How does God speak today? (part 1)

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Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

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No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the apostle

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Paul said, "'But we did not yield in subjection to them "'for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel "'would remain with you.'"

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In short, if you like smooth, watered -down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn't for you.

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By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we're called by the divine trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her king.

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Here's our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio Ministry. My name is

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Mike Abendroth, and I am your host. If you prefer to call me Mike Abendroth, I guess you can.

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Or Mike Abendroth, you could do that as well. We are No Compromise Radio Ministry here, and we believe that this show should be biblical.

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After all, if it's gonna be a ministry, should not the content be biblical? Secondly, we believe it should be provocative.

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We want to poke and to prod and to goad you into reading your Bibles for yourself and going back to the text, back to the book.

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And then lastly, we think it should always be in that order. So there's no sense just to poke and prod and provoke at the expense of the

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Bible. So that's the format. And today I'm going to talk to you about God speaking.

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Does God speak to you? How does God speak to you? In what ways does God speak to you?

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I get all kinds of emails forwarded to me and people say, do a show on this, do a show on that. You should do a show on such and such.

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And I'm trying. Actually, we're going to put together a better research team.

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A better research team, meaning I was a research team before. We're gonna put together a research team. And if you've got a topic of drooling in the spirit or something like that, then

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I'll have our crack staff get on it. They can feed me all the data. Or as we say here in New England, the dater.

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And then I will try to abendrothize it and then we'll do a show on it.

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So anyway, thanks for listening. Thanks for writing. Info at NoCompromiseRadio .com. Today, does God speak and how does he speak?

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So the forward that I received just a couple of weeks ago was called God Speaks.

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Are you listening? God Speaks. Are you listening? And it was a blog post by a pastor,

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Rob Reimer. R -E -I -M -E -R. He's in Massachusetts and he has a blog on how

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God speaks. And so if you are bold enough and brave enough to put a blog in the public arena, you ought to be ready for critique, for praise, for anything else.

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And so the subtitle here, Rob Reimer, is Revelation is a byproduct of intimacy with God.

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And then he talks about six ways that God speaks. So to start off with the title,

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God Speaks. Are you listening? So far, so good. I'm fine with that, by the way. It's a February 11th, 2011 blog post,

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Rob Reimer. Revelation is a byproduct of intimacy of God. That's the subtitle and that's the subtitle.

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The subtitle has no biblical credulity at all. It's not biblical. Revelation is not a byproduct of intimacy with God.

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Maybe you want to say illumination, but as a pastor, Rob should know better. We have revelation, we have inspiration, and we have illumination.

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And revelation is not a byproduct of intimacy with God. God is not adding to the canon of scripture.

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God is not speaking any longer just because you are close to him.

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And so I guess the blog post is meant to say that you should get close to God. I would agree with that part.

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And then if you do, God speaks to you. That is malarkey. That is not true. That is denying the

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Protestant principle, the biblical principle of sola scriptura. That is denying Hebrews chapter one, that in these last days, how does

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God speak? Well, he's spoken in times past to the Urim and Thummim. He's spoken in dreams, he's spoken through Moses, he's spoken in an audible voice.

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But in these last days, he speaks to us in and through his son and certainly his apostolic messengers.

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And so today I'd like to critique this article and it's six ways God speaks. And I'd like to ask you the question, are you buying into this?

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Because it's everywhere. We have an epidemic. It's a pandemic that Christians think that God speaks revelation outside his word.

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And basically what happens is we turn in to modern day tarot card readers, modern day diviners, people who tell fortunes and some kind of snake charmers because of this very fact that people now believe and they're being taught by so -called pastors that you can hear

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God outside the very word of God. Now, what does that say about God's word being sufficient?

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What does that say about the authoritative message of the word of God from Genesis 1 through Revelation 22?

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We've got a problem. As B .B. Warfield would say, there are two religions in the world.

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Religion one is the religion that says that God speaks to us from the inside and God speaks to us through our feelings, our dreams, through us.

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And the problem with that is there's something called the fall, the fall of Adam and the sin of man.

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And that means the internal voice, the internal direction is torqued.

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It's tweaked, it's perverted, it's twisted. It is unreliable. It cannot be trusted.

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Why? Because it's sin tainted. And then there's one other religion and that is the religion of Christianity where God speaks to us from the outside.

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It's not through us, it's not because of us, it's not any kind of instrument channel through us.

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He has spoken inerrantly and infallibly through the prophets, through Moses, through Jesus, through the apostles, and we have now his authoritative sufficient word.

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And so there's only really two religions. There's the Disney religion, trust your heart, and there's the real religion,

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Christianity. And so in this article, God Speaks, Are You Listening? Reimer talks about six ways that God speaks today and I'd like to analyze those so you could think critically.

