Bobby Chandler - Bad Signal
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Summary
In this sermon, the pastor passionately affirms that yes, God still speaks to us today through the Holy Spirit living inside every believer. Drawing from John 16:13 and Numbers 11, he shows that hearing God’s voice is not reserved for a special group or denied because of past sins—God pours out His Spirit on all who believe. The conclusion is that we often experience a «bad signal» not because God stopped speaking, but because we need to be real, repentant, and ready to receive His intimate guidance.
We’re on message number seven, and we have been asking a very powerful but difficult question for many. We have been asking the question: Does God still communicate with us today? All right, can you still hear God’s voice in your situation or whatever it is that you’re going through?
But let me ask you in the room today to raise your hand or make some noise if God has ever spoken to you. Come on, you can make some noise. Joyful.
Notice that God has spoken to you through a hard time, maybe through a difficult season, perhaps during a time when you felt like you had nothing left to give or you couldn’t pay that bill, and you didn’t know where to go or what to do. Then, all of a sudden, God showed up.
I believe for each and every one of you, God wants to communicate with you. He has something special just for you. Because I’m telling you today, I need you to believe this: You’re a child of God. He has a destiny for you; He has something powerful for you.
Let me encourage you with this today, because if you have felt like you haven’t heard from God for a long time, listen to this: Isaiah chapter 30, verse 21, NIV translation states, «Whether you turn to the right or you turn to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you saying, ‘This is the way; walk in it.’»
I believe that each and every one of us has experienced that sometime in our life. Maybe you were about to do something and, all of a sudden, you heard God say, «Nope, that’s not for you. No, that’s not the relationship you need to be in right now. No, that’s not the best decision for you.»
What is that? That is a loving Father trying to protect you and guide you. But it’s that voice too; you can’t escape it. Because a lot of times, we want to—let’s be honest, right? —“No, God, I want to do my own thing.» And you keep hearing it, hearing it, hearing it: «No, that’s not for you; that’s not for you.» Then finally, you’re like, «Okay, God, I get it. You’re trying to get my attention.»
We serve a miraculous God who wants to communicate with you today.
How the Father Communicates
And I love this, but what’s interesting to me, and what I want to teach you today, is something very powerful. I want to ask the question: How does this happen, then? How does the Father communicate with us? I’m going to show you out of the Bible that the Father communicates with us through the power of the Holy Spirit. Come on, we’re going to dive into it today. I promise you, it’s going to be good. You came on a good Sunday.
But Jesus made this very clear to His disciples. Remember, I’ve told you over and over again: as Jesus was about to leave the disciples, He tells them, «It is better that I go, because I will be at the right hand of the Father; and when I’m at the right hand of the Father, something magnificent is coming to you—something special, something rare, something that’s going to change your life.»
Let’s look together at John chapter 16, verse 13. Now I’m going to read the Amplified version for this. But Jesus said, «But when He, the Spirit of Truth, comes, He will guide you into all truth.» So let’s stop right there. Jesus is telling the disciples, «The Holy Spirit is coming. He’s going to live inside of you and He’s going to speak to you all that is true.» Because the world is going to feed you a bunch of lies. The world is going to tell you you’re not good enough or you need to look just like everybody else or chase these things that will never satisfy you. But the Spirit of Truth tells you what is right and what is wrong.
Then Jesus continues. He says, «For He will not speak on His own initiative, but He will speak whatever He hears.» This is important to understand. He said He hears from the Father the message regarding the Son. Now what does this mean? This means that when the Father, when God is communicating with you, He uses His Spirit to speak. Okay? So the Holy Spirit hears from the Father, speaks to you, and tells you how to walk right. How to walk in obedience to what God is telling you to do.
Here’s what’s powerful about that: when you obey God, your life glorifies Christ. Right? So that’s what Jesus is saying. He’s saying, «Hey, this is how God’s going to do it: He’s going to speak to the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit is going to speak to you from the Father, and then your life is going to glorify Christ, and everybody’s going to come to you and say, ‘Hey, what do you have? ’ Because I know how you used to talk, and you don’t talk like that anymore.» Or, «I used to see you out every weekend.» Right? We have a lot of testimonies in this church; people have said, «I used to play in the bars all the time. I never thought I’d be up here playing for Jesus.» Why? Because the Holy Spirit starts working on your heart. He starts changing you. He starts speaking to you, and now our life can’t help but glorify Christ.
