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Results from: Answered Bible Questions, Answers, Unanswered Bible Questions, Notes Ordered by Verse | ||||||
Results | Verse | Author | ID# | |||
1 | "My Sheep Hear My Voice" | John 10:27 | kalos | 165770 | ||
"My Sheep Hear My Voice" 'Many have taken this statement by Jesus in John 10 to refer to the Christian's acquired ability to "hear" God's personal instructions to him. "Hearing God's voice" is advocated as a very useful skill that aids optimal Christian living. Allegedly, this is a learned ability one gains as he matures in Christ. It enables him to sense Jesus' will in any given situation as he "hears" Jesus' voice. 'Jesus has nothing like this in mind, though. I know because of the context surrounding the verse and a key clarification John himself gives early in the chapter. In verse six, John explicitly states that when Jesus speaks of His sheep "hearing His voice" He is using a figure of speech.' NASB John 10:6 This figure of speech Jesus spoke to them, but they did not understand what those things were which He had been saying to them. 'The word "voice," then, can't actually mean some kind of inner voice because a thing is never a metaphor of itself. It's a picture of something else. Jesus must be referring, in a figure, to something else that the phrase "hear my voice" represents. What is it? 'The context tells the story. Jesus says, "My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me," and then adds, "and I give eternal life to them" (27-28). Note the sequence: His sheep hear His voice. They follow Him in response. He then gives them eternal life. Hearing Jesus' voice is a figure of speech for the inner working of the Holy Spirit that leads to our salvation. It results IN salvation; it's not the result OF salvation. It's applied here to non-believers destined for the Kingdom, not believers already in the Kingdom. 'This makes perfect sense in the broader context of the chapter. The Jews have no trouble hearing Jesus' words. They know what Jesus is saying. Their problem is that they don't respond with belief. Why don't the Jews "hear" Jesus by responding with belief? Jesus tells us plainly. They don't "hear" because God is not "speaking" to them. They are not among the sheep the Father has given to the Son (26). 'The voice being referred to here is not the still, small voice of private direction given by God to Christians, but the effective call of the Holy Spirit bringing non-Christians to salvation. 'Our paraphrase test comes to our aid once again: 'You do not believe, because you are not of My sheep. Mature Christians have the ability to sense My personal direction for their lives and obey it, and as a result I give eternal life to them, and they shall never perish; and no one shall snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all…. 'vs. 'You do not believe, because you are not of My sheep. The ones that the Father gives me, my sheep, are the ones that respond to my message and believe in me, and as a result I give eternal life to them, and they shall never perish; and no one shall snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all…. 'The first view actually makes salvation dependent on the ability to get personalized communications from God. The second makes salvation dependent on the Father, which is Jesus' point in the passage. 'To Jesus, "hearing" God is not an advanced skill one must develop to open lines of communication to the Father. It's a figure of speech. Hearing Jesus' voice is not getting individual, personalized direction. It's getting saved. It's the result of the Father drawing the non-believer into Jesus' arms.' (Never Read a Bible Verse By Gregory Koukl) ____________________ To read more go to: www.str.org At this website, under "Search Stand to Reason", enter the words: never read a Bible verse |
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2 | "My Sheep Hear My Voice" | John 10:27 | mark d seyler | 165788 | ||
Hi Kalos, This is an interesting post. As I have perused the places where the Bible speaks of hearing God, esp. NT, it is predominantly regarding salvation. I would agree with you that "hearing" God is not a skill we must develope. I believe it is something that comes with being a child of God. After all, He chose us to have relationship with Him, to be His children, and my Father does not just sit in heaven silently watching as I stumble around. Gregory Koukl would seem to agree with this as well. This is from his website "Stand to Reason" (str.org): "First of all, learning to hear the voice of God is not taught as a Christian discipline that we must learn in order to live the optimal Christian life. This is the "hotline to God" view in which we get specialized and tailor-made instructions for our personal lives. That is not taught in Scripture. Secondly, God sometimes does give specialized instructions, so I'm not saying that God can't do that and I'm not putting God in a box. He does sometimes give specialized instructions. He did in Biblical times and He does in the present. But when we read in the Bible especially in the New Testament, which is what our discussion is about today when He has done it, such specialized instructions are clear first of all. They are not mumbled. They are not whispered. They are not nudged. And they are, almost without exception in the New Testament, a sovereign intrusion by God into the circumstances rather than something that is first sought by a Christian. Thirdly, God's intrusion in these cases is sometimes through special gifts in the body that I believe are in full operation today, but are by very nature individual. In other words, every person has his own gift and each person does not have every gift. So this working through gifts can't be a means of every Christian hearing from God. In other words, sometimes God intervenes with a prophetic word, but since prophetic words only come through those people who have the gift of prophecy, it's not the kind of thing we all have to cultivate, to learn to do. Finally, there are clearly workings of the Spirit in the area of teaching, conviction of sin and comforting of individual Christians. I admit that those workings are private, individual and tailored to individual people. Those kinds of things are not in question here." What he says hear largely agrees with what I believe, although even here, he says both that the Bible does not teach that we can get specialized instructions from God, and in virtually the next breath that God does give specialized instruction, so one has to wonder, which is it? And what does he really believe? He is obviously an intelligent man, but he seems kind of hit and miss. Isn't this the guy that was saying it is ok to tell lies? And his interpretation of Col 3:15 seemed to ignore the plain reading of the text, while claiming context which ignored much of the actual context. I'd say be careful of this one. Love in Christ, Mark |
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Questions and/or Subjects for John 10:27 | Author | ||
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Hiram Abiff | ||
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Hiram Abiff | ||
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prazn | ||
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Joseph3 | ||
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kalos | ||
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mark d seyler | ||
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dolly beard | ||
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corin | ||
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hitman | ||
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Lou |