The question can quietly haunt even the most committed follower of Jesus.

We long to hear God’s voice—until the moment we think it might disrupt our carefully laid plans and desires. I once spoke with a young woman who captured this feeling perfectly: “I’m too scared to listen to the Holy Spirit,” she said, “what if God says something I don’t like?”

I’ve known the feeling. I remember having the same fear at the beginning of my God conversations journey. What if God asked me to move to a country I didn’t want to live in? Or marry someone I didn’t like? What if God’s will doesn’t align with my desires?

Our fear of what God might say disappears when we remember what God is like. Adam’s story shows us why.

Adam was leading a Bible study for a group of people who were struggling with addictions and crime. One evening, he gave them a simple homework assignment: “Ask the Holy Spirit to speak to you this week. Then come back and tell us what God said.”

The next week, they gathered again, stories in hand. One couple was especially excited. They had each prayed separately—and incredibly, God had spoken the same thing to both of them.

Adam was hopeful. He thought of all the life-changing things God could say: “get free from drugs, care for your children, stop the criminal behaviour!” 

Instead, they beamed and said, “God told us to register our car!”

Adam was shocked. That was it? 

A week later, the couple came back with joy and a sense of victory. “We registered our car! What’s next?”

Can you see what’s happening here? That moment captures something essential about God’s voice. God doesn’t drop a mountain of demands on our shoulders. Like a loving and patient Father, He meets us where we are and invites us forward—one step at a time. Each word He speaks is tailored to our journey. Each step builds trust. Each instruction leads to healing and wholeness.

When we remember God’s character, we discover the Spirit’s voice is not something to fear. Jesus said it himself: “Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake?” (Matthew 7:9-10). God isn’t looking to trap or punish us. He’s guiding us gently, like the Good Shepherd he is.

Fear comes when we forget the character of God. God’s words are always good, always loving, always for us. As Jesus said, “The words I have spoken to you—they are full of the Spirit and life” (John 6:63b). God’s words aren’t burdens to bear—they’re nourishment to feed us. 

So yes, God may speak something unexpected. The Spirit may speak something that challenges us. But God will never speak anything unloving. God’s words bring life, not fear. God’s voice always leads us home.

Article supplied with thanks to God Conversations.

About the Author: Tania Harris is a pastor, speaker, author and the founder of God Conversations.

Feature image: Canva

Does fear of God help us hear the voice of the Holy Spirit? Some say it does… The concept is related to our obedience… that is, if God speaks, we should obey, and if we fear God, we’re more likely to do so.

Verses from the Old Testament like Psalm 25:14 are often quoted: “The LORD confides in those who fear him…” 

So are we supposed to fear God?

The truth is, fear works.

As a child growing up in church, I experienced the effectiveness of fear as a motivator. We were regularly reminded to fear God’s anger and punishment. This is why I ran to the altar repeatedly, ever ready to confess my sin and pray the sinner’s prayer. Each time, I was terrified that God hadn’t heard me; my words weren’t correct or I hadn’t prayed with enough sincerity. And so, fear led me back there over and over again. 

But is this the response God longs for? 

Fearing Jesus?

Here we remember that God sent Jesus to show us perfectly what God is like. “If you’ve seen me, you’ve seen the Father,” Jesus said (John 14:9). Jesus is the perfect image of the invisible God (Col. 1:15). So the question becomes… were people afraid of Jesus?

Indeed, we see the opposite.

Children ran to Jesus. 

“Sinners” flocked around him.

Jesus’ disciples were called friends, not subjects (John 15:15).

When we look at Jesus’ life, the only times people experienced fear was when he revealed his power. For example, the disciples were terrified when Jesus calmed the storm with just a few words. Who was this man who spoke to the wind and commanded the waves? The disciples were filled with fear in his presence – and yet Jesus told them not to be (Mark 4:35-41).

A fear reaction is natural in the presence of power. We fear that someone will hurt us, oppress us or impose their authority on us. Great power can and does instil fear, but only when it is experienced without love.

Love versus Fear

The truth is, fear is the opposite of love. The Apostle John expounds on this explicitly: “There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment.” (1 John 4:18a). In responding with fear, the disciples couldn’t fathom God’s love. To fear God is not to know his love (1 John 4:18b). 

Indeed, fear actively stops us from hearing God’s voice. This was the problem amongst God’s people at Mount Sinai. God’s great power as seen in the thunder and lightning caused the people to remain at a distance and insist Moses do the listening for them! (Exodus 20:18-19). Later, God specifically showed his preferred mode of revelation to Elijah – not through acts of power but through a deeply personal and intimate voice (1 Kings 19:11-12). 

The writer of Hebrews reiterates this further. We are commanded not to fear – since we have a “new mountain” – called Zion. This mountain is not characterised by the wind, earthquake and fire of Sinai, but by “thousands of angels in joyful assembly” and to Jesus – “who speaks a better word than Moses”! It is this motivation we’re given for refusing the “one who speaks” (Hebrews 12:18-25). 