And it’s powerful, but I need you to understand how rare this is, how special this is. Because in the Old Testament, this wasn’t a gift for all believers yet; Jesus had not come yet. A lot of times when you read the Old Testament, you see that the Spirit of God was placed upon a certain prophet. Okay? Now understand this: there was a big burden with that as well. Because imagine you’re the only one that hears from God. All right? And we know how difficult that can be when God is telling us, «Hey, what you’re doing, you don’t need to do that anymore.» So imagine being the only voice out of everybody else. I’m the only one that can hear from God, so everybody’s coming up to you, running up to you, «Hey, what’s the answer to my life problems? What do I need to do? Help me understand.»
And not only that, but we talked about it. Jeremiah—last week we talked about it—his nickname was the Weeping Prophet because everything that God told him to say went against what the king wanted to do. He risked his life. So it was a great burden to hear from God, but it was also a rare gift to have the Spirit of God upon you.
Moses and the Seventy Elders
But I’m going to show you something miraculous today. So if you have your Bibles, turn to Numbers chapter 11. And I want to look at Moses. All right? Now I’m going to show you Moses in a new way today because I love this passage of Scripture, and we’re going to revisit it too at the end of the sermon. But in this passage of Scripture, Moses really becomes human to us. And the reason why is I’m about to show you he gets an attitude with God. Right? Have you ever felt like you had an attitude with God? «Not me! I’m a Christian! I love God! I’m always going to do what’s right!»
In this moment, Moses was fed up with people, all right? He’s done. He’s tired of hearing them complain. He’s tired of hearing them whine. He’s tired of everything that they’re doing. The reason why—if you know the backstory—God freed the Israelites out of slavery from Egypt, and you would think they would be grateful. God is also promising them, «Hey, I have a special land for you.» In other words, «I have a destiny for your life. I have somewhere special for you to go. You gotta travel there. You gotta obey Me. You gotta keep up in good faith, but you’re going to get there.»
And what did they do? Did they praise God every step of the way? Like, right? They whined. And in this particular passage, Moses is fed up with it because now they’re complaining about food: «Oh, we don’t get to eat like we used to when we were in Egypt.» And Moses is probably looking at them like, «Do you understand you were a slave? Like, you would rather go back to Egypt and be a slave so you can eat some of the things that you used to eat? Don’t you understand God is leading us to a land flowing with milk and honey?» But somehow along the way, even though God has already done the miraculous, you lost faith.
It’s crazy how we can see a miracle from God, but man, just give us a few days of opposition—a month of opposition, and all of a sudden we’re like, «You know what? God’s not here, and I just want to go back!» Now that’s not how it works! God is trying to strengthen you. He’s trying to show you something powerful. So Moses was done with it. And he got to a point… How many parents are in the room? Raise your hand. You know those days when you want to surprise your kids? So let’s say you’re going to a fast-food restaurant, and you’re thinking, «Okay, I’m going to come home tonight, and I’m going to bring in some good food, and they’re going to—I’m going to open the door, and they’re going to run to me and say, ‘Daddy, I love you! ’ or ‘Mommy, I love you! You’re the best! You’re awesome! ’» That’s what we think, okay?
Then you walk in the door like, «Look what I got!» expecting to be a hero, and they’re like, «That’s not the drink I wanted! Come on, come on, Dad! I didn’t want pickles! You know I don’t like pickles! How come you got me a burger? I wanted nuggets!» And like any responsible, mature parent, I usually scream back, «Well, you’re never eating again! Fine! See if I buy you food again!» That’s where Moses was. He was done. He’s like, «God, no matter what You do for them, they’re not going to like it! They’re going to complain!»
