirit and discipleship and friend I, I booked a start date
for the course of the friend said, look, you need to go away
to my beach penthouse. I said, OK, I'll suffer for
Jesus there and maybe try and get some momentum and get this
thing started. So I had very little time to get
all this written and I'd just done a spiritual retreat the
(12:48):
weekend before running a retreat.
So I was very, very tired and I went up there and lost most of
the first day. I didn't really get anything
done on the second day. I just remember it so clearly,
like I was yesterday. I woke up and I wasn't an early
riser back then, more so today now, but I was woken up very,
very early before the sun came up and the, the, the miracle was
I, I woke up instantly wide eyed, full of joy, which was
(13:12):
very unlike me back then. And I just, I woke up with a
yes, incredible expectancy. And but instantly I, I heard
what what I would as as we've framed to find the audible voice
of God. And in in the most unusual way,
I heard very clearly, Hey, Pat, as in wake up.
Are you are you listening? It's like, Hey, Pat was what I
(13:34):
heard. And I just became aware that I
had the the widest, most silly looking grin on my face.
I just I thought, he's here. He's right here in this room.
And the next words were I am thevine straight from John 15.
I'm the vine. You are the branches.
But just that part. I am the vine.
And you'd think at that moment, you know, you would, you would
(13:56):
come out with some profound biblical response that you'd be
happy to preach for the next 20 years.
You know, all I could think of to say was I know.
And that's all I said was I knowwith this silly grin on my face.
I know. And and that was it.
That was the that was the discourse.
But what then happened was I gotup and got to my laptop and I
(14:17):
started working away. And within that under three week
period now I ended up writing those 87,000 words that were
left easily was time to spare and time to watch the sunset and
eat some cheese. It was it was a miraculous
provision of the fact that I wasliving from the vine.
I was writing content from and inspired by the heart of God.
(14:40):
And it was just so, so easy. And what I'd forgotten was that
that verse, John from John 15, I'm the Vine was the actual
benchmark verse of the entire course.
And I'd long forgotten that until I got to the end of the
process and realised, oh, that this is where I started.
He's just demonstrated to me howto live from the principle I was
(15:00):
trying to teach. So it was just a, a really good,
it just reflected for me the heart of God, the, the, the
relational. It was a powerful glimpse of his
joy, his provision, his if it matters to me, it matters to
him. And it just, there were so many
values tied up in just a few words.
It was incredible. What I love about that story is
(15:21):
the economy of God's words. I have found that God doesn't
it's, he chooses his words very carefully and doesn't waffle,
you know, very straight to the point and a little bit, not a
little bit like a Riddle. Like what do you mean?
Why are you saying that to me? What, why now?
I've heard that before. What does this mean for me right
(15:41):
now as I'm writing this book andI'm struggling to get the words
out and he leaves. It's it's very Jesus like I feel
like Jesus often didn't add longwordy explanations, just said
things and mic drop, you know, and then everyone's left to go
what, how, what and. The more you say, the more that
(16:01):
can be confused or misunderstood, so I guess maybe
there's something in that. True that.
And hey, Pat, so friendly. Of all the things, it's like,
son, it was, it was a call, son.Good morning you know anointed
Patrick one or you know, you just Hey, Pat.
Oh my gosh, I love it so why whydo you think God spoke out loud
(16:27):
to you in that moment? I.
Guess he was making a point. You, you wonder why would God
need to communicate audibly? And that's a good thing for us
to flesh out, I guess, but it's to be heard, to be to be known
and understood. He's he's making a clear point
and quite possibly in a in a waythat would be ambiguous in any
other way would leave room for questions and in another
(16:49):
process. But as I boiled it down, that's
about as far as I can get. He speaks loudly in that sense
because there's a reason why he speaks there in that way that he
couldn't speak in another way. And it's not to say that the
audible voice of God is the mostpreferred voice of God in my
view, because I I think it's actually not.
(17:09):
But I can tease that out a bit later on.
We are talking with Pastor Patrick Hegarty all the way from
Brisbane in Queensland, Australia, all about the audible
voice of God. We will be back in just a
moment. There's nothing quite like
hearing God's voice. With one word.
People's lives are forever changed.
(17:30):
But at the same time, hearing God's voice is also risky.
History tells the terrible talesof abuse associated with the
claim God told me. So how do we hear from God?
How do we know it's God? And what does it all look like
in the life of the church? In my book, The Church Who Hears
God's Voice, I bring history, theology, and real life
experience from my PhD research together to answer these
(17:53):
questions. The book provides both the
comprehensive theology and pastoral strategy for building a
community where everyone can hear the Spirit in ways that are
theologically orthodox and pastorally safe.
Every time the Spirit speaks, disciples are formed, miracles
happen, and God's mission is fulfilled.
May we be the Church Who Hears God's Voice available in hard
(18:17):
copy or digital at your favourite bookstore and
godconversations.com. Welcome back to God
conversations. So we're talking about Patrick's
experiences of hearing the out loud voice of God.
And it's just a beautiful, stunning example of how God
communicates. But you know, it's interesting,
Patrick, we were talking about why does God speak out loud?
(18:40):
And I, I mentioned earlier that I have not heard this out loud
voice of God. Most of the time I've heard the
Holy Spirit speaking words. It's been like a, a thought in
my head and, and words have formed in my mind and I knew
what it meant. It's like this transfer of
information rather than this, you know, startling striking
(19:03):
moment. It it's, it's still been
striking, but it hasn't had any physical ramifications.
It it, you know, you talked about being full of joy and it
woke you up when you're not an early riser.
It's interesting. In my PhD, people said they
heard the voice of God out loud.And every situation, nearly
(19:23):
every situation, as I recall, was in a crisis moment was in
this really defining moment, like they were just about to
step onto the road to cross the road.
And then this wayward truck drives by and God's like, stop.
Oh, there was another situation.A woman was in a domestic
violence situation and she heardGod call her name really loud as
(19:49):
she was sleeping in the middle of the night.
