His Presence First
When it comes to hearing God, the question that I always get is, “Jason, when I hear God for others it’s easy, but I when I go to hear His voice for myself, I hit a wall.” Unfortunately, this happens a lot more than I would like to know. There is a confusion within the body of Christ that when we hear God for others and for ourselves, we are purely operating out of the gift of prophecy. This is true for one of them. I know you are probably thinking, this guy has lost it, right? Hear me out. I say that because we tend to get the two confused. When we listen for God’s voice for others, we are operating out of our ability to prophesy that is given by the Holy Spirit. When we hear God’s voice for ourselves, we are hearing Him out of a relational context.
“But what does that mean Jason?” I am so glad you asked. The reason why people are having difficulty hearing God for themselves is because there is lack in how much they engage with God and cultivating a relationship with Him. I see so many people spend so much time prophesying over everything that walks that there is an absence in priority with their relationship with God. I am not questioning the motives of people’s hearts. I am just stating that people can get so caught up with prophesying over people so much that their connection with God doesn’t have priority. I use to be this way until I realized that I was starving my need for face to face time with God. The same God who spoke to Moses face to face desires to speak to us and spend time with us (Numbers 12:6-8). He wanted to speak to speak to you before He did anyone else. Please know that.
The most important thing that I have learned in my journey of growing in the prophetic is that it’s always been about relationship with Jesus. Our prophetic voice is birthed out of the secret place with the Father. God is calling His prophets and those who feel led into the prophetic back into the secret place. This is not something new. He’s always been saying that and Jesus exemplified it well. If we want to be used by God, we must first cultivate a close and intimate relationship with Him first by being in His presence. Moses said, “God if your presence does not go with us, do not lead us up from here… Is it not by your going with us, so that we, I and Your people, may be distinguished from all the other people who are on the face of the earth?” (see Exodus 33:15, 16) Moses refused to be used by or go anywhere unless His presence was with him. It’s His presence that sets us apart.
All throughout the the Old and New Testament, we see an emphasis on God’s presence. Samuel grew in the presence, his calling as a prophet, and the first he heard God’s voice came while he was ministering to the Lord (see 1 Samuel 3). Jesus was so extremely close with the Father that he could do nothing of himself, unless it was something that he saw the Father doing. Whatever God did, Jesus did in like manner (see John 5:19). Paul Cain once said, “We are only as close to God as we want to be.” Some of the most healthy and powerful prophets and prophetic people spend time in His presence
