I’ve talked about asking questions. And asking why. And mentioned that questions are probably the fundamental skill for discernment. But I’m convinced the most important aspect of this particular skill is to ask God questions.
Is is valuable and necessary to talk to other people, to listen well, to ask good, hard questions and search out the answers through reading and listening to wise counsel. But as important as all of that is, if we aren’t also asking God questions, we will never succeed at biblical discernment.
How To Ask God Questions.
You can call it prayer. Or talking to Jesus. Or whatever your favorite vocabulary for it is. But at some point in our spiritual formation, we have to learn to connect with God.
Like a friend or spouse we want to get to know better, we have to figure out how to bring God the truest version of ourselves, even if it’s messy or full of doubt. And we must learn to listen to him. To know which answers are actually from him.
How do we do that? Well, firstly, we just start. We talk to God, bringing him our thoughts and fears and requests. We pray. And it feels sometimes like we’re talking to an empty room. But the Bible is clear: God hears every one of our prayers.
And as far as listening to him, God speaks to us through the Bible, first and foremost. His answers for what we need to know are already in there. That’s why I’m convinced the more you know your Bible, the better equipped you’ll be to handle, well, everything.
How to Connect with God
But is that really it? Just “talk to him and read your Bible.” It’s such a church-y answer, isn’t it? And frankly, I always found it a bit unhelpful. A bit vague. And way too much like a checklist.
Said a prayer. Check. Read a chapter of my Bible. Check. So I’m good for the day, right? And yet, so often, I walked away unsatisfied. Like I was still missing something. Because I was. Maybe you are, too.
Now, don’t get me wrong. “Pray and read your Bible” is actually a good place to start. It’s not bad advice. But it isn’t necessarily enough to help us learn how to talk to God.
Because we don’t really want or need another checklist; we need a connection. And the key to that connection is the Holy Spirit.
And please know, we won’t be getting any new revelation from God in this connection. The Bible is a closed canon, as they say. But we aren’t looking for new revelation. We’re trying to figure out how to connect, to develop an actual two-way line of communication with God.
Start with His Voice
Here’s the key: Do you recognize the voice of God? Can you identify the Holy Spirit’s voice amid all the noise?
Of course, I’m not talking about a physical voice, like my husband or my kids. Could God speak to us literally? Sure. But he doesn’t. By “God’s voice” I mean the internal nudges, thoughts, reminders, Bible verses that spring to mind, and other ideas that we have.
Some of them are my own. Some of them are other voices from culture or the world. And some of them are from the Spirit. But how do we tell them apart?
I couldn’t. Not for a very long time. And when God started to deal with me in the area of my anxiety specifically, this was the first real obstacle I faced. What thoughts and responses and ideas were from God and which weren’t? And how could I tell the difference?
So I started with a very simple prayer: Teach me to know your voice. I prayed it regularly. I still do, even though I’m much better at recognizing the Spirit’s voice than I was then.
And of course, the process of recognizing his voice won’t be the same for all of us. But if we pray this prayer, God will begin to answer it. So start there.
Ask God Questions, But Which Ones?
But recognizing God’s voice is really about hearing his answers when we ask him questions. Which brings us back to our original point.
We need to ask God questions. But which ones? The simple answer—any questions you have. But in terms of discernment, here are few to get you started.
What parts of (fill in with your favorite song) are biblical? Which lyrics aren’t?
Do you like the shows I’m watching right now?
Please help me read this book with my brain turned on. I don’t want to get lost in deceptive ideas or feel-good philosophies.
Should I say this idea or do I need to keep it to myself? Should I join this argument or will I do more harm than good? (online or IRL)
(For Bible reading) How does this passage apply to me today? What’s one thing you want me to carry with me through the day?
Trusting God To Answer
There are so many questions we can ask God. Really any question at all. He will not snort at our silly questions or look down at us for not already knowing something.
He loves us and wants to connect with us. There is no doubt he wants to keep us from being deceived. He will help us.
And that’s where faith comes in. We can ask God questions all we want. But we also have to trust him enough to believe he will answer our questions.
We have to sit quietly and listen for that still, small voice the Bible describes. We have to come back to the same question, sometimes many times, to make sure we heard the Spirit accurately. But we can also thank him for his desire to communicate with us and for making it possible.
God wants to answer our questions. We can trust that he will. And it begins the moment you ask God what you most want to know.