And it woke her up. And she said it literally woke
her up emotionally because it gave her the impetus to get out
of that situation. And I do wonder if it's a bit
like when God speaks out loud inthe crisis moment, like a parent
seeing a child. Their hand is over the flame of
(20:09):
the stove and the parents yelling no.
Perhaps for you in this moment, writing this book, it was a
defining moment for you to be able to to flesh out the meaning
of what it meant to abide in thevine and then let that reality
permeate your writing. Because God wanted to use that
(20:30):
writing to to teach others perhaps.
I don't know, I I mean, people have urgent situations all the
time and they don't always hear God speak.
And and I've had non urgent situations where it's handy to
hear him speak, but I could havelived on without it.
And he's given clarity anyway, so we can struggle to to wrap up
(20:50):
the mystery around this. Yeah, there, there's a lot of
variables in there. You know, the beauty of it all
is whether whether we can categorise it neatly with a nice
little bow. The truth is, it's more about
the message than how it comes, isn't it?
It seems. To be the consistent thing seems
to be that he's making a point about something that otherwise
(21:12):
would be very difficult to make and and can't be denied.
If I perceive something in that sense on that scale of of
perception, it's, it's easier for me to explain that away and
say maybe I didn't hear. Whereas if you have this sort of
experience, you can't wipe that it it.
You would have to deny who you are and who God is to wipe it
(21:34):
away. I like what you said earlier
that you said you'd had varying degrees of clarity in your God
conversations throughout your life.
And I think that that adds a bitof perspective because, because
when we hear stories like yours,which are so startling and so
spectacular, we kind of go, oh, that's never happened to me.
And we kind of compare ourselves.
But it is, it is a very, it is acomplex, it's, it's not all easy
(22:00):
categorised, isn't it? This person always has out loud
experiences. Maybe tell us another one that
you've had that has been significant for you probably the
most? Significant was an experience in
Kenya that I had on my first trip to Kenya, and it was the
most impacting because I'd just come out of a situation up in
the north of the country where Ireally didn't have, I had no
(22:23):
right to survive. I, I, it should have sort of
been my last day, but I'd, I'd come out of there and, and I'd
come back down and I was ready to head out of the country and I
was, I was emotionally shaken. I, I didn't have a lot of
empathy left and I was wanting to get on a plane and just
literally get out of there and not come back.
But they'd asked me to stop in at the one of the slums that
(22:44):
we'd been doing some work in andjust do one more talk on the way
to, to the airport. I said, OK, well, we'll do that.
But I was pretty shaken up. I was I was not feeling my
strongest not a good day. It was 40°.
You're in a a little tin shed with just a a slot cut out of
the window. But in typical African Swahili
(23:05):
fashion, they wanted to have a worship time 1st And so there's
no instruments fall part harmonyand beautiful Swahili.
And and and as I was listening to that, it sounded like heaven.
I could have sworn I was listening to heaven.
But as I looked at the, at the, the cut out on the wall, I was
looking down into the valley andin the, all the sewerage and all
the rubbish was running down. It was the, the biggest slum in
(23:27):
Africa, a million people in one square mile.
And all the, all the little toddlers were walking in that
literal string of sewerage looking for food.
And so I had my ears listening to heaven.
My eyes I could have categorisedas saying I was looking into
hell. And it's enough to sort of
unhinge your mind to question your beliefs and your
(23:48):
priorities. And I was just about to proceed
down a different line of thoughtwhen suddenly it was that out
loud voice moment where everything else went quiet.
And the word was, I remember these people, I want you to
remember them. It was very clear, it was very
precise. There was no questioning who he
was talking about, what my responsibility was.
(24:10):
I remember these people, I want you to remember them.
And the moment that voice ended,they switched from Swahili to
English. And what they've been singing
without me knowing was the song Remember Me God.
And they've just been saying Remember Me God as a prayer over
and over and over. And even in the state that I was
in, he was able to get through and say, you're the answer to
(24:33):
that prayer. I want to use you for this.
And, and so I think anything less than a voice at that
clarity I would have, I would have explained it away.
I would have done something. But when I got back home, a
friend and I, he'd had a, an experience not with, of the
clarity I just had, but God had spoken to him in his inside
voice because he didn't need to use his outside voice no less
(24:55):
clear and impacting. And we started a charity from
there. And that charity still runs and
puts about $1,000,000 a year into that area and, and a few
others. So it had quite an impact.
It was quite disruptive if it went against anything I would
think or wanted to think. But with that word came clarity,
conviction, faith, all that you need because his word brings
(25:17):
faith with him. Romans 10/17.
Faith comes from hearing, hearing by God's word.
And and I think there are more parallels to that than our
strictly Theo theological approach would give us.
I know when I've heard the voiceof God like that, faith comes
with it. And so, yeah, that was probably
the most impacting. That is profound.
(25:39):
There's so many things. I, I, I'm, I'm thinking about
you. You're hearing heaven and you're
saying hell and Jesus's words that we're called to help bring
the Kingdom from heaven to earth, and that's God's heart.
But then if God wants to remember these people, he
(25:59):
chooses us to actually enact what that looks like.
That is profound. And I, I, I love that it, it
struck you so fully that you then acted on it.
And I think God always speaks toact.
That's why faith comes. And that's perhaps why clarity
comes too. We've been talking about why so,
(26:21):
so clear? Why so loud?
Well, there's a reason behind itbecause God wants to reach, you
know, remember these people. And so it needed to be a
defining moment in the midst of tiredness and weariness,
perhaps. I don't know.
Is that how you see it looking back?
Yes, all that. And I mean the other thing that
(26:44):
seems to come with God's voice, regardless of its clarity or or
audibleness. In that sense, it always comes
with what you need to fulfil. He, he doesn't call us to
something that we can do on our own.
It's a bit like conviction. He doesn't convict us of
something and then leave us to figure it out in our own
strength. His Word brings the faith, and
(27:04):
the faith is reliance on Him whofulfil the Word.
