Bible Question: Is God still speak to man today? |
Bible Answer: Of course God still speaks to man today. We see in John Chapter 1 that Jesus was God from the beginning and that he came to earth to dwell among men. Then in John 14, Jesus again confirms that if you have seen him then you have seen the Father. He then goes on to say that when he returned to the Father that he would not leave the disciples comfortless, or without a leader as the Greek suggests. He then said that in his absence that he would send the Holy Spirit unto them. That then happened at the day of Pentacost. He has been doing that now since that day. In Ephesians chapters 1 and 3 Paul speaks very inclusively of the Holy Spirit sealing the believer at conversion. Hebrews 1 speaks how in times past God spoke to the prophets in many different ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son. Now depending on how you interpret Scripture, you will either arrive at the conclusion that what Jesus spoke was the final answer for all times, or you will find from the whole counsel of Scripture that all of Scripture was given by the Inspiration of God (1Tim. 3) and is still useful for us today. Again in John 14 and 16 Jesus said that the Comforter (the Holy Spirit) would come to teach us and to remind us of all things that he had spoken and taught. He also prayed in John 17 that the Father would sanctify the disciples by His truth, and then stated that his Word was truth. Wo here we can see 2 ways that God speaks today- by his Word, and by His Spirit. Ultimately it boils down to just one way though. The Spirit always leads back to Scripture becasue he leads to truth and the Word of God is truth. Now, I believe that there is a very important element that should be interjected here- that is that God is ALWAYS speaking and willing to still dwell with man in an ongoing vital relationship, but because of pride, self, or various other things that allow our hearts and spirits to be distracted- we have ultimately "quieted" the voice of God. Though he certainly have not quieted his voice in the sense that He is God and we do not ultimately have that real ability, we have kind of shut out his voice in our lives. In Isaiah, we find the Lord rebuking Israel for 2 main things- 1 they did not build a temple for him. He had told them that they needed to provide him with a place of dwelling, yet they did not- See Is. 66. 2 they were a very proud and self-sufficient people who did not have room in their lives for him- See Is. 57:15. I believe with all of my heart that if we will prepare a place for the Lord, yield ourselves fully to him without reservation and total obedience, and be humble before him then we will hear him speak. But witout humility and obedience-which leads to holiness-we will not be able to see God. Yet if we do things his way and wait on him to do all of the work in us and through us, then we will indeed still hear from God as people have all throughout time. Blessings Saintopher. |