Throughout this book you are going to hear "God said," "The Lord told me," and "The Father showed me." To those who have never experienced this kind of dialogue with the Holy Spirit, this may seem a little hard to believe. Please allow me to explain it this way. God has given some of us extra grace to push in and fight for a deeper relationship with Him. This grace I might add is available to all. "Friendship with God is reserved for those who reverence Him. With them alone he shares the secrets of His promises."--Psalms 25:14.

I realized at one point in my walk that although I had been a committed Christian since childhood, I didn't really know God. I had accepted him into my heart, and tried to serve him, but didn't KNOW Him. I can tell you from experience that it's hard to love someone that you don't know.

"Do you want more and more of God's kindness and peace? Then learn to know Him better and better. For as you know Him better, He will give you, through His great power, everything you need for living a truly good life: He even shares His own glory and goodness with us! ...You must learn to know God better and discover what he wants you to do. Next, learn to put aside your own desires so that you will become patient and godly, gladly letting God have his way with you. This will make possible the next step, which is for you to enjoy other people and to like them, and finally you will grow to love them deeply. The more you go on in this way, the more you will grow strong spiritually and become fruitful and useful to our Lord Jesus Christ."--II Peter 1:2-3&5-8.

The kingdom of God seems to be built on levels. The higher the level of relationship you achieve, the narrower a walk you must have. There is less room for sin or self. Picture a man on a narrow window ledge near the top of a high-rise building. That man would be pressed up against that wall, lest he fall, just as we must press into God. I can't resist being cliché' here because the scripture is so fitting. "Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall."--Proverbs 16:18.

If one gets puffed up because of their "superior" relationship with God, that one is sure to fall, because there is just no extra room on that ledge. The good news is that God's grace is ever present and even if we do fail, he will be there to pick us up, dust us off, and set our feet back on the right path.

SEEK

If you haven't heard the voice of God, it's O.K., that dimension of fellowship is available to you, too. The trick is, God won't reveal much if you don't ask Him or if you're not listening. "If you want to know what God wants you to do ask Him, and He will gladly tell you, for He is always ready to give a bountiful supply of wisdom to all who ask Him; He will not resent it."--James 1:5.

In the past, I went about my life assuming that if God wanted to speak to me, I would hear a voice from heaven and feel like I had been hit by a thunder bolt. "You are in error because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God."--Matthew 22:29 NIV. "Therefore I will reveal my name to my people and they shall know the power in that name. Then at last they will recognize that it is I, yes, I, who speaks to them."—Isaiah 52:6.

The still small voice thing was a mystery to me. God said to Elijah: "Go out, and stand on the mountain before the Lord." And behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind tore into the mountains and broke the rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a still small voice." --1 Kings 19:11-12.

I could write a whole separate book on listening to the voice of God and at least half of it would be about my failures to obey because I wasn't sure it was Him. "My sheep recognize my voice, and I know them, and they follow me."--John 10:27. For me, recognizing His voice definitely took practice. It will come through prayer as well as trial and error. In a desperate search for a deeper relationship with the Lord, I read many biographies of the great men of God, to see what they had that I didn't. The connective thread from Andrew Murray, George Mueller, Billy Graham to Benny Hinn and more, was prayer. All of the giants of our faith depended on prayer to nourish their faith, and realized that prayer and relationship are like manna, they have to be fresh each day to be effective. End Sample.

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