So everything about what Jesus talked about in so much of his
teaching makes so much more sense when you see him speak and
provide at the same time. I, I, I love that about the Holy
Spirit because we've got the teachings of Jesus and the, and
the life and the, and the actions of Jesus giving that
foundational understanding aboutwhat the Kingdom is like.
(27:27):
And then the Holy Spirit's job is to then remind us of Jesus
and then to speak about things to come.
In other words, as we go into other contexts and different
times and through the ages with different people, Holy Spirit
goes with us and reminds us of Jesus, but then helps us to take
that truth that that good news, and then enact it in the place
(27:51):
where we're called to be, where we go.
So for you in that, in that little metal house in the slum
in Kenya, what does that look like for you?
And the Holy Spirit goes this here now and then we walk with
God and God shows us how to enact that.
It's it's just brilliant, Patrick.
I love it. Contrast that then with a
(28:13):
quieter experience of hearing the voice of God.
How does it differ? How?
What difference did it make for you?
Well, the thing I like about thequieter voice, if we put it that
way, is for me it tends to emphasise what God would
(28:33):
emphasise because if I have an outside voice, there's no
seeking of Him required to confirm that.
I mean, when we speak out loud to someone, if we speak with our
outside voice, there's no necessity for relationship in
that sense. So, so, and the Spirit with us,
(28:54):
Jesus was always after the gods seekers.
He's seek me and you'll find me.I I just tend to think he would
prefer to speak in an inside voice because that means I'm
leaning in, I'm listening and it's relational.
We speak to slaves with an outside voice.
Do this, don't do that. And that's just not the dynamic
that God wants to communicate with these people.
It's to children to sons and daughters.
(29:16):
And so I know with my wife, her her clearest communication with
me is non verbal. It's, it's a movement of the eye
or a small whisper or. And I get the point because.
Of the strength of the. Relationship, you know, and so
this dynamic we have with God isrelational first.
And so his primary dynamic, I believe, would be that it comes
(29:37):
from a result of leaning in the inside voice, the quiet
prompting which compel us to lean in more.
It's almost like a game of spiritual hide and seek.
And he doesn't hide things from us, He's hiding things for us
because it's in the seeking thatwe build the relationship.
And it's in the seeking that we build the spiritual muscles that
we need to, to steward what he has to say.
(29:59):
It's in the seeking that we build faith.
And, and they're all so the outside voice, it has to be an
exception because there's no equivocation about it.
And it, and it also the inside voice will also require the
church to be the church because no one person can claim I'm the
one hearing the, the voice of God.
And, and I don't need all the rest of you.
We're a prophetic community in that sense.
(30:21):
And so we need to test these words.
But if it's the audible voice, there's, there's not a lot of
testing required. It's either true or it's not
true and there's not a lot of negotiation needs to happen
there. So I just tend to think the
inside voice, the the gentle promptings from time spent with
him, that's by far the majority and possibly, if we could put it
(30:41):
that way, the preferred way thathe would communicate.
Oh. I think that's brilliant,
Patrick. I I was just reflecting as you
were speaking, you know, in in ahousehold, it's quite rude to
try and yell to someone in the other end of the room rather
than move yourself and go closely and have a a close
(31:02):
conversation. It's true.
It's a mark of intimacy, isn't it?
And it's a mark of relationship that we come close And I love
that posture of seeking that then postures us to seek the
person as well, perhaps not the experience.
And I want I wanted you just as a way of wrapping us up,
Patrick, to perhaps give some wisdom to someone who is seeking
(31:27):
to hear the out loud voice of God.
What would you say to them if perhaps they've got that
expectation? You know, I, I'm, I'm only going
to listen to God if he's fixed me really out loud.
What would you? What would you suggest?
Yeah, it's let the Bible beware.I've never really seen a very
(31:48):
frequent good outcome from any attitude that expects of God
something he doesn't owe us anything.
And to come to him with a posture saying, you know,
shaking out proverbial fist and saying, I'll believe you if you
say it out loud. It's, it's devaluing that that
whole dynamic, that relationship.
(32:09):
He's got nothing to prove. He's proven himself so many ways
through creation, through our lives and all those things.
And he just doesn't engage, generally speaking, on the terms
that a, a shaking fist or a demand or expectation would
place upon it, that that's just not the dynamic that you
approach with God. And it's a, it's a bit like
saying things in a way that the contrary to what God would
(32:32):
believe say if you were, if you were saying I'm, I'm a terrible
person, I'm insecure, I'm, I'm nothing, I'm a worm God, what do
you say? And he'd say, well, I have
nothing to say about that because I fundamentally don't
agree with him. So he doesn't engage in a
conversation in which he doesn'tagree.
So expectation is a demand. One step different from that is
what I would call expectancy. And expectancy is so much
(32:55):
different to expectation. Expectancy removes the
prescription. It's it's, it believes anything
is possible. God can do.
God can say, God can communicatein any way he wishes.
I don't put a prescription on that, but I'm expecting that he,
anything's possible. Anything can happen and probably
will. And if it doesn't happen, I'm
not going to lose my faith aboutit.
(33:16):
But I have an inherent hopefulness that God's going to
speak and give me everything that I need.
And so the audible voice is not ordinary.
It's, it's an exception. And so to expect an exception
is, is just, I don't think it's that wise.
And again, it, it trumps that higher dynamic that he's put in
place with the New Testament church, where we are a prophetic
(33:37):
community. And he speaks in many ways
personally, but also through theother believers around it.
So I think he'll defer to that that's.
Yeah, I, I, I think that's a good way of describing it,
Patrick. I, I wondered too, if the
orientation of our hearts shouldbe to seek a person and not an
experience and just let God define what that looks like.
(34:00):
I think that's probably puts us in a, in a better place.
So I guess I'll stop asking God to hear his voice out loud.
Well, we need to remember that the the the Pharisees had the
same demands. Do this, say that.
And they said I could raise somebody from the dead to you
people and you wouldn't believe it.
So he knows well. Thank you so much Patrick for
(34:20):
sharing your incredible story and for the pathway that you
have journeyed that helps so many others as well.
