Part 2A: Does God speak?

In talking about adaptation for my neurologically impaired friends whose bodies weren’t very cooperative with direct communication, they were still able to communicate. The big idea of this piece is that God also “adapts” so that we can hear His communication. And there are specific ways God has made it possible for us to hear.

So, how is God’s communication identified?

Let’s start with the most direct route: Jesus Christ. Yeah, yeah, yeah – old news, huh? Jesus walked this earth in bodily form long ago. That’s easily identified and proven. What takes a little more digging is ‘why and what.’ Why choose this modality for communication? What was the communication? And what does that have to do with communication, or modality of communication, with God today?

Jesus demonstrated – in his actions - how to communicate with, and hear, God, the Father. There are four small books that chronicle what Jesus said and did. In them, we are pointed to see and hear God. Let me explain.

He said this: “The kingdom of God is at hand.” (the book of Mark, Chapter ) In our language today: ‘God is here – look and hear.’ That’s a bold claim – don’t miss it. Jesus said God is here and that YOU can look and hear God!

Let’s go further. Signs and symbols: healings, being among people in their real life, talking on the road with friends. “Jesus didn’t see his healings as a kind of premodern traveling hospital. He wasn’t healing the sick just for the sake of it, important though the healing itself was. God, the world’s creator, was at work through him, to do what he had promised to, to open blind eyes and deaf ears, to rescue people, to turn everything right side up. The people who had been at the bottom of the heap would find themselves, to their own great surprise, on top. “Blessed are the meek,” he said, “for they shall inherit the earth.” And he went about making it happen.” (from Simply Christian: Why Christianity Makes Sense by N. T. Wright, pp. 101-102.)

Let’s unpack for a minute.
o Healings are one way Jesus communicated God to us.
o It is God’s action by very real touch
o But it isn’t communicating to focus upon healing – but to focus upon what God is doing in the world – for you, but for all as well
o God made physical promises
o God is making good on that message of promises
o To see God’s voice in speaking those promises, we would have to read the whole Old Testament – so go for it sometime! But for today, God has spoken loudly enough that we actually know his promises.
o God is communicating through Jesus that he cares about everyone – even those who don’t think they’re worth anything – God values people highly
o Did you catch that message? That’s God’s message – heard, voiced and passed on to you. From Jesus to you.

God (Father) speaks through Jesus (Son) like one person talking to another through a telephone line (direct communication, modality, physical). Let me illustrate with Jesus speaking again – a story to communicate God’s message/direct communication with us - from God to our present world.

“These parables [stories Jesus told] weren’t, as has often been supposed, ‘earthly stories with heavenly meanings.’ The whole point of Jesus’ work was to bring heaven to earth and join them together forever, to bring God’s future into the present and make it stick there. But when heaven comes to earth and finds earth unready, when God’s future arrives in the present while people are still asleep, there will be explosions. And there were . . .

The younger of two sons leaves home, disgraces himself and his family, and then returns penitent to an astonishing [lavish] welcome. The older son, who stays at home, bitterly resents the father’s lavish welcome for the returning prodigal. . . . As with most of Jesus’ parables, the story compels the hearers to put themselves in the picture and thereby discover the truth about Jesus—and about themselves. The parable is told to make a specific point: This is why there’s a party going on with all the wrong people attending it; and this is what you look like if you’re refusing to join in. God’s kingdom is happening under your noses, and you can’t see it [speaking to those who didn’t want to hear Jesus’ words, particularly to the ‘rules of the church’ crowd].” (Simply Christian, pp. 102-103)

Jesus communicated God’s words for us to hear in a very physical way. Some wanted to hear. Others didn’t. Just like in our human interactions and conversations, we can choose to pay attention to the person talking and listen. We can tell when someone’s serious about what they’re saying – or we can let our mind drift to the party we’re going to tonight or the list we have to get done today.

In communication terms, this is called ‘direct revelation.’ Not only is it communicating, it is communicating on the deepest level – in person, direct and with a message that breathes the very soul of something that outlasts ‘how the weather is going to be tonight.” It is communicating the person himself – in this case, God himself.

One way to hear God speak today is to listen to Jesus. Other ways, modalities, next.

Part 2: Does God really speak?

Link to Part 1
Part 2: There must be identifiable ways in which God speaks or a “modality” that shows us God speaking.


Recap from where we left off about communication as direct communication in Part 1:
- direct communication is words spoken
God has spoken his words and we have accounts from people hearing

- direct communication is also more than words (body language, tones, passion, etc.)
God doesn’t have a “body” so how do we hear if God’s communicating?
direct communication is “revealing” – i.e. it shares personhood in a process
- this is God’s primary objective

- the problems of direct communication for us
+ intellectually we find it hard to allow for the possibility of God speaking
+ historically the Bible has been used for reasons other than God’s
+ deeper communication, into revealing, is challenging work

We’ve already glanced at the problem: God doesn’t have a “body” per se, like you and I. Does that necessarily mean God doesn’t speak and can’t be heard? Or has God in history addressed that issue? Are there identifiable ways in which God speaks?