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After all, don't you want to be a Berean? And Bereans were commended as noble people because they studied to see if these things were true.

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And Paul also said to the church of Thessalonica in 1 Thessalonians 5, that you are to examine everything carefully.

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Examine what I say. Hey, I'm on the radio every day. I was going to say a public figure, you don't figure like I'm some big shot, but not that.

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I'm in the public and so what I say better be true. What I say should be biblical and what

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I say is open to critique. So please don't give me this faux, have you talked to the author yet?

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Have you gone first in step one in Matthew 18 before you've brought it out in public? That is just all, duck and jive to get away from the real issue.

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Here's the real issue. You write something, you print it, you say it in public and it should be held up to biblical scrutiny.

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So number one, Reimer says, God speaks through an audible voice sometimes.

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That's the first one. Here's what he said, quote, Jesus heard the audible voice of his father, both at his baptism,

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Matthew 3, and his transfiguration, Matthew 17. Jesus hears the father speak out loud and others around him heard it too.

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The apostle Paul came to faith in Christ because Jesus appeared to him in a bright light and spoke to him audibly, underlined.

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There are many other examples, but sometimes God speaks out loud. So is that true? Is that true since God the father spoke to the son, therefore

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God the father now speaks to us? Friends, that's just one of the basic hermeneutical principles that just because something is described in the

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Bible, it is not prescribed for the Christian church. And so that's just a very simple and easy one to dissect because of the hermeneutical errors in that.

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That is not true. That is the wrong deduction. That is false logic. Just because God has spoken to Jesus, this is my beloved son in whom

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I'm well -pleased or this is my beloved son, hear him. Just because those things have happened, that is now the paradigm for the

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Christian church that we are to hear God out loud because Paul, the great apostle, heard from Jesus on the

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Damascus road and we now hear God speak audibly.

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That's the paradigm for today. That is not true. That is categorically incorrect.

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And that shouldn't be taught whether that's in the pulpit or that's someplace else. Now we're looking around and listening for God speaking audibly.

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Where is that found in the New Testament epistles that we are supposed to listen to the audible voice of God?

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Where can that be found in Romans? Where can that be found specifically? Let's think about pastoral epistles.

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In pastoral epistles, don't you think Paul would have told the leadership both at Crete and at Ephesus in Titus and 1

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Timothy, this is how you discern the audible voice of God to see if it's true or to see if it's not true.

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This is how you can critique it. If someone says, I heard God speak, God said to me, but you don't see any of that.

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There are many other examples, Rymer says, but sometimes God speaks out loud. Well, if you're waiting to hear

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God speak out loud, you've got a major problem because he is not going to.

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God has spoken with clarity, with finality, and with sufficiency.

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We have the sufficient word. Wanting something more is a sign of immaturity.

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Here God has spoken to us in his word from Genesis to Revelation, and there's plenty of revelation for us to dissect that would take a lifetime to understand, to exegete, to fully grasp the grandeur and the greatness and the transcendence and the eminence of God.

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Isn't there plenty enough in scripture? Except here's what happens. People are lazy, people are experiential, people are subjective, people are mystical, people are charismatic, and people want to hear

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God in a different way, in a new way, in a fresh way. And you've got all kinds of people, from Blackabees experiencing

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God, on down to some of the wackies on TBN, pushing this

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God speaking. I get it that it's more romantic, nomadic,

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I get it that it's more touchy -feely, I get the whole sensation of this and the feeling of that, and oh,

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God speaks in an audible voice, but you need to go to scripture. How does

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God speak? What is God -breathed? What is profitable? What is given to us so we can know about life and godliness?

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Well, you could just look at 2 Peter 1, and find that out, or 2 Timothy 3, you can find it out.

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This all slaps at the sufficiency of the word of God. This all slaps of the canon that is closed.

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If God is still speaking, you better get your papyrus out, and your pens, and start writing things down, because we need to add this.

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When God speaks, we ought to include it. And so when people say God speaks today through an audible voice,

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A, it's not true, B, it's misleading, and C, it denigrates the authority and sufficiency of God's revealed word that is fixed.

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So today on No Compromise Radio, we're looking at Rob Reimer's post, God Speaks, are you listening? And I thought it was interesting,

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A, because he's in Massachusetts, and B, this is a problem that is widespread.

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This is indicative of an issue that's going all around, the voice of God, and can you hear God, God speaking.

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And of course it packs out churches, but it packs out churches that then gives people immaturity for their dinner.

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You show me people that do run around trying to find God listening and God speaking, and I'll show you people that don't know their

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Bibles, that don't know hermeneutics. I'll show you pastors that don't know their Bibles, and pastors that don't know hermeneutics, because they will just not take the time to understand what the

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Bible says. On a positive note, if you'd like to read a good book about the Bible, and how we got the

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Bible, and how we got the canon, you need to read Geisler and Nick's book called Introduction to the

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Bible. That'd be a great book for you, or maybe The Canon of the Scripture by F .F.