When fear is used to motivate, we become externally driven rather than internally motivated. We become pretenders, behaving to please another, all the while our hearts are turning away. We behave because we have to, not because we want to.

So why do we insist on it?

And what about those “fear God” verses in the Old Testament?

The Importance of Obedience

It is true that the psalmist wrote that those who “fear God walk in obedience to him” (Psalm 128:1) and that “the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom: all who follow his precepts have good understanding.” (Psalm 111:10). 

In these verses, we see a clear emphasis on the importance of obedience to God’s ways. The consequences of disobeying God’s wisdom is real, producing deathly and toxic consequences in our lives and the lives of others. Hence, throughout the Scriptures, there is a recurring emphasis on the need to submit to God’s ways.

Jesus emphasised obedience too, but also clarified our motivation… the one who loves God keeps his commands! (John 14:21). Those who are friends with God do what he says (John 15:14-15). It is after receiving God’s grace that we leave our life of sin (John 8:11). Indeed, Zechariah, the father of John the Baptist phrased it well when he sung about Jesus – the one who enables us to serve God in holiness and righteousness without fear (Luke 1:74-75).

This approach does not dilute God’s holiness. God convicts and calls us to repentance while yet surrounding us with his grace and acceptance.

It does not dilute God’s wrath on sin. Disobedience to God’s ways will always produce deathly consequences that harm and destroy His beloved creation.

It does not diminish our awe and wonder of God’s power. We remain forever humbled by God’s sovereignty and authority.

But we must always remember that God never uses his power to threaten or coerce. As Jesus showed us, God’s love woos and draws. This approach emulates the heart of God towards us. Just as Jesus lay down his life in love, so too we are called to do the same.

We do not need to fear God more to hear the Spirit’s voice – we need to know God’s love more.

Article supplied with thanks to God Conversations.

About the Author: Tania Harris is a pastor, speaker, author and the founder of God Conversations.

Feature image: Canva

Pentecost Sunday is a Christian holiday celebrated each year on the 49th day after Easter Sunday. It marks the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on everyone, irrespective of their gender, age or status, and is the fulfilment of a promise given to the Ancient Hebrew prophets hundreds of years earlier and further told by Jesus before he left the earth. It was the moment everyone had been waiting for!

Pentecost Sunday was also one of the most life-changing events in church history. Along with a violent wind, tongues of fire rested on each person and people fell about in a seemingly drunken state. The experience of that day turned a hapless group of disheartened Jews into a force to be reckoned with. Amongst it all, the Apostle Peter stood up before the crowd and explained the significance of the occasion:

This is what was spoken by the prophet Joel:

“‘In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people.

Your sons and daughters will prophesy,

your young men will see visions,

your old men will dream dreams.” (Acts 2:16,17)

So what is the significance of Pentecost for us today? In the two thousand years since this event, there have been multiple different ways to understand this Day. While everyone agrees that the day marked a powerful dissemination of the Spirit on every person, they do not always agree on what this means for the ongoing church.

A New Spiritual Speech

For some – particularly those from the Pentecostal tradition – Pentecost Sunday means that when the Spirit is poured out on a person, everyone will be able to speak in a new spiritual language. Some of our most famous revivals since the first Pentecost show how this gift of spiritual speech has continued to occur. For some, this has meant being able to speak in a recognised language they have never learnt, while others emphasise a heavenly language that is useful for prayer and Paul mentions later in his letter to the Corinthian church (1 Cor. 14:2).

A Big Vision for Our Lives

Another reading of Peter’s interpretation of Acts 2 emphasises the idea that the Spirit’s outpouring makes us “visionaries.” This is a common understanding in Western churches. The phrase “dreams and visions” is understood to be a metaphor for our sanctified imagination. So with God, we can have a great “vision for our lives.” This “vision” points to a God-ordained destiny that transcends our natural limitations and imagination.

Empowerment for Miraculous Witness

The outpouring of the Spirit on every person is also equated with the ability to perform miracles in the pattern of Jesus. This includes miracles of healing as displayed in the lives of the early church leaders after Pentecost. Not only did the miracles usher in God’s kingdom, but they acted as a sign for witness so that others would turn to God. Believers would also be filled with boldness, courage and the capacity to take the message into new places and cultures. This empowerment for witness directly echoes Jesus’ words before he ascended to heaven: the disciples would “receive power” when the Holy Spirit came on them; and they would be his “witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” (Acts 1:8)

Ability to Prophesy

Another interpretation of Peter’s words is that the dissemination of the Spirit gives everyone the ability to prophesy – that is, to hear God’s voice on behalf of someone else.

