God Is Ready to Speak

It is a great truth, almost as evident on natural as it undoubtedly is evident on Scriptural grounds, that, when we have given ourselves wholly to God, he will give himself to us in all that is necessary and important for us. And this general principle involves the subordinate idea, that he is willing to communicate knowledge, and to become our TEACHER. We ought not to doubt, that God is ready to speak to us with all the kindness of a Father, and to make known all that is necessary for us. And while in the process of teaching and guiding men, he operates outwardly, even at the present day, by means of his written word; he also operates inwardly by means of interior communications. Sometimes by sudden suggestions, in the manner which has already been mentioned; but much more frequently and satisfactorily, by availing himself of the more ordinary laws of the mind's acting; and by uttering his inward voice through the decisions of  a spiritually enlightened judgment. This is a great practical and religious truth, however much it may be unknown in the experience of those who are not holy in heart, that the decision of a truly sanctified judgment is, and of necessity must be, the voice of God speaking in the soul.

The Voice of God in the Soul

"I laid my request before the Lord, and the Lord, answered me." 

This is a remark, which is frequently made by persons of eminent piety. They cannot doubt that they truly hold communication with God. Addressing him either in silence or the spoken utterance of words, they find that they do not ask without receiving. God speaks to them in return.

It is important to understand the nature of the answers which God gives. In those earlier religious dispensations, of which we have an account in the Old Testament, God answered his people in various ways; by visible signs, by the cloud and the fire, by Urim and Thummim, by miracles, by audible voices. The periods of those dispensations have passed away, and the methods of communication, which were appropriate to them, have passed away also. What are we to understand, then, by the divine utterance, the voice of God, in the soul, of which those persons, who are eminently pious at the present time, have frequent occasion to speak?

We remark in the first place, that one class of those inward utterances, which are frequently regarded as returns or answers from God, appear to be impressions, or rather suggested thoughts or suggestions, which are suddenly but distinctly originated in the mind; and apparently from some cause independent of the mind itself. Sometimes the suggestion consists in suddenly bringing to the mind a particular passage of Scripture, which is received as the divine answer.