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Bruce. But you need to study the Bible, and you need to study the Bible so much so that you understand sola scriptura.

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God speaks in his word, not through tradition, not through the magisterium, not through inner voices, not through audible voices, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

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No compromise radio ministry. Here we go, number two. Rhymer says, number two, quote, God speaks through a whisper.

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Okay, you knew this was coming, didn't you? Here comes the whisper. So I guess you've got the loud audible voice that kind of sounds like thunder, and now you've got the whisper.

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So here's the whisper. Let's go to the blog post again. The old timers,

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Rhymer said, called it the still, small voice of God. Often it is just God guiding our thoughts, but we learn to recognize when it is

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God guiding our thoughts and when it is just us thinking. Well, first of all, how do we learn to recognize it?

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Where in Scripture are we told to recognize it? Where in Scripture are we told how to recognize it?

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When you hear the inner voice going, you better be careful because the heart is desperately wicked, deceitful above all else.

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How can we know it? That's why we need to be told from the outside. We need truth that's extra nos, on the outside of us.

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We need to be told from the outside. Here's how we think of life and death and heaven and hell and the Savior, situation, circumstances, et cetera.

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How about this that Rhymer says? Sometimes these thoughts are interrupting thoughts. We're driving down the road and all of a sudden out of the blue, we think that we should call someone.

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Call Jim. The thought may keep pressing us because God is on the line with the divine appointment.

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I guess it sounds good, but to me that sounds immature. That sounds loony.

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That sounds like Mormons could do it. That sounds like Catholics could do it. That sounds like Wiccans can do it.

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What does that have to do with anything? If you say, maybe more technically, that the

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Spirit of God is prompting you, the Spirit of God is laying that on your heart,

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I could live with that, I guess. It's not such a big deal. But when you say God speaks and then your subline is, revelation is a byproduct of intimacy with God, that is a major problem.

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You ought not to believe this. This is not good for your soul. This is Captain Crunch for your breakfast every morning.

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You might like it, but it's not good for you. Here we go on to hear the same blog writer.

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Often these thoughts come when we are intentionally quiet, listening for a prompting of the Spirit. Friends, that's

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Quakerism, that's mysticism. You ought not to just be quiet and just listen to God. Remember, there's a paradigm, and here's the paradigm that you ought to put in your mind for once and for all.

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God speaks to us through His Word, and we speak to God in prayer.

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God does not speak to us in prayer. Unless you think about verses from the Bible, God isn't speaking to you in prayer.

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You talk to God, it's called prayer. God talks to you, it's called the revelation of God found in the 66 books of the canon.

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We don't get quiet and listen to God. That's gonna give you problems because it's all gonna go through you, and you, even if you're a

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Christian, are still not fully glorified. You're not glorified at all, and you positionally are in Christ, but your sanctification is continued to be worked out, and you have a heart that will deceive you, that you'll think it's

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God, but it's not. You'll think it's this, but it's not. You need to be told from the outside what the scoop is.

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And so here, let's go on. It says, we may be asking God for wisdom. We may be praying with a friend, and we're listening to God for help.

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Often, I've been sitting in pastoral counseling sessions. This is turning the page. I'm almost afraid to turn the page.

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It's gonna get psychic crazy here. Praying for someone, when I heard the whisper of the Spirit, well,

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I have lots of comments. One, no you didn't. Two, prove it. Three, where does

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God whisper to the Spirit? And what I've also found is, the whole group that goes around saying,

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God wants to talk to me, God's talking audibly to me, God's whispering to me, why are they the ones that seem to know the least about the

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Bible? If God's going to talk to someone, don't you think he'd pick someone who really knows the scriptures?

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Why are the people out on the fringe, who somehow believe in these still small voice whispers, and that God is still speaking audibly because Jesus heard the audible voice of God?

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That's incongruous. It is, the blog post goes on to say, there are times God has said to me, this person has been abused, ask them.

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Now, that's not true. You may think they've been abused. I meet people all the time and think, this person's on psych medicine, this person's done such and such, this could be possibility.

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This is nothing more than, oh, I wonder if they have been abused based on what they've said, done, and acted.

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Maybe I should ask them. That's not God saying it. The blog post says, and I asked them, have you been abused?

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And all of these horrid secrets came out and healing began to flow. There are times I've been praying for someone and the

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Lord whispered to me, this person has a secret. Tell them it is safe to tell it. Yeah.

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I conveyed the word and a secret came out and into the open that had long since been buried in destructive.

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God speaks through whispers. God spoke in a still small voice back in the

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Old Testament one time, and now that's the paradigm. Again, it is hermeneutical folly to think that here we have the still small voice one time in the

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Old Testament, and therefore now that's a paradigm for what Christians should look for today.