Let’s look together at Numbers chapter 11, verses 21-23. So Moses responded to the Lord: «God, there’s 600,000 foot soldiers here with me, and yet You say, ‘God, I’ll give them meat for a whole month! ’» So here’s where Moses gets an attitude. He said, «Even if we butchered all the flocks and the herds, that wouldn’t satisfy them! They wouldn’t be okay with that! They would still gripe and whine! They would not be pleased; even if we caught all the fish in the sea, God, would it really be enough to satisfy these people?»
And I admire the strength of God. We serve a merciful God. Think about some of the things that you’ve said to God, all right? He’s very gracious. I just think sometimes He wants to backhand us just a little bit, just a tad. But instead, He holds back, and this is what He says to Moses: «Has my arm lost its power? Now you will see whether or not my word comes true.»
For some of you right now, that spoke to you. You’ve been telling God, «Okay, yeah, my situation is going to change. Things are going to get better, God. Even if this happens, I’m still not going to get to where I want to be, ” or „This relationship is not going to get fixed.“ And God is telling you today, „Have I lost my power? My authority in your life?“ Just because you doubt, does that mean that I can’t perform a miracle?
You keep walking in obedience. Show the world that our God is still in control. And so this is what happens next. This is where the story gets very interesting because, like I said, the Holy Spirit in the Old Testament being upon a bunch of people at the same time—that was a rare thing; that really didn’t happen much. And all of a sudden, Moses gets instructions from God. So Moses takes the 70 elders, and he leads them to the tabernacle, okay? This is the tent and the meeting place of God, and there God does something spectacular to me. Because in a lot of translations, it says it kind of like this: God got the Holy Spirit upon Moses and placed it upon all the elders. And for the first time ever in the Old Testament, all of them started to prophesy together! This is special; this is rare.
Let me show you Numbers chapter 11, verse 25: „And the Lord came down in the cloud and spoke to Moses; and then He gave the 70 elders the same Spirit, the Holy Spirit that was upon Moses. And when the Spirit rested upon them, they started to prophesy.“ Now imagine Moses probably being able to breathe like, „Oh wow, the burden’s off of me for a second! Everybody in the room is hearing from the Lord! Everybody is proclaiming God’s goodness! Can you imagine what this church would look like if everybody just came in here and knew the voice of the Father and started shouting out praises, not being scared of who’s beside you? It’s okay, I’ll ask forgiveness later, but right now I’m excited about what God is doing because I hear His voice, and I hear Him saying, ‘He’s for me! He’s for me! ’ Even though I don’t see it in my life, He’s for me, and that gives me joy!“
But then it says in the last verse, „This never happened again.“ See, it was a rare moment in the Old Testament to see that many believers with the Spirit of God. But here’s what’s fascinating: they had hope. The reason why? Because there were prophecies! As time went on, there were prophecies being spoken that one day there would be a new era of the Holy Spirit and that He would come upon every believer.
So imagine them in the Old Testament saying to each other, „You mean one day I’ll be able to hear from God? One day I’ll be able to talk to the Father and actually hear His voice in my life and know that He’s with me?“ These prophecies were magnificent to them.
Prophecies of the Coming Spirit
Let me show you the first prophecies were about the Son, about Jesus Christ, that the Son of God would come to earth, and He would take the Holy Spirit upon Himself in all fullness and show us how to live through the power of the Holy Spirit. Here’s some of the prophecies. Isaiah chapter 11, verses 1 and 2: „Out of the stump of David’s family will grow a shoot. Yes, a branch bearing fruit from the old root.“ You didn’t know Isaiah could flow, okay? He could rap a little bit! You got to have fun sometimes, anyway.
All right, so the Holy Spirit comes, listen to this: „And the Spirit of the Lord will rest on Him, ” talking about Jesus, „the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding, the Spirit of counsel and of might, the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord will come upon Him in fullness, and the glory of God will be seen like never before upon the Son of God, Jesus Christ.“
Let me show you another one: Isaiah chapter 42, verse 1. God says, „Look at my servant whom I strengthen! He is my chosen one who pleases me, for I have put my Spirit upon Him and He will bring justice to all the nations and to the people.“
This gave them hope! Oh man, God is going to send His Son, His special servant, and He will have the Spirit of God upon Him; everything we’ve ever hoped for—everything we’ve ever dreamed for—He will bring it, and He will save the nations! But then other prophecies spoke that even they would be able to receive the Spirit. Now listen to this! Because in the Jewish culture, especially in those days, it wasn’t really thought of that the Holy Spirit could come upon a servant or even a woman, okay?
