A couple weeks ago I heard a voice around 4 in the morning. I felt like it was the Lord there and the voice said my name and that he would guide me. Does God speak to people this way? I was a little scared after this. This was a much nicer incident than one from when I was a kid. Is it possible this was not from God?
When I was a kid, maybe eleven or twelve I heard this mean voice in my sleep saying "The Devil is going to get YOU!" I was terrified about this incident for years. I did stray away from God during my teen years but recently came back.
Has anyone ever heard audible voices like this in their sleep? I have only experianced this twice.
This one really deserves an answer, because of the possibility of allowing the devil to interfere. And, incidentally, I'm not really referring to the voice you recently heard, but the one that you heard when you were a
child (I'm very particular about the use of
child instead of
kid, incidentally -- this is because of something the Lord showed me many years ago, in which He appeared to be telling me not to use the term to refer to children, since children are
accepted in Scripture, and kids (goats) are
rejected).
The fact that you were terrified about this incident for
years is very revealing. No doubt, the devil spoke to you (or one of his emissaries, a demonic spirit). That had the effect of
terrifying you. That was the goal -- and it worked. It's very important to get a very firm handle on this, and to understand how to deal with this effectively, because any hindrance in this area can mean you will not be able to hear God's voice
clearly, which is God's will for you. Now I am not saying this because you are currently affected, but I cannot help but think that (1) it will be useful to someone reading this and that (2) it may be useful for you, too, since right at the current moment, you are seeking for help on whether or not God is speaking to you.
So let's get something really straight! And I'm speaking to the general audience, now, and not you specifically. God speaks in a certain "way" to His children, and it may be firm, sometimes, and it might even raise questions as to whether or not it's Him speaking, but He will certainly not terrorize you. So if you can get a handle on
that, then you will know -- and would have know straight out -- who it was who was speaking to you the first time. All this goes back to
character. This is absolutely crucial. Now don't get me wrong, God can deal in a very forthright manner with His own children (if they are disobedient). But He would never say something like, "The Devil is going to get YOU!" What He
might say would be, "If you don't straighten up your act, the devil is going to get you." Do you see the clear difference between these two statements?
So why am I even emphasizing this? I am emphasizing all of this because it goes back to your first question about the voice you heard recently at about 4 in the morning. Who was it? Here is something that is a "tip off" that you may not be entirely in the right position to be able to hear God's voice clearly, even today: You wrote, "I was a little scared after this." That means you are still working on His
character. Why were you scared? Answer
that question. It's crucial. If you know
why you were scared, then God can help you solve the question as to
who it was who was speaking. There are three possibilities in all of this, and I will go through each of them and explain them to you. You should have a good understanding of how to proceed after this -- but I'm not going to tell you who spoke to you -- you are going to have to figure that one out for yourself. I highly recommend you take everything that I am writing and bring it before the Father. He cares for you and definitely wants you to know the answer to your question. I cannot answer it. But the Lord can and will.
1. First, you might have been delusional or simply thought you heard a voice. Of course, I do not believe this is the case, but I'm just mentioning it!
2. Second, the Lord might have spoken to you. If He did, He might have spoken to you
in order to address the very fear you had in response to it. In other words, what I am saying is that you absolutely want to "get out of the mode" of responding in fear to God's voice. It's not what God intends. If you are scared every time God speaks to you -- guess what? That's a perfect opening for the devil. The devil seeks places of fear and enters in. You will not be able to properly discern God's voice if you respond in fear. Thus, you have a character issue that needs dealing with. I'm going to tell you what that character issue is: God's love for you. You need to pray in the following manner, and this is a whole lot more important than knowing if it was God who was speaking to you or not: "Lord, reveal your love to me." Just pray that prayer. Make it your daily prayer. God needs to "crack" the fear barrier that's present, and He wants to. And, He definitely will. His love is so overpowering (in a good way!) that you will not fear again, when He speaks to you. That fear will be gone.
3. Third, the devil (or one of his demons) might have spoken to you. My personal feeling is, he did
not speak to you. I'm saying that only because the Spirit in me seems to be saying that (but since I'm not infallible, that's not a guarantee!). However, I don't think it was the devil (or one of his demons) who said that. In fact, there's a good reason why the devil would not have been the one to have spoken to you! That's because you have faith in God. So if you have faith in God, the devil does not want to reinforce that by acting like God's speaking (when the devil is really speaking instead). In that case, you should have stronger faith in God, because of the voice. The devil does not want to encourage you to have faith in God.
So do you know who spoke to you? Oops. It looks like I answered the question. I didn't mean to do that!