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I suggest that you go back to 1 Kings and study the passage to see what it actually says before we use that as the paradigm for whispering today.

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This is nothing different than people who go get their palms read, and then the good palm reader sizes up the person, can see, can talk, can sense, can understand, and then can pick a generality.

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And if I ask anybody in my counseling sessions here at the church, do you have a secret? The answer's going to be yes.

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Of course people have secrets. They have skeletons. And so that doesn't prove anything to anyone. So far, in the first one at least, he's got a couple verses.

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It is true that God spoke audibly in the past, but no verses on how he speaks audibly today.

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Nothing about Hebrews 1. Nothing about the text that tells us how

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Jesus speaks today. And on the second one, God speaks through a whisper. I have no verses.

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I have nothing to go on except experience. And so here's what people do. They say, it happens to me, therefore it's true.

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That is not correct. Just because something happens to you doesn't mean it's true.

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And we're going to look at 2 Peter 1 16 -21 next time as a follow -up to this, to show you that you cannot trust experiences when they contradict the word of God.

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You can have an experience where you can see Jesus on the Mount of Olives, on the Mount of Transfiguration rather, as Peter, James and John did.

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But Peter says, I've got something more sure than that. And so you cannot have an experience and then tell me that's therefore the truth.

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That is not the way the Christian faith has ever worked. Rhymer number three,

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God speaks through pictures. Okay. I'm not making this up, trying to be respectful.

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God speaks through pictures. In this passage in Acts 2 17 -18, Peter tells us, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams.

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God is going to speak to people through dreams and visions. Those are pictures. Not every picture that comes to our mind, not every dream we have is from God.

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I like that last sentence. Just like every voice that is heard, nor every thought that we have is from God.

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That's certainly true. We have to test it. Now, how do we test it? That's going to be the good question.

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But sometimes God speaks through dreams and visions. This occurs throughout the Bible from the first book of Genesis to the last, which is a vision.

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I'll end this series with a talk and a blog about dreams and visions. Well, that's probably going to be a no count for my show too.

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Dreams and visions. God speaks through pictures. Well, Acts chapter two would be a good passage to study and ask yourself the question, when will this happen?

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To whom will it happen? And again, we fall back in the same Bible interpretation.

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We call it hermeneutics, hermeneutical faux pas, hermeneutical fallacy, that because something happens in the

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Bible, it happens to us today. Kind of like when the spirit of the devil snatched up a person and dropped them off 10 miles down the road in Azotahs.

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I guess that happened once, so we should be kind of Star Trek, beaming up Scotty guys, because if it happened once, it ought to happen again.

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That is folly. That is not correct. This whole show is trying to drive you to see the insanity of this so that you'll study your

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Bibles. Yes, it takes time. Yes, it takes toil. Yes, it takes an understanding of languages, but it is worth it.

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Listen to this. The Holy Scripture is the only sufficient, certain, and infallible rule of all saving knowledge, faith, and obedience.

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Second London Confession, 1689. That is true.

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It is only. We believe in sola scriptura. We believe that the

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Scriptures have divine credentials. We believe that there's no reservation mentally regarding the trustworthiness and the authority and the sufficiency of Scripture.

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You have to be careful. How does God reveal Himself today? If you want to say the Spirit of God illumines the

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Scripture to our mind, I'm with you. It's fine by me, but once you start seeing

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God's talks outside the Scripture, you are pretty much done, and pastors ought not to teach anything like that.

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They ought to be teaching the sufficiency and the reliability of the

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Scriptures. Probably one of my favorite things that has happened in church history is when

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Quakers, who are known for all this, this is Quakerism, by the way, they had a practice of going naked as a sign.

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Well, if the Lord prompts you to do that, the Lord whispers to you to go naked as a sign, would you do it? I'm not sure you would.

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Okay, well, we're no compromised radio ministry. We're talking about how God speaks today. He does not speak any longer through an audible voice.

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He does not speak through a whisper, and He does not speak through pictures. Every picture is worth a thousand words, but it's not worth one word when it comes to the revealed mind of God.

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Study your Bibles. Study yourself to show yourself to be a proved workman who need not to be ashamed.

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That's what you need to do. You need to divide rightly the Word of God. Let's go back to the Bible. Open the

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Bible. Why don't you read 1 Kings today? That's your homework assignment. 1 Kings or nocompromisedradio .com.

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You can write us at info at nocompromised .com. No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

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Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life transforming power of God's Word through verse by verse exposition of the sacred text.

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Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at six. We're right on route 110 in West Boylston.

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You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.

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The thoughts and opinions expressed on No Compromise Radio do not necessarily reflect those of WVNE its staff or management.