Now listen to this: Joel chapter 2, verse 29: „In those days, ” God says, „in the last days, I will pour out my Spirit even on the servants, men and women alike.“ That was big! Imagine feeling like you’re a nobody—like if you’re in a position where you’re serving everybody else, and everybody else has authority over you, and you see these prophets from far away, and all of a sudden somebody speaks, and God says, „Hey, one day, everybody who chooses to believe will hear my voice.“ One day you will know, men and women alike, you will have my Spirit within you, guiding you into all truth. Because only God knows the future; He knows everything that’s going to happen.
Listen to this: Ezekiel chapter 36, verse 27, New Living Translation: „And I will put my Spirit in you.“ I want you to think about that for a second because God was talking to His chosen people, but I need you to understand because we believe in Jesus Christ, because God has saved us by His Son, we have also been grafted into the family of Israel. And because of that, God has adopted us into the family. So not only was God talking to His chosen people, but He’s also talking to you!
Now listen, knowing that He’s speaking to you: „I will put my Spirit in you.“ You’re not alone! You may feel alone at times, but you’re not alone. And the reason why is that you will be able to follow my decrees and carefully obey my regulations. And what God is saying is that you’re going to have strength like no other! When temptation comes your way, guess what? I’ll provide a way out! When the flesh wants to give up, guess what? I’ll be your strength! When you feel all alone, speak to me, for the Spirit of God brings comfort; He is the Comforter.
I was back there, and I was praying, and I started to think, you know, back in the day, I never said „Holy Spirit“ ever in a prayer or even speaking to God. I’d say God the Father, God the Son—I never said the Holy Spirit. And what completely changed my life was me talking to God and saying, „Holy Spirit, will you just speak to me today? Will you lead me today? Will you help me make the right decisions?“ He’s with you! This is God—the Spirit of the Lord living inside of you, guiding you and directing you, and that gives you strength to walk in His ways.
And if you’ve been here the last two weeks, we’ve been talking about some heavy things. We’ve been talking about dreams; we’ve been talking about visions—how God still does this today. And I’ve been speaking out of Joel chapter 2, verse 28: „Your sons and your daughters will prophesy, and your old men will dream dreams; your young men will see visions.“ But how does it happen? What is the first line of the passage? God says, „For this to be possible, for this to take place in your life, guess what I have to do? I will pour out my Spirit upon some people? No! All people! All people! Anyone willing to receive, to believe that the Son of God would die on that cross for your sins—all people! And then because of the Holy Spirit, your sons and your daughters will prophesy, and your old men will dream dreams, and your young men will see visions!“
And when I say that, a lot of us are like, „Wow, that’s pretty cool, ” and we think about it like, „Man, that’s awesome! That’s a great truth!“ But how come I feel like I’m not experiencing that in my own life, or how come I feel like I’m kind of lost sometimes, and I don’t know what God is really saying to me?
The Title: „Bad Signal“
So I took some time to build this up, but now I want to give you the title of the message. The title of the message today is „Bad Signal.“ How many of you remember what this thing is? Some of you are going to get a history lesson today. So back in the day, in case you didn’t know, not all TVs were flat. All right? And they had a special trick. No matter how small they were, they still weighed about 300 pounds. All right? So if you wanted to get your swole on, you’d go find you a big TV and start lifting it up.
But also, before cable got really good, you would have one of these things called an antenna, and you would put it on top of the TV, hoping to get it just right so that you could get the perfect signal. Right? And you remember the frustration with this thing? Now, if you were in the know, you also had the tinfoil—you know what I mean? And you wrapped that on the top, and people came over like, „Yeah! That’s why I want to watch the game today; that’s where the good pitch is going to be.“
And you would get it perfect. But also, I remember being a kid, and I was at my aunt’s house, and she had this guest room, old school TV with an antenna. I remember as a kid being super frustrated because if I did this—guess what? The picture’s gone! So then I do this—get it for a second, picture’s gone! So then I would put it in the middle, and I would do this, and finally, I got a good picture.