Looking from a human perspective, it’s difficult to imagine communicating taking place without some physical form. I have a hard time thinking outside of these standard ways of communicating: picking up my cell phone to call someone requires a body/physical interaction, typing into this blog or IM-ing requires physical touch, and writing a note or sending a birthday card requires my hands (and money). When I worked as a nurse with neurologically diseased and partially/severely paralyzed persons who couldn’t communicate in our ‘standard’ ways, I could watch their eyes, get a blink for yes, or help them adapt with what they could do. Still a body and physical interaction was able to take place in some way between us.

Perhaps that’s the clincher though. Adaptation to what is available to us. As a nurse one of the most important jobs I had was to find ways to help these patients be able to communicate with their outside world. Someone who didn’t know their challenges and hadn’t worked through those challenges with them, or who hadn’t spent time watching their normal behavior – would not understand how one of the nurses knew what a person was “saying” or “asking for.” It didn’t make sense to them.

I had learned to identify their “signs” and “behaviors.” Our communication efforts with them were based upon a couple of assumptions found to be true. First, we assumed that they wanted to communicate with us. Second, that we could mutually find ways for that communication to happen. Third, that they would want to find the means to do more than exist, but find ways of sharing with us who they were, what they liked, what they were thinking, and how they felt – personhood or the revealing side of communication. So, our team of medical staff set out to find and invent modes for them to communicate.

One patient was able to move one toe and one finger. Our medical team made a computer control pad that could be attached to their toe. One patient was deaf, and so our team worked with this patient to learn American Sign Language. One patient was mute and blind but could smile and nod their head. We found modes of interaction that worked. They were able to reveal to us who they were because each had a very different personality, liked very different things and expressed emotions or feelings in different ways.

I want to make two points. They are both about the modes in which God communicates, and I would simplistically call them “adaptive modes” God uses. First, is about the physical modes God employs to communicate personhood. That will be in Part 2A (God’s communicating in general) and 2B (a human body in Jesus Christ). Second, is to stay tuned for how we’re made to adapt to those modes on a soul level for Part 3.

Does God really speak?

I'll get back to this subject this week. Sorry things have been crazy, and I haven't had the time. Part 1 and beginning explanations are in Nov. 2006 blogs.

Does God really speak? Part 1 of 3

Link to Beginning of Explanation.

Part I: Does God really speak?

God speaks? To be a Christian is to believe this underlying notion: God speaks. In fact, if everyone believed that God actually speaks, and if everyone actually heard God speak, there wouldn't be many agnostics in the world, right? So, starting with the third question first, and the most crucial of the three, Does God talk as 'direct communication'?

To follow William Abraham's treatment of the subject, we need a little bit of common, in-this-world sense. When you and I speak, as long as our hearing is good and we're not deaf, we can hear the words directly from you to me. That's direct communication. I can ask questions of you, and you have the opportunity to respond with answers. I can hear those answers.

Now, of course, we know that communication is more than words: body language, intensity and "feel" of the words, speed of the words, the interpretation of slang used, etc. I may need to ask some clarifying questions back to understand what you are saying and meaning. But you are present for me to ask and to hear. The bottom line: you communicate with me and I hear you. I hear you through physically hearing the words; I hear you through 'reading' your body; I hear you in a very physical way. Over the internet, I "hear" you. I read your words. I can (usually) ask questions and will (usually) get/want a response from you. There's some sort of physical back and forth taking place. You reveal yourself to me. I reveal myself to you.

So, let's get onto hearing from God! Oh, you mean it's different? God is not a physical form (usually)?

Hence, the "problem." Even if we use our ears, even if we use our lips, there seems to be a God-side problem. If God is really there, wouldn't we hear and speak just like we do with a person? (That's question number one: "the modality" - later for that.)

We are not used to thinking of the fact that the activity we're involved in (talking together) goes deeper than "communication" and enters the territory of "revealing." If I could make a simple delineation. Communication is more about the "physicality of the process." Revealing is more about the "sharing of personhood in the process." God's primary objective is the revealing side; the physicality side comes as a result of the primary objective.

This may be to oversimplify it, but to put it into descriptions of personality we may be accustomed to: God is a people relating first "guy/gal" (sharing, revealing, creating community) who then becomes "task-oriented" (physicality, stuff that can be physically touched and heard, tasks to be done together, the context). Isn't that amusing to put God into our personality categories?

That does not mean that we have God without the physicality/context side of sharing/revealing. (more on that in Part 2). God does not have a "body" as you and I. So, it makes no sense to expect God's communication to be limited to our "bodily" expectations. God doesn't wear shoes, drink coffee with us or stuff letters into our post office boxes. However, that doesn't mean God can't speak - doesn't communicate - doesn't reveal.