Perhaps people are interested inlearning more about the process
of spiritual formation that you wrote about Inspired by the
Vine. Where would they go to to find
out more? Patrick?
We have a number of websites. Probably the simplest way would
(34:41):
be to go to 1calledthegrowthtrack.com.authegrowthtrack.com
dot AU and that on that website there there'll be links to all
sorts of resources and downloadsand things people can tap into.
Beautiful. Well, thanks so much, Patrick,
for your time. It's been wonderful to have you
on the show. Always a pleasure to talk to
you, Tanya. Thanks for.
(35:03):
Listening to God Conversations with Tanya Harris Don't miss the
next episode by subscribing to the show and your favourite
podcast app. And remember, the Holy Spirit
was given so we could all hear God's voice.
It was never meant to be a one way conversation.
God Conversations with Tanya Harris.
I think there's another. Teresa and someone asked her.
When does God speak to you and. She said whenever he wants.
How could I know if God was speaking to me?
And how could I know that that was actually just me thinking
about I just had some bad pizza?I just thought it was normal to
dream and have experiences and she said to me.
I actually have a relationship with.
(00:22):
Jesus and he talks. To me and it just blew my mind.
And then hearing the Lord speak again very clearly and just
saying this, this is where I've called you to love himself.
Jesus said we'd recognise his voice.
It was never meant to be a one way conversation.
Some people talk about hearing the audible voice of God, but
(00:43):
what does that sound like and should we expect to hear it?
Personally, I've never heard theout loud voice of God.
I wish I had. But on the show today we have
someone who has experienced the voice of God out loud five
times. We're going to talk today about
what God's audible voice sounds like, why God sometimes speaks
(01:07):
this way, and what our expectations for hearing the
Spirit should be. Hi and welcome to the God
Conversations podcast. My name is Tanya Harris and I'm
a pastor, practical theologian, author, and the founding
director of God Conversations and Ministry that equips you to
recognise and respond to God's voice.
(01:28):
Well, welcome to all our listeners to the show,
especially any new listeners that whether you've met me at a
church or reading a book or through the Internet, it's
really great to have you. Hey, just some really exciting
developments and updates in the life of God conversations.
Right now I'm preparing to go onthree big international trips.
(01:51):
So I think England, Germany, Switzerland, the Czech Republic
is in there. So I'm very excited to be
meeting some of you soon. But apart from that, we've
recently launched a brand new book, God Dreams, How to Hear
God's Voice in Dreams and Visions, and along with that, a
small group online course. I'm super excited about these
(02:14):
two resources because to be honest, this is a really
neglected area in the global church today.
There's just not a lot of good understanding and teaching about
it, even though it's God's most common way of speaking in the
Scriptures. So the resources, the book and
the course are for people who may have had God dreams, but
(02:34):
also for people who are longing to hear God's voice more
clearly. Perhaps you've never had a dream
from God at all, but you've justrealised, hey, this is how God
seems to speak a lot in the Scriptures and God still speaks
that way through the Spirit today.
So we talk about lots of different topics, what the Bible
says, what psychology and science says, what we can learn
(02:55):
from them, and then also how to interpret the symbolism and the
picture imagery that we and see in our dreams.
It's not as difficult as you think.
There's a really interesting verse in the Bible.
It says that why do you complainthat God doesn't speak?
God does speak in a vision or a dream of the night and we don't
(03:15):
notice it. So these two resources are to
help you to notice it, to reallyrecognise what God's saying.
So if you're super keen to checkthat out, come come visit us at
godconversations.com. And we're very excited that you
can access those resources there.
So onto our topic today. This is a fabulous, a
(03:37):
fascinating topic. Our guest has heard the audible
voice of God, not just once, buthe says about 5, maybe 6 times
and he's here to share from his story.
He's a friend of mine. I visited his church recently in
Brisbane in Australia where he'sbeen pastoring there, but he's
(03:59):
also done a lot of other things as well.
He heads up a national church planting organisation and has
authored several books on spiritual formation and renewal,
which is how we crossed paths inthe 1st place.
So a big warm welcome to our guest today on God
Conversations, Pastor Patrick Hegarty.
Welcome Patrick. We are talking all about the
(04:20):
audible voice of God. You've had a few experiences
with that, but first of all, whydon't you introduce yourself to
our listeners? A little bit of back story.
How did you get to be doing whatyou are doing today?
Well, a bit of a long story. You have a history as long as
mine. There's bound to be some terms
along the way. But I, I was raised in a non
Christian background, pretty much an atheistic background in
(04:43):
Sydney. But I became a Christian in at
the age of 19. And then I was studying
engineering. That led to being a, a business
owner and a, and a, someone who could do business start UPS.
So I got involved in that kind of thing.
So I was all all the way into the, you know, the corporate
world there until I hit about 40.
And then at age 40, I just realised it was time to stop
(05:06):
running from ministry full time ministry because I'd always had
a heart for the church world. Once I became a Christian, I, I
saw it as, as so valuable. So my wife and I made a, a
decision. I only took a few minutes to
sell the business and get in theministry.
Few minutes. To sell the business.
Oh my gosh, yeah. A few minutes and and 20 years
(05:26):
of of avoiding it so. So you felt like you had a cold
ministry way back in the early days.
Yeah, from the time even before I met Trish when I was about 23,
had a strong sense I was going to go into ministry.
But then life took me a completely other direction in
order to prepare me for ministry.
(05:46):
So it took me longer than most. It took about 17 years to get
get the preparation done. And that's why that's where my
ministry ended up coming from inthe end, because I, I spent a
lot of time trying to find out the reasons how God wants to
grow people, how he grows people, What was the process
he'd taken me through? And because I, I believe we
could do a bit of a better job of it if I knew what he was
(06:08):
trying to do and how he does that.
So I've just always been one of those, I guess it's the
engineering mindset. You want to find the biggest
problems in town and find the answer to them.
So that led me down that path for about 11 or 12 years.