Now if you knew anything about that too, you had to walk away like this: „Praise Jesus! Today’s going to be perfect! Everything’s going to be good! I’m going to be able to watch my show in peace! In Jesus’ name!“ Don’t you mess up. Then somebody comes in the room; they mess it all up. „No! Got to do it all over again!“ This thing had to be in the perfect position to have a good signal, and when it had a good signal, you were able to see a full picture! You were able to watch whatever show you wanted to watch or hear whatever you wanted to hear!
And I started to think about this illustration because to me, this is a lot of us when it comes to communicating with God. Some of us feel like we’re in a position with God that we’re not getting a good signal, or we feel lost, or we feel like if we move one step to the left, we’re out of it; one step to the right, we’re out of it. Sometimes we feel good: „I got it today! God, today is the day I’m hearing from You!“ And then this week goes by: „God, I lost it! What happened?“ And we’re kind of back and forth, and we don’t know what to do.
Also, these things were called bunny ears. You remember that too? Got the bunny ears going. And I started to think about this, and I realized that a lot of people who feel like they don’t hear from God or they don’t know how to hear from God—again, they put themselves in one of these three categories.
So maybe you’ll relate to this today. Category A: I’m not anointed enough to hear from God. Maybe the reason I have a bad signal right now to hear from God is because I’m not anointed enough; I’m not holy enough. Maybe I’m not in that special group. Right? Category B is this: I’ve done too much wrong in my life for God to speak to me now. I’ve made too many mistakes, or I’m on a tough path right now, and I don’t know if God’s going to speak to me or if He loves me.
Category number C: I just don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t have a clue what this is. I don’t know how to plug it up. I don’t know how to get the full picture that I want in my life to hear from God.
And so what I want to help you do today: I want to understand, first of all, God speaks through the Holy Spirit, and the Spirit of God lives inside of you.
Point 1: No Special Club Required
And I want to show you out of these three categories how to get a good signal with God again. So point number one is this today—go ahead and write this down. Point number one: Do I need to be part of a special club to hear from God? Now the short answer to that is no. Okay? You don’t have to be part of a special club, but I want to show you out of the Bible today.
So we started out with Numbers chapter 11. Moses was fed up with the people. He’s kind of getting an attitude with God. „All right, God, fine! I believe You, let’s move in faith.“ He brings seventy elders into the tent, the tabernacle. All of a sudden, all of them are prophesying. God is moving with the Spirit upon all people. But something else happened. See, two of the elders decided not to go. They decided not to go. Now if we were to look at any commentaries, a lot of them would say maybe just possibly they didn’t feel worthy enough to be in the presence of God like that, so they stayed behind.
Or maybe they felt like they weren’t part of the group—like they just weren’t good enough to be there. Okay? So they kind of hid themselves away. Now here’s what’s powerful about it: God still found them, and the Spirit of God came upon them just as it did the other elders in the tent, meaning it didn’t even matter the location. It was powerful! This had never been seen before! Are you telling me these people can hear from God and not have to be in the tabernacle? They can hear from God on the outside?
Look at this: Numbers chapter 11, verse 26: „Two men, Eldad and Medad, ” I guess at this point they just lost creativity with names, „had stayed behind in the camp, but they were listed among the elders, but they had not gone out to the tabernacle.“ Now listen, that’s where it gets cold: „Yet the Spirit rested upon them as well, and they were able to prophesy there in the camp.“ This is powerful stuff! So let this be a reminder to you today: when your heart is ready to receive, the location doesn’t matter! That’s how good God is!
When your heart is ready to receive, the location does not matter! I still remember the moment God really changed my life. It actually was not in a church service, but it was in my college house. Because I had been living a party lifestyle, living for me. I was tired of it; I was tired of being selfish. And I remember being in my bedroom one day, in tears, saying, „God, I don’t want to do this anymore!“ I was failing college. I didn’t know what I wanted to become; I didn’t know what I was doing in life. All I knew was I felt like I was about to give up. So I started praying in my house, „God, do something! Wreck me!“
Little did I know He would answer that prayer because I tell people all the time, never in my life did I know I would go into ministry. I had no desire; I had no clue. But God wrecked me, and He spoke to me! So it doesn’t matter your location. When your heart is ready to receive, God will speak to you!