This prophetic capacity is later qualified by Paul’s letter to the Corinthian church, when he writes that not everyone has a gift of prophecy or the call of a prophet (1 Corinthians 12). Later Paul writes that contemporary prophets in the church have a specialist vocation to equip the church to hear from God for themselves (Ephesians 4:11,12). In addition, they may be used of God to speak to the wider church (as in the example of Agabus, Acts 11:28).

Ability to Hear the Spirit for Ourselves

The final interpretation for the experiences of Pentecost is that Peter’s words reflect an understanding that every person has been given the ability to hear God’s voice for themselves. The phrases Peter quotes: “sons and daughters” and “young and old men” are presented in Acts 2 as a Hebrew parallelism. This is a poetic device (note how they are arranged in our Bibles) used to emphasise the fact that people from every demographic: young and old, male and female – now have access to the revelatory Spirit.

This is in contrast to the time of the Old Covenant, when only specially appointed people known as “prophets” could hear from God. Before Jesus, dreams and visions were the most common way God spoke to the prophets (Numbers 12:6, 1 Samuel 28:15b, Hosea 12:10). They would hear God’s voice in dreams and visions and then pass the message on as prophecy to the people.

This understanding of the backdrop of Pentecost places Peter’s words in context. For Peter, the big shift on Pentecost Sunday, was not primarily about endowment with power, a new prayer language or even boldness for mission, although all those things are important.

The most crucial shift on Pentecost was the capacity for all to receive direct revelation – to hear the continuing voice of Jesus in the Spirit and follow (John 10:27). This reiterates Jesus’ teachings before he died that the Spirit would speak as his continuing voice to remind them of Jesus and to speak about things to come (John 14:26; 16:13). It is from the place of Spirit revelation that has facilitated transformation and discipleship that we receive the commission to witness, speak prophetically to others, pray in the Spirit, heal the sick, testify to the kingdom and fulfil one’s God-given purpose.

Article supplied with thanks to God Conversations.

About the Author: Tania Harris is a pastor, speaker, author and the founder of God Conversations.

Feature image: Canva

What language does God speak? Hebrew? English? ‘Australian’?! Or perhaps, the one we best understand… 

Leigh’s God Conversation

Leigh had a high-profile career in the recruitment industry. In his role as National Accounts director, he was responsible for overseeing 2000 staff across multiple client accounts. It was a face-paced and high pressure position that involved strategic meetings, contract negotiations and frequent travel around the world. Though it was demanding and often stressful, Leigh thrived – at first. But after 13 years, Leigh began to experience a deep sense of un-fulfilment. Life was still good, but something was missing.

In the midst of his growing dissatisfaction, Leigh had a vivid dream. This was unusual since Leigh rarely remembered his dreams. In the dream, Leigh saw himself at the office, standing in front of his treasured whiteboard. Leigh was a big fan of whiteboards. He used them all the time to train and manage his staff and had multiple boards installed in his office. He even had a portable board for his travels.

In the dream, there was writing on the whiteboard. Written in the centre was Leigh’s job title: “national account director.” Then in a circle around his job title were written other areas of his life… “family”, “friends”, “God” and “church.” These were all written in non-permanent marker that was easily erased, but for some reason his job title was written in permanent ink. No matter how hard Leigh tried, it couldn’t be erased.

When Leigh woke up, he knew what God was saying. His job had become the most important area of his life and everything else had been relegated to second place.

After a heartfelt conversation with his wife, Leigh began to reorder his priorities. Later they began to explore a new path for his career—one that would eventually lead to full-time ministry.

God Speaks “Whiteboard”

Leigh’s God conversation shows us what language God speaks. The Holy Spirit spoke in a language Leigh was familiar with. In order to get the message across, God spoke “whiteboard!” The language God used communicated specifically to Leigh’s situation.

This is the beauty of hearing from the Holy Spirit. Remember, the Holy Spirit speaks to remind us of Jesus and then to apply his teachings to our unique situations (John 14:26, 16:13). On earth, Jesus had already spoken to the disciples about how to order their life priorities. God’s kingdom was to be sought first and then all the other areas would be provided for (Matthew 6:33).

Back then of course, Jesus spoke the language of Aramaic using the idioms and metaphors of first century Jews, but in Leigh’s life, the Holy Spirit took those truths and applied them using the language of a 21st century executive! In other words, the Holy Spirit acted as a kind of translator for Jesus.

Perhaps now we can see why Jesus said it was to our advantage that he left! (John 16:7)

The same Holy Spirit that spoke to Leigh has been given to each one of us. As in Leigh’s life, the Spirit takes the universal truths of Jesus and translates it to our personal situations so that we can respond to it. What language does God speak? The one we best understand. 

Article supplied with thanks to God Conversations.

About the Author: Tania Harris is a pastor, speaker, author and the founder of God Conversations.

Feature image: Photo by Slidebean on Unsplash