And then I went into full time senior leadership leading my own
church and then planted the current church in Kenmore a few
years ago. It's super interesting to me,
(06:30):
Patrick, meeting you and we had a great chance to have some good
God conversations in Brisbane last month because that has been
a very similar journey for me. The path of spiritual formation
has definitely my understanding of it has come out of my walk
with the Holy Spirit. And I was fascinated to, you
know, flick through some of yourbooks because you talk about how
(06:52):
God leads us through a wilderness process and comes out
the other end in order to transform us.
And I use that same well, it's straight out of the Bible.
But having walked that in my ownlife and then talking with you
about it, you've experienced similar things.
And what we find is that the pattern of the Spirit is common
to all, even though the pathway can express itself differently.
(07:15):
So I, I understand a lot of where you're coming from.
Excuse me. The truth is that the Spirit
speaks to us to form us into disciples of Jesus.
The role of the Spirit is central to that process.
It's not separate. So all of our God conversations
come to that. But in particular, you've had a
(07:38):
special experiences of hearing what people typically call the
audible voice of God. And I am interested in this
question because I have to say that as a 21 year old seeking to
experience the voice of God, I fully expected God to speak to
me with this out loud booming voice.
(07:59):
And it never happened for me that way.
It was much quieter. But tell us about a time, a God
conversation where you heard theaudible or the out loud voice of
God. Yeah.
I guess it's, it's interesting to hear you frame it because I
guess it's a bit like anything that somebody hasn't
particularly experienced until you've experienced it, then it's
(08:21):
very normal. And I, I can't say that any
experience I've had of God feelsbeyond normal once you've had it
because it's still you there andit's still the same God you've
always known who's, who's with you.
So, and it's not like you enter into hyperspace or the twilight
zone or something like that. You, you, you are there with all
your senses, just as you were seconds before and, and the, and
(08:43):
the minutes after. So it's a very normal
experience. And, but to expect it is a, is
a, an interesting conversation. Maybe we'll get into later.
Should I expect that? But I'm like everybody else in
the I'm, there's nothing unusualabout me, but, and to hear the
voice of God and the way we'll describe it is, is an
exceptional experience. And like everyone else, I
(09:05):
perceive what God is doing and saying in a spectrum of ways
from sensing to reading scripture and all those normal
ways, varying degrees of claritywith 1000 different variables
that might affect that. But so typically for me, it's a
prompting of scripture within and particularly with an ongoing
season of relational closeness. So it's not like I suddenly pick
(09:26):
up the Bible and I haven't done it for 50 years and, and, and
I'm hearing God speaking to me. It's not like that at all.
It's more there's an ongoing developing season of relational
closeness there. And he speaks from within the
relationship that that's, that'smy normal day to day.
But my favourite, I love that, Ilove that, I love that
contextualising 'cause that is actually very, very true.
(09:49):
It's just in the course of our everyday life, very normal and
as normal as a human relationship.
In some ways life changing. But you're right.
The the earth doesn't shift, does it?
You know, some of my God conversations have happened
while I'm brushing my teeth or, you know, or driving in my car.
And it's just God's with us always.
(10:13):
It's just those moments. I always find it fascinating
when God chooses to interrupt, but also just in the course of
going to church and being in worship and, and reading the
Scriptures. That's so true.
I've never found it to be a convenient time.
I must say that there's never a moment when I'd go now would be
great. And he does that.
(10:34):
Come interrupt my life, come turn it upside down.
Help me to see things differently.
I'm actually quite happy seeing things the way they are.
Thanks God I. Find that his voice is normally
very disruptive. Ask.
Ask for that voice at your peril, because your life
normally will pivot from that moment.
Oh I know, I understand that completely.
(10:56):
I look back before I heard God'svoice and after I heard God's
voice and I go, oh, so maybe share one of a favourite God
conversation, a time you heard God's voice out loud.
Now if you notice, I'm using thephrase out loud 'cause I don't
like the word audible. Because audible by definition
just means able to be heard, andGod's voice is always able to be
(11:18):
heard or able to be understood. So I I'm not a fan of audible,
but I do think there is a difference when when I've
listened to people's experiencesof hearing this very loud voice,
almost like God is shouting. Tell us about one of those.
Yeah, I agree. It seems to be audible when
you're there and in the moment. But but as you reflect and you
(11:41):
realise no one else heard that, would you wonder whether it
would be helpful if they did? But perhaps not.
But but to you it it seems audible.
But because everything else for me goes quiet so all you can
hear is what God is saying and that that's my own experience
anyway. But my favourite story would
probably be the shortest. And I find the the the longer
(12:04):
God talks to you, the more disruptive it becomes.
So short can be good, you know. But I've been labouring for
about 9 months on a, a manuscript for my next book
slash course that I was writing.And then not that back then
there were about 100,000 words and people had a lot longer
attention span back then. But I'd spent about nine months,
I've gotten only about 13,000 words written.
(12:26):
It was a very important topic. It was on leadership and, and
the Spirit and discipleship and friend I, I booked a start date
for the course of the friend said, look, you need to go away
to my beach penthouse. I said, OK, I'll suffer for
Jesus there and maybe try and get some momentum and get this
thing started. So I had very little time to get
all this written and I'd just done a spiritual retreat the
(12:48):
weekend before running a retreat.
So I was very, very tired and I went up there and lost most of
the first day. I didn't really get anything
done on the second day. I just remember it so clearly,
like I was yesterday. I woke up and I wasn't an early
riser back then, more so today now, but I was woken up very,
very early before the sun came up and the, the, the miracle was
I, I woke up instantly wide eyed, full of joy, which was
(13:12):
very unlike me back then. And I just, I woke up with a
yes, incredible expectancy. And but instantly I, I heard
what what I would as as we've framed to find the audible voice
of God. And in in the most unusual way,
I heard very clearly, Hey, Pat, as in wake up.
Are you are you listening? It's like, Hey, Pat was what I
(13:34):
heard. And I just became aware that I
had the the widest, most silly looking grin on my face.