And this situation got created, though. So here’s what’s crazy: These two guys stood back, they stayed back; they’re still hearing from God. Everything should be perfect! Wow, God speaks to all people! This is awesome! No! There’s always drama, right? Somebody’s always upset: „Did you see that? They stayed over there! They don’t think they’re good enough to be over here in the tabernacle! How dare they stay over there!“
See, word got around, and Joshua, Moses’s assistant, he started to get upset because he started to think, „This is a threat to our group!“ What they’re doing—hearing from God outside of the tabernacle—that’s a threat to our group! And he runs to Moses, and then Moses puts him in check. So Numbers chapter 11, verses 27 and 28: „A young man ran and reported to Moses, said, ‘Hey! Eldad and Medad—they’re prophesying in the camp! ’“ Now Joshua, son of Nun, who had been Moses’s assistant since youth, protested to Moses, „My master, make them stop!“
Now you remember not that long ago, everybody was saying that little phrase: „You mad, bro?“ The way Moses replies reminds me of that because he’s pretty much like, „You jealous?“ I wonder if it took Joshua back because he thinks he’s protecting Moses. „Hey, we’re going to protect our group!“ And Moses comes back like, „You jealous?“ „Oh, I don’t know, I’m upset about it.“
Look at verse 29. Moses said, „Are you jealous for my sake? Don’t you know that I wish that all of the Lord’s people were prophets? That all of them would have the Spirit of God upon them? That everybody could hear from God! This is powerful; this is not a threat to us!“ Moses is saying, „Listen, I’m not better than them; I’m not higher than them. Right? God doesn’t show favoritism. The thing is, God just knows who will obey and who will not, knows who’s faithful, who’s ready to leap; and God also knows that some of us are not ready yet, right? But when God speaks, He does something powerful!“
So I want to make this clear: what Joshua saw as a threat to the authority of Moses, Moses saw as a victory to the authority of God because it wasn’t about him; it was about God’s glory. In other words, to make it simple, other believers hearing from God should never be a threat to you, but only to the enemy! Should never be a threat to us, only the enemy!
Just a few weeks ago, I was talking with another pastor that’s about to start a church plant in the area, and I told him, „Man, we’re here for you! I know what it’s like; I know that it’s hard! We’re praying over you! If you need anything, let us know!“ And he was just kind of blown away. He told me, „You know, that really encouraged me.“ I said, „Why?“ He goes, „Because y’all are a church; we’re a church plant in the same area; you’re saying you’d still like to help us.“
See, that should always be the mindset of the church! Who am I to stop who God wants to use and speak through? I want to support that because the whole mission of every church is to glorify Christ, to bring the gospel! So our mind should always be bringing people into the church so that their life will be completely changed—not divided: our group, their group!
And let me show you another example of this—Jesus in Luke chapter 9, verse 49: „The disciples got upset for pretty much the same reason.“ It says, „John said to Jesus, ‘Hey Master, we saw someone using Your name to cast out demons, but don’t you worry? We told him to stop because he’s not in our group! ’“ Are we on the playground? Like, can you imagine Jesus looking at him like, „You did what? He’s using My name? Okay, the authority of My name to cast out demons, but he’s not in our group?“
It’s real, right? It doesn’t matter how much older we get; we still do this. We still struggle with this in our flesh. This is the gospel! This is bigger than what we want in our own lives! This is seeing people as our brothers and our sisters in Christ. And I remember too—I remember being that kid going to Sunday school, and you would have those Bible drills, and I got to be honest, there were some kids that were ruthless with those things. Like, they came; they memorized it; they wanted the stickers; they wanted a plaque with their name just to let you know that they were the best at memorizing Scriptures.
I was not okay; I was that kid. „Where are the donuts? Y’all bring donuts?“ Like literally, after Sunday school, I would walk around church trying to find any extra donuts! That was me! That’s why I was there! And what’s funny—I told Pastor Felix that my kids are now the type where they memorize everything, and Micah—if you know Micah—he comes here ready for those Bible challenges, he loves it. But I just—I wasn’t when I was a kid.
