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Five areas to create space in trying to learn to hear from God.

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I’m going to briefly share the five areas, but my hope is that you would just pick one, that you could do one small thing to create some more space to hear from him. The five areas that he highlighted to me was we need to make spiritual space, mental space, emotional space, schedule, time, space. And we need, we don’t need to make physical space, but it’s nice if we can make physical space, spiritual space. What do I mean by making spiritual space? Um, if there’s not room in our belief system that God can talk to us, it’s going to be really hard to hear him. Um, so there could be wrong beliefs about God. Like the church I grew up in, said God spoke through the Bible only ever. Um, so that would make it really hard to believe that he was going to communicate uniquely personally with me.

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But then we also can have wrong beliefs about ourselves. Like, well, God does that for other people, but I don’t know if he’s going to do that for me. Um, I don’t think I have it together enough or I don’t think I’ve been good enough for haven’t spent enough time. Whatever those kinds of thoughts and those wrong beliefs can spiritually get in the way. And another key piece that he showed me this morning is if we have judgment against someone because maybe they, we think they hear better than we do, or, um, the really dangerous ones are where maybe someone has said they heard from God, but they were actually just manipulating you. And so maybe you went, I’m never going to be like that yet. You want to hear from God. And um, so those things, um, like spiritually, there might be some stuff to clean out, to create space.

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Um, so that might mean forgiving. It might mean repenting. Um, it might mean some healing. And then we need to make mental space our brains, I think especially as women are going all the time and way too many directions and if we’re consumed in our own thoughts, then it’s hard to hear his thoughts. Just all the things to do, all the things you worry about with your kids. Um, our dreams and our goals, there are just so many distractions in our culture and the dings of our phone, just so many distractions. So we need to make a mental space to hear from him. And so maybe that’s writing things down. Um, maybe it’s talking things out. Maybe it’s just being more intentional that if you’ve thought through something that you’re not going to think about it anymore. If you’re going to give yourself 10 minutes a day to think about that and then the mental space for his voice.

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Um, then emotional space is the third one. Emotional space, all the feelings. Oh my gosh, right now I think is just worse than ever with the whole covert thing and more time on social media. For most people it seems, and like we have all of our own personal stuff, but then there’s all of the drama in society and if we just let those emotions roll and direct us, then again, it’s hard to hear from him because our emotions are screaming at us and are vying for our attention. But the answer isn’t to ignore your emotions. The answer is to get the message that your emotions have for you so that you can set them aside. Um, the Lord has been teaching me that our emotions are actually another sentence. So like we have the sense of touch, we have the sense of smell, it gives us information we need to make choices.

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You know, when you’ve got little ones running around and you smell something and you’re like, Oh, somebody needs to be changed. Like it’s not a pleasant thing, but it’s giving you information you need and our emotions, not that they’re all unpleasant, but it could be the same thing. It’s giving us information that we need to make choices and take care of ourselves. And so if we will acknowledge that and learn from them, then they can pass on. Just like that smell can go away once you take care of it. So make that emotional space to be able to hear from him as well. And then the schedule, and I know this is a challenge for moms, like as I have my first three were, there was 13 months between the first two and 15 months between the next two. So I know when it’s like to be a busy mom with little people that need you all the time, this can kind of go back to the spiritual space of like if we believe we have to have a set amount of quiet time with the Bible, with a Bible study, with a notebook, those kinds of, you know, we have like, it has to be this way to count, then it’s really hard to make the time.

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But if we look at God wanting to meet us wherever we are, like he knows what season we’re in, he knows what we need so he can connect with us in small little moments like, and connect with us through the day, making, making time, making space in our schedule. If there’s a way that you can, you know, whether that’s get up before the kids have the kids have alone time so that you can have time with God. Um, trade with a friend, a spouse help. Like if you can come up with a way to have that extended quiet space, obviously that is a wonderful, but God’s not mad at you if you can’t and he’s not going to say, well I’ll talk to you when you can get that together. When my first three were little, um, and it’s kinda funny cause my three year old is out there watching the show right now.

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They would watch Clifford on PBS and um, so I’m letting them watch and on. This is when it was like actual TV and so you had to be on the TV at the right time to watch the show. Um, but so they were watching Clifford and I was doing whatever, trying to take care of housework, laundry, dishes, whatever. And the theme song says Clifford needed Emily. So she chose him for her very own and God pricked my spirits and was like, that’s why I chose you. That’s why I love you because you needed to want, I’m just doing my stuff. Being a mom surrounded by three busy people and God spoke to me and he wants to do that for all of us all the time. So touched my heart. There’s like, Oh yeah, I needed you. It’s not because I’m lovely or because I have anything to offer is just because I needed you that you loved me.

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And so he can speak to us without, okay, I’m sitting down to listen to you right now. You can speak to us any time. Um, and like yesterday I woke up with the phrase from, I forgot to look up who sings it, but I’m fully known and loved by you and just on repeat in my spirit, like just constantly and fully known and loved by you. And I chose rather than going, Oh, I have this song stuck in my head too. Okay. That is the Lord speaking to me. Is the Lord ministering to me and just meditate all day on what does it mean that he fully knows me and loves me anyway. Um, one of my biggest, I don’t know, like trust breakers or whatever is to not be known in human relationship. So for him to be speaking that to me, like you are fully known, you’re fully known and going, well what does that look like and what does that mean?

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And just letting him minister to me through the day through that simple phrase of the song and she was choosing to go, okay, this is him speaking to me. And sometimes, you know, obviously the Clifford song, it’s, it’s not a Christian song by any means, but that he still used it to speak to me. Wonderful to have that scheduled time, but it’s not required and it’s not going to keep you from hearing as though the fifth way that he said that we can make spaces physically make space and you know, if you have the luxury of having a separate room or an office or maybe you have a favorite coffee shop and that kind of thing is wonderful. But again, don’t put yourself in the place of, well I’m not going to be able to hear until I have that. I love to connect with him out in the sunshine.

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I take my notebook and I go out in the sun. Um, maybe you have a favorite chair. And one story that I absolutely love is Susanna Wesley had, I don’t remember now how many kids, 14, 17 something. Lots of kids. The way that she made physical space to spend time with the Lord was she put her apron over her head and the kids knew that she was spending time with God and they needed to leave her alone. Maybe that’s what it takes. And for me, like I have a notebook, like that’s my physical. I’ve got my notebook. Not that I don’t hear from God other times, but if I’m setting like this is a time I’m going to go write out my thoughts, write out my prayers, ask him questions and listen for his answers. Like I’ve got my notebook, I’ve got that physical thing.

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She had her apron, she put her apron over her head and, and prayed. And um, she’s somebody I would love to learn more about. And obviously she had a connection with the Lord because two of her sons went on to make global impact, you know, so really she made global impact. And because she didn’t let her relationship with the Lord wait until her kids were older or until something else was perfect, she just made time for the Lord. And if we believe the scripture that children are a blessing of the Lord, then obviously he’s not going to bless us with them and then not talk to us till they’re raised. Like we need him while we’re raising them more than, than any other time. So the five areas that you can create space, our spiritual, mental, emotional schedule or time, space and physical space. And so just encourage you to pick one of those that he highlighted to you, watching this and just comment which one it was and what’s one small thing that you can do to create space to hear from Him today or through this next week?