I just I thought, he's here. He's right here in this room.
And the next words were I am thevine straight from John 15.
I'm the vine. You are the branches.
But just that part. I am the vine.
And you'd think at that moment, you know, you would, you would
(13:56):
come out with some profound biblical response that you'd be
happy to preach for the next 20 years.
You know, all I could think of to say was I know.
And that's all I said was I knowwith this silly grin on my face.
I know. And and that was it.
That was the that was the discourse.
But what then happened was I gotup and got to my laptop and I
(14:17):
started working away. And within that under three week
period now I ended up writing those 87,000 words that were
left easily was time to spare and time to watch the sunset and
eat some cheese. It was it was a miraculous
provision of the fact that I wasliving from the vine.
I was writing content from and inspired by the heart of God.
(14:40):
And it was just so, so easy. And what I'd forgotten was that
that verse, John from John 15, I'm the Vine was the actual
benchmark verse of the entire course.
And I'd long forgotten that until I got to the end of the
process and realised, oh, that this is where I started.
He's just demonstrated to me howto live from the principle I was
(15:00):
trying to teach. So it was just a, a really good,
it just reflected for me the heart of God, the, the, the
relational. It was a powerful glimpse of his
joy, his provision, his if it matters to me, it matters to
him. And it just, there were so many
values tied up in just a few words.
It was incredible. What I love about that story is
(15:21):
the economy of God's words. I have found that God doesn't
it's, he chooses his words very carefully and doesn't waffle,
you know, very straight to the point and a little bit, not a
little bit like a Riddle. Like what do you mean?
Why are you saying that to me? What, why now?
I've heard that before. What does this mean for me right
(15:41):
now as I'm writing this book andI'm struggling to get the words
out and he leaves. It's it's very Jesus like I feel
like Jesus often didn't add longwordy explanations, just said
things and mic drop, you know, and then everyone's left to go
what, how, what and. The more you say, the more that
(16:01):
can be confused or misunderstood, so I guess maybe
there's something in that. True that.
And hey, Pat, so friendly. Of all the things, it's like,
son, it was, it was a call, son.Good morning you know anointed
Patrick one or you know, you just Hey, Pat.
Oh my gosh, I love it so why whydo you think God spoke out loud
(16:27):
to you in that moment? I.
Guess he was making a point. You, you wonder why would God
need to communicate audibly? And that's a good thing for us
to flesh out, I guess, but it's to be heard, to be to be known
and understood. He's he's making a clear point
and quite possibly in a in a waythat would be ambiguous in any
other way would leave room for questions and in another
(16:49):
process. But as I boiled it down, that's
about as far as I can get. He speaks loudly in that sense
because there's a reason why he speaks there in that way that he
couldn't speak in another way. And it's not to say that the
audible voice of God is the mostpreferred voice of God in my
view, because I I think it's actually not.
(17:09):
But I can tease that out a bit later on.
We are talking with Pastor Patrick Hegarty all the way from
Brisbane in Queensland, Australia, all about the audible
voice of God. We will be back in just a
moment. There's nothing quite like
hearing God's voice. With one word.
People's lives are forever changed.
(17:30):
But at the same time, hearing God's voice is also risky.
History tells the terrible talesof abuse associated with the
claim God told me. So how do we hear from God?
How do we know it's God? And what does it all look like
in the life of the church? In my book, The Church Who Hears
God's Voice, I bring history, theology, and real life
experience from my PhD research together to answer these
(17:53):
questions. The book provides both the
comprehensive theology and pastoral strategy for building a
community where everyone can hear the Spirit in ways that are
theologically orthodox and pastorally safe.
Every time the Spirit speaks, disciples are formed, miracles
happen, and God's mission is fulfilled.
May we be the Church Who Hears God's Voice available in hard
(18:17):
copy or digital at your favourite bookstore and
godconversations.com. Welcome back to God
conversations. So we're talking about Patrick's
experiences of hearing the out loud voice of God.
And it's just a beautiful, stunning example of how God
communicates. But you know, it's interesting,
Patrick, we were talking about why does God speak out loud?
(18:40):
And I, I mentioned earlier that I have not heard this out loud
voice of God. Most of the time I've heard the
Holy Spirit speaking words. It's been like a, a thought in
my head and, and words have formed in my mind and I knew
what it meant. It's like this transfer of
information rather than this, you know, startling striking
(19:03):
moment. It it's, it's still been
striking, but it hasn't had any physical ramifications.
It it, you know, you talked about being full of joy and it
woke you up when you're not an early riser.
It's interesting. In my PhD, people said they
heard the voice of God out loud.And every situation, nearly
(19:23):
every situation, as I recall, was in a crisis moment was in
this really defining moment, like they were just about to
step onto the road to cross the road.
And then this wayward truck drives by and God's like, stop.
Oh, there was another situation.A woman was in a domestic
violence situation and she heardGod call her name really loud as
(19:49):
she was sleeping in the middle of the night.
And it woke her up. And she said it literally woke
her up emotionally because it gave her the impetus to get out
of that situation. And I do wonder if it's a bit
like when God speaks out loud inthe crisis moment, like a parent
seeing a child. Their hand is over the flame of
(20:09):
the stove and the parents yelling no.
Perhaps for you in this moment, writing this book, it was a
defining moment for you to be able to to flesh out the meaning
of what it meant to abide in thevine and then let that reality
permeate your writing. Because God wanted to use that
(20:30):
writing to to teach others perhaps.
I don't know, I I mean, people have urgent situations all the
time and they don't always hear God speak.
And and I've had non urgent situations where it's handy to
hear him speak, but I could havelived on without it.
And he's given clarity anyway, so we can struggle to to wrap up
(20:50):
the mystery around this. Yeah, there, there's a lot of
variables in there. You know, the beauty of it all
is whether whether we can categorise it neatly with a nice
little bow. The truth is, it's more about
the message than how it comes, isn't it?
It seems. To be the consistent thing seems
to be that he's making a point about something that otherwise
(21:12):
would be very difficult to make and and can't be denied.