But because of that, I remember, and I did this myself—nobody did it to me—but I remember putting myself in a different group, thinking that, „Okay, these are like kind of anointed kids. They have a passion, and I’m just not there.“ And so in my mind, I kind of separated myself with that. But that’s not how God works! See, that’s a lie from the enemy, and it still happens today, even as adults. You walk in here, you see people serving, you see people joyful, you see people giving. „I wish I could give. Must be nice, one day I will, ” or „I wish I could serve. I wish I could be a leader, but I’m just not that good.“
I wish I could be on stage and pray, but every time I try to pray, it gets all funky and weird, and I don’t know what I’m doing. Now we just put ourselves in another group! When John said that to Jesus, Jesus said this: „Don’t stop him! Anyone who’s not against you is for you!“ God does not play favorites! You might have been through some hurt in life; I know we’ve all dealt with that! But God doesn’t do that! That’s not His character! Romans chapter 2, verses 11, New Living Translation: „For God does not show favoritism.“ It’s that clear!
Because the Spirit of God will rest upon all believers. Again, Romans—I mean, Joel chapter 2, verse 29: „In those days, I will pour out My Spirit even on the servants men and women alike.“ So do I need to be in a special group to hear from God? No! Just be ready! Be willing! You don’t know what you’re doing—that’s fine! I didn’t for a long time! We never really just know; we just obey! For God is in control!
Point 2: Past Mistakes Don’t Silence God
Point number two is this: You may have put yourself in this category: „Have I done too much wrong to hear from God?“ If this is you today, you’re not the only one. Let me say it like that! It is so easy for us to look at our mistakes, the things that we’ve done, and say, „That’s the reason I can’t hear from God.“ And even biblical characters—let me show you this—King David thought this way too.
And if you know the story about King David, before him was King Saul, and he witnessed Saul completely rebel against God. The Scripture says that Saul rejected God, so God rejected him. And David witnessed the Spirit of God being taken away from Saul. If you know the story, Saul goes crazy. He gets jealous; he tries to control everything. He just makes life worse; he tries to kill David—all these things happen. First Samuel 16:14: „Now, the Spirit of the Lord had left Saul.“
So this is what David saw. And David was known for being a man after God’s own heart, right? Everybody cheered David; yes! What a mighty warrior! What a mighty leader! But then all of a sudden, he made a mistake—a really big one—a bad one that most people in this room would say is unforgivable because he took another man’s wife, he got her pregnant, and then he killed her husband. I think about it—that’s the David that we talk about all the time! He made a mistake like that! And it took a prophet of God to come to him and make him realize what exactly he had done!
So he had lost himself, I guess, in the comfort of his authority that God had given him in his position. He lost himself in what he had, and he did not even realize his sin until the prophet made it known to him. And at that moment, he realized, „Oh God, I repent! Like, I’ve made a terrible mistake! People will never think about me the same.“
Listen to this prayer in Psalm chapter 51, verse 11: „David said, ‘Do not banish me from Your presence or take Your Holy Spirit from me.’“ Have you ever prayed something like that? „God, I’ve done wrong. I’m sorry. I’m ready to get right. Please don’t take Your presence away from me! Please don’t take Your Holy Spirit away from me! Please don’t let me go back to this!“ And this is when we start to get in our head.
And we start to feel that we have a bad signal, okay? Somebody has placed me over here. How do I get back? How do I get back right here so that I know that I can hear from God? Because all of this is messed up; I’m not who I used to be! You know the Holy Spirit has feelings; He has emotions because this is how God works through us. He is God! And Ephesians chapter 4, verse 30 says, „Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God.“
„Don’t grieve the Holy Spirit with whom you were sealed on the day of redemption.“ Now, another translation, NLT version—because that was the NRV—NLT says this: „Do not bring sorrow to God’s Holy Spirit by the way you live.“ Let me ask you this question: What is grief? What is grief? Many would say sadness, sorrow, feeling loss. But really, what it is is a lack of intimacy in your life.