For the initial question, "Can we hear God speak?", we want to keep focus on the fact that the point of communicating (real communicating) is to say something that tells us something about you or I. For God, it's the same. And, theologically, what we are then discussing about God's communication is the ideas of revelation. There is an experience at stake here that is more than subject-object talking activity, but is also about purpose, direction, communion together, looking to the future, and transforming who we are, to name a few experiences that happen in revelation.

To quote Abraham, "It is only because God has spoken His word that we can have any assurance about what He has done in creation and history and about His intentions and purposes in acting in creation and history. Without His word, the alternative is not just a tentative, carefully qualified guessing at what God is doing, but a radical agnosticism." (p. 21 in Divine Revelation and the Limits of Historical Criticism by William J. Abraham)

Within the Bible, we have accounts of people claiming to hear God's voice. Jeremiah hears God call and telling him to pass on messages. Paul is struck dumb and hears Jesus Christ speak to him directly on the Damascus Road (Acts 9). The Disciples hear Jesus Christ speak and "experience" it as God-with-them speaking. Here is what Jesus is quoted as saying: "My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me." (John 10:27)

To be more specific, we are making the claim that hearing God speak is more than "pious human speaking." To quote Abraham again, "Divine revelation is not a pious way of doing justice to the genius of human discovery." (p. 19)

This is not human imagination or genius, but God speaking. It is the testimony of people who wrote the Bible, quoted God's speech to others, and saw events change before their eyes. It is the testimony of people today. The testimony is to say that people have told what they saw and heard from a first-person standpoint. Others have passed on what was heard and seen.

To be clear, people throughout history have said they heard God speak, not themselves.

But, I am also not saying that the Bible is a word-for-word account of God's dialogue with us! The Bible has been used in that way - "God said it right here" as people choose and select what is appropriate for their "cause." "It conjures up the image of a flat Bible dictated by a literalist God who gives inside information on the workings of nature and the details of history (science)." (Abraham, p. 22)

To deal with God's speaking and people's testimonies, we need this understanding of revelation: God has, is ready, and will continue to reveal Himself. God's purpose is to be known, like two people getting to know one another. We will have to allow for the "intellectual possibility" that God speaks - rather than begin with any proposition creating the impossiblity for God to exist or speak. In simpler terms, if we don't look for God speaking, we won't hear God speak, the same as if you decided this blog didn't exist and didn't look, you would not have found it either.

First, taking seriously what people say they've heard is investigating the evidence that God speaks.

Secondly, listening for God's speech is a primary activity every Christian - or seeker - needs to do. You can hear God speak. Run your own experiment. Sit down and ask God to speak in a way that you can hear. Then, take notice (observe) and write down what you see and hear. Gather the data later. Focus on observing and notekeeping first.

(For more help on hearing, see Part 2 on how God reveals)

Later ... Part 2.

Books that help think about "Does God speak?"

An older book, but a theological "goodie": Divine Revelation and the Limits of Historical Criticism by William J. Abraham.

Hearing God: Developing a Conversational Relationship With God by Dallas Willard.

What are some books you've found helpful?

Does God really speak? Explanation begins.

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Does God really speak?

You may have heard people say: "I heard God tell me ..." and wondered how they knew it was God? You, like me, may hear people saying they've heard "God" speak and then watch them do aweful things, like the terrorists of 9-11? This issue of hearing God speak, hearing accurately, and deciding whether God speaks - today - may be gnawing at you. It gnaws at me - especially some days.

There are several "questions" around this subject. I'll talk through my thoughts in several posts here. First question: When we say "God speaks" what do we mean? Do we hear voices? Is it a feeling? Is it our imagination? Do we make guesses? Is it tangible or imagination?

I asked a question among "church leaders" lately, "Where have you seen Christ this week?" There was a long, long, long silence. One person offered up: "Well, if you mean where have I seen people do things like Christ, then I can answer that. But if you mean, where did I see Christ, with my eyes, then I can't answer that question."

What do we mean when we ask: Where have I seen - where have I heard Christ speak this week? Some people become strangely silent, while others jump in with all sorts of information - from "clues" to Christ's presence to actually hearing voices to feelings felt that gave special knowledge of Christ's presence and movement in the world.

I want to make three distinctions here about what I mean.

First, God speaking means there must be some identifiable means by which God speaks - "the modality." And second, God speaking means there's a receiving end - that it's heard by someone.

Third, God speaking means fundamentally, that it is direct communication - like you or I speaking with one another over coffee - rather than indirect/non-specific/possible communication. The next three posts will deal with each of those questions, one at a time.

Send me your questions about "God speaking" by "comment" here. I can't wait to hear!