If I perceive something in that sense on that scale of of
perception, it's, it's easier for me to explain that away and
say maybe I didn't hear. Whereas if you have this sort of
experience, you can't wipe that it it.
You would have to deny who you are and who God is to wipe it
(21:34):
away. I like what you said earlier
that you said you'd had varying degrees of clarity in your God
conversations throughout your life.
And I think that that adds a bitof perspective because, because
when we hear stories like yours,which are so startling and so
spectacular, we kind of go, oh, that's never happened to me.
And we kind of compare ourselves.
But it is, it is a very, it is acomplex, it's, it's not all easy
(22:00):
categorised, isn't it? This person always has out loud
experiences. Maybe tell us another one that
you've had that has been significant for you probably the
most? Significant was an experience in
Kenya that I had on my first trip to Kenya, and it was the
most impacting because I'd just come out of a situation up in
the north of the country where Ireally didn't have, I had no
(22:23):
right to survive. I, I, it should have sort of
been my last day, but I'd, I'd come out of there and, and I'd
come back down and I was ready to head out of the country and I
was, I was emotionally shaken. I, I didn't have a lot of
empathy left and I was wanting to get on a plane and just
literally get out of there and not come back.
But they'd asked me to stop in at the one of the slums that
(22:44):
we'd been doing some work in andjust do one more talk on the way
to, to the airport. I said, OK, well, we'll do that.
But I was pretty shaken up. I was I was not feeling my
strongest not a good day. It was 40°.
You're in a a little tin shed with just a a slot cut out of
the window. But in typical African Swahili
(23:05):
fashion, they wanted to have a worship time 1st And so there's
no instruments fall part harmonyand beautiful Swahili.
And and and as I was listening to that, it sounded like heaven.
I could have sworn I was listening to heaven.
But as I looked at the, at the, the cut out on the wall, I was
looking down into the valley andin the, all the sewerage and all
the rubbish was running down. It was the, the biggest slum in
(23:27):
Africa, a million people in one square mile.
And all the, all the little toddlers were walking in that
literal string of sewerage looking for food.
And so I had my ears listening to heaven.
My eyes I could have categorisedas saying I was looking into
hell. And it's enough to sort of
unhinge your mind to question your beliefs and your
(23:48):
priorities. And I was just about to proceed
down a different line of thoughtwhen suddenly it was that out
loud voice moment where everything else went quiet.
And the word was, I remember these people, I want you to
remember them. It was very clear, it was very
precise. There was no questioning who he
was talking about, what my responsibility was.
(24:10):
I remember these people, I want you to remember them.
And the moment that voice ended,they switched from Swahili to
English. And what they've been singing
without me knowing was the song Remember Me God.
And they've just been saying Remember Me God as a prayer over
and over and over. And even in the state that I was
in, he was able to get through and say, you're the answer to
(24:33):
that prayer. I want to use you for this.
And, and so I think anything less than a voice at that
clarity I would have, I would have explained it away.
I would have done something. But when I got back home, a
friend and I, he'd had a, an experience not with, of the
clarity I just had, but God had spoken to him in his inside
voice because he didn't need to use his outside voice no less
(24:55):
clear and impacting. And we started a charity from
there. And that charity still runs and
puts about $1,000,000 a year into that area and, and a few
others. So it had quite an impact.
It was quite disruptive if it went against anything I would
think or wanted to think. But with that word came clarity,
conviction, faith, all that you need because his word brings
(25:17):
faith with him. Romans 10/17.
Faith comes from hearing, hearing by God's word.
And and I think there are more parallels to that than our
strictly Theo theological approach would give us.
I know when I've heard the voiceof God like that, faith comes
with it. And so, yeah, that was probably
the most impacting. That is profound.
(25:39):
There's so many things. I, I, I'm, I'm thinking about
you. You're hearing heaven and you're
saying hell and Jesus's words that we're called to help bring
the Kingdom from heaven to earth, and that's God's heart.
But then if God wants to remember these people, he
(25:59):
chooses us to actually enact what that looks like.
That is profound. And I, I, I love that it, it
struck you so fully that you then acted on it.
And I think God always speaks toact.
That's why faith comes. And that's perhaps why clarity
comes too. We've been talking about why so,
(26:21):
so clear? Why so loud?
Well, there's a reason behind itbecause God wants to reach, you
know, remember these people. And so it needed to be a
defining moment in the midst of tiredness and weariness,
perhaps. I don't know.
Is that how you see it looking back?
Yes, all that. And I mean the other thing that
(26:44):
seems to come with God's voice, regardless of its clarity or or
audibleness. In that sense, it always comes
with what you need to fulfil. He, he doesn't call us to
something that we can do on our own.
It's a bit like conviction. He doesn't convict us of
something and then leave us to figure it out in our own
strength. His Word brings the faith, and
(27:04):
the faith is reliance on Him whofulfil the Word.
So everything about what Jesus talked about in so much of his
teaching makes so much more sense when you see him speak and
provide at the same time. I, I, I love that about the Holy
Spirit because we've got the teachings of Jesus and the, and
the life and the, and the actions of Jesus giving that
foundational understanding aboutwhat the Kingdom is like.
(27:27):
And then the Holy Spirit's job is to then remind us of Jesus
and then to speak about things to come.
In other words, as we go into other contexts and different
times and through the ages with different people, Holy Spirit
goes with us and reminds us of Jesus, but then helps us to take
that truth that that good news, and then enact it in the place
(27:51):
where we're called to be, where we go.
So for you in that, in that little metal house in the slum
in Kenya, what does that look like for you?
And the Holy Spirit goes this here now and then we walk with
God and God shows us how to enact that.
It's it's just brilliant, Patrick.
I love it. Contrast that then with a
(28:13):
quieter experience of hearing the voice of God.
How does it differ? How?
What difference did it make for you?
Well, the thing I like about thequieter voice, if we put it that
way, is for me it tends to emphasise what God would
(28:33):
emphasise because if I have an outside voice, there's no
seeking of Him required to confirm that.