It’s a loss of intimacy, it’s a loss of a relationship that used to be there, but now seems dead, right? One pastor stated it best. He says, „When a believer deliberately walks in sin—like just rejects God; God, I’m gonna do my own thing. I just don’t care anymore. I’m tired of people! I know You keep promising me things, but I’m not seeing it, so I’m gonna keep walking—when a believer deliberately rejects God over and over again and walks in sin, the Holy Spirit grieves because the rebellion creates a loss of intimacy.“
See, a lot of times we think, „All right, God’s just mean, and He doesn’t want us to have fun!“ Or, „He’s always telling me not to do this, not to do that.“ But really, what it is, the Holy Spirit wants to be close to you! He wants you to know His voice! But when you live for the world, you reject every invitation He’s given you. „Hey, let’s talk!“ „I’m too busy!“ „Hey, let’s spend time together today!“ „No, not today, it’s gonna be okay! God’s in control!“ „No, not this situation.“
And we keep rejecting the Holy Spirit, and it’s that loss of intimacy. And you would see the same thing within a marriage, right? We all make mistakes; we say dumb things; we do things, or maybe we take somebody for granted. And it takes getting two people who desire to have the relationship restored to come together and speak together and say, „You know what? I’m sorry!“
It’s repentance! „I’m sorry that I said that about you! This is how I’m feeling and this is the reason why!“ And what happens? If there’s forgiveness, if there’s forgiveness, intimacy can be restored. And so God showed grace upon David because he repented with all of his heart, and the Holy Spirit would not leave him!
And here’s the truth: the Holy Spirit is not going to leave you! The Holy Spirit will not leave you! Right? The Holy Spirit is now upon all believers when you accept Christ and walk in His ways! Trust me, there’s going to be days that you make mistakes, but God’s not going to give up on you!
But what I’m telling you is sometimes the Holy Spirit will not leave you, but He’ll allow bad signals in your life to convict you, to desire to see the whole picture again. Because guess what happens when the picture’s off? Like I just said, what would we do? We would spend time! „I gotta get this back right! I gotta watch my show again! I gotta get this perfect! I’m ready! I lost signal!“
But I’m not done. I’m gonna keep messing with this until it’s back! God is not done with you! He’s not done with you! Will you look to somebody next to you and tell them that today? He’s not done with you! I don’t care what you’ve done or where you’ve been! Maybe it was last night! He’s not done with you! He’s not going to leave you! But the Holy Spirit will help us walk in His ways! That’s conviction; that’s good! It saves you with salvation!
Point 3: Keep It Simple and Real
But my last point is this: many of us would say, „I just don’t know what I’m doing! I want to hear from God! I believe it; I just don’t know how!“ And I realize just how much we complicate things. We make a lot of things complicated that are very simple.
Paul stated this in Philippians chapter 3, verses 7-11: He said, „Once I thought a lot of things that this world was valuable. I used to chase achievements to tell me who I was. I used to have the perfect post on Instagram. I used to get the most likes, or I wanted everybody to know how successful I was in my business or how smart I am, or that I had the perfect marriage or that I could be the perfect mom or the perfect dad.“ Those things used to bring me life, but they never satisfied me!
So Paul says, „Now I consider these achievements of my life worthless because of what Christ has done.“ And in verse 8 he says, „Everything else is worthless when you actually compare it to just the value of knowing Christ Jesus.“ I talked about it last week: What you value, you treat differently! And do you value that relationship? Because like I said, we overcomplicate it!
And so how do I hear His voice? Be real! Have an intimate conversation with a loving Father! Pray! Be in His word and just hear! You don’t have to be dressed up! You don’t have to be in a certain spot! You don’t hear from God better over there than you do over here! You just have to be ready! And I’ve noticed I’ve said it over and over again—it’s like when I close my eyes, even in the midst of my pain at times, God would just give me a little glimpse of a vision of where we’re going and what He’s doing!
And I start to recognize His voice! We overcomplicate so many things, but it’s just about being real in His presence! So I’m asking you, when’s the last time you enjoyed the Father’s presence like this? It was just you and Him! You allowed Him to hold you; you cried; you rejoiced! Because this is what it’s like!