I mean, when we speak out loud to someone, if we speak with our
outside voice, there's no necessity for relationship in
that sense. So, so, and the Spirit with us,
(28:54):
Jesus was always after the gods seekers.
He's seek me and you'll find me.I I just tend to think he would
prefer to speak in an inside voice because that means I'm
leaning in, I'm listening and it's relational.
We speak to slaves with an outside voice.
Do this, don't do that. And that's just not the dynamic
that God wants to communicate with these people.
It's to children to sons and daughters.
(29:16):
And so I know with my wife, her her clearest communication with
me is non verbal. It's, it's a movement of the eye
or a small whisper or. And I get the point because.
Of the strength of the. Relationship, you know, and so
this dynamic we have with God isrelational first.
And so his primary dynamic, I believe, would be that it comes
(29:37):
from a result of leaning in the inside voice, the quiet
prompting which compel us to lean in more.
It's almost like a game of spiritual hide and seek.
And he doesn't hide things from us, He's hiding things for us
because it's in the seeking thatwe build the relationship.
And it's in the seeking that we build the spiritual muscles that
we need to, to steward what he has to say.
(29:59):
It's in the seeking that we build faith.
And, and they're all so the outside voice, it has to be an
exception because there's no equivocation about it.
And it, and it also the inside voice will also require the
church to be the church because no one person can claim I'm the
one hearing the, the voice of God.
And, and I don't need all the rest of you.
We're a prophetic community in that sense.
(30:21):
And so we need to test these words.
But if it's the audible voice, there's, there's not a lot of
testing required. It's either true or it's not
true and there's not a lot of negotiation needs to happen
there. So I just tend to think the
inside voice, the the gentle promptings from time spent with
him, that's by far the majority and possibly, if we could put it
(30:41):
that way, the preferred way thathe would communicate.
Oh. I think that's brilliant,
Patrick. I I was just reflecting as you
were speaking, you know, in in ahousehold, it's quite rude to
try and yell to someone in the other end of the room rather
than move yourself and go closely and have a a close
(31:02):
conversation. It's true.
It's a mark of intimacy, isn't it?
And it's a mark of relationship that we come close And I love
that posture of seeking that then postures us to seek the
person as well, perhaps not the experience.
And I want I wanted you just as a way of wrapping us up,
Patrick, to perhaps give some wisdom to someone who is seeking
(31:27):
to hear the out loud voice of God.
What would you say to them if perhaps they've got that
expectation? You know, I, I'm, I'm only going
to listen to God if he's fixed me really out loud.
What would you? What would you suggest?
Yeah, it's let the Bible beware.I've never really seen a very
(31:48):
frequent good outcome from any attitude that expects of God
something he doesn't owe us anything.
And to come to him with a posture saying, you know,
shaking out proverbial fist and saying, I'll believe you if you
say it out loud. It's, it's devaluing that that
whole dynamic, that relationship.
(32:09):
He's got nothing to prove. He's proven himself so many ways
through creation, through our lives and all those things.
And he just doesn't engage, generally speaking, on the terms
that a, a shaking fist or a demand or expectation would
place upon it, that that's just not the dynamic that you
approach with God. And it's a, it's a bit like
saying things in a way that the contrary to what God would
(32:32):
believe say if you were, if you were saying I'm, I'm a terrible
person, I'm insecure, I'm, I'm nothing, I'm a worm God, what do
you say? And he'd say, well, I have
nothing to say about that because I fundamentally don't
agree with him. So he doesn't engage in a
conversation in which he doesn'tagree.
So expectation is a demand. One step different from that is
what I would call expectancy. And expectancy is so much
(32:55):
different to expectation. Expectancy removes the
prescription. It's it's, it believes anything
is possible. God can do.
God can say, God can communicatein any way he wishes.
I don't put a prescription on that, but I'm expecting that he,
anything's possible. Anything can happen and probably
will. And if it doesn't happen, I'm
not going to lose my faith aboutit.
(33:16):
But I have an inherent hopefulness that God's going to
speak and give me everything that I need.
And so the audible voice is not ordinary.
It's, it's an exception. And so to expect an exception
is, is just, I don't think it's that wise.
And again, it, it trumps that higher dynamic that he's put in
place with the New Testament church, where we are a prophetic
(33:37):
community. And he speaks in many ways
personally, but also through theother believers around it.
So I think he'll defer to that that's.
Yeah, I, I, I think that's a good way of describing it,
Patrick. I, I wondered too, if the
orientation of our hearts shouldbe to seek a person and not an
experience and just let God define what that looks like.
(34:00):
I think that's probably puts us in a, in a better place.
So I guess I'll stop asking God to hear his voice out loud.
Well, we need to remember that the the the Pharisees had the
same demands. Do this, say that.
And they said I could raise somebody from the dead to you
people and you wouldn't believe it.
So he knows well. Thank you so much Patrick for
(34:20):
sharing your incredible story and for the pathway that you
have journeyed that helps so many others as well.
Perhaps people are interested inlearning more about the process
of spiritual formation that you wrote about Inspired by the
Vine. Where would they go to to find
out more? Patrick?
We have a number of websites. Probably the simplest way would
(34:41):
be to go to 1calledthegrowthtrack.com.authegrowthtrack.com
dot AU and that on that website there there'll be links to all
sorts of resources and downloadsand things people can tap into.
Beautiful. Well, thanks so much, Patrick,
for your time. It's been wonderful to have you
on the show. Always a pleasure to talk to
you, Tanya. Thanks for.
(35:03):
Listening to God Conversations with Tanya Harris Don't miss the
next episode by subscribing to the show and your favourite
podcast app. And remember, the Holy Spirit
was given so we could all hear God's voice.
It was never meant to be a one way conversation.
Popular Podcasts
Spooky Podcasts from iHeartRadio
Whether you’re a scaredy-cat or a brave bat, this collection of episodes from iHeartPodcasts will put you in the Halloween spirit. Binge stories, frights, and more that may keep you up at night!
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.