The Kingdom Cowboy

When God Is Silent #9

Summary:
When it seems like God has withdrawn from us or is being silent with us, it is seldom because He is mad at us or that we have done something wrong. As we get deeper into our relationship with Him, He starts speaking to us in various ways. But when we go through a time of not feeling His presence or hearing His voice, we can start to get very introspective. It is likely that God just wants you to get closer to Him by spending time with Him and/or spending more time in the written word (the Bible). We all have to remember that the most important thing is not what God says to us or what He gives to us. The most important thing is HIM, and just enjoying His presence, being with Him.
 
Show Notes:
When we start entering into a relationship with God, He wants to speak and commune with us in many different ways.
A lot of Christians tend to experience a small still voice when God speaks to them. It is a voice that you hear in your heart and mind, but you don’t hear it with your natural ear. There are, however, some people who do actually hear the audible voice of God.
When it seems like God is silent toward you at times, it is so easy to think that you have done something wrong, and are being punished for it. In most cases, that is not true at all.
When you are in a time of not hearing God that much, it’s so easy to think that you have to get busy and do something, when all the time God just wants you to stop and just enjoy His presence.
Asking God when you really, really need to know something isn’t bad, but you might find that when you go to the Lord without an agenda, and you are not there for anything, your list of wants and needs greatly decreases. “I’m just here for You, Lord”.
 
Quotes:
The average person out there who doesn’t go to church, when they hear someone talking about hearing God, they can automatically think that the one talking is hearing the audible voice of God.
Sometimes God will withdraw the tangible evidence of His presence and His voice to cause you to draw closer to Him.
Let’s not forget that God does speak to us through the written word, and maybe that silence is to drive us back to the Word, back to the Bible.
As we grow and deepen in our relationship with the Father, these are some of the things that we begin to understand, that even if we have messed up, He still wants to talk to us.
 
References:
Hebrews 13:5
John 11:27
Isaiah 55:8-9
Romans 12:1
 
Takeaways:
As we grow in our relationship with the Father, we start to sense Him and hear Him more. We get used to feeling Him close to us, but there are times when He seems to withdraw His presence and His voice from us. When this happens to us, it is natural to think that you have done something wrong, or made God mad you in some way. Most of the time, that’s not the case at all. In most cases, God is just pulling us into a deeper place with Him, and is wanting for us to press into the written word (the Bible) more.
 

Can Anyone Hear God? #8

Summary:
 
God created everything for one simple reason; to have a people that He can love, commune and talk with, and have a close relationship with. There has never been a more important time than now to develop a relationship with the Father and learn His voice.
Having a drive to be close to Him and making it a priority in our lives makes God happier than any of us can understand at this point.
 
 
Show Notes:
 
It’s so important to make it a priority if we want to hear God. The secret is getting in the mode of listening for Him to speak to you.
The first thing I always tell people on the subject of hearing God is to learn to relate to God as Father, which sets everything else in proper perspective.
The love that the Father has for us and the relationship that He wants to have with us is probably the very most important thing in life.
God loves it when you take the time to be with Him and come without an agenda. That allows the Lord to tell you what your agenda should really be. That’s hard for some people, because they have all these things that they really feel like they need to hear the Lord on.
There’s coming a time when everything that can be shaken will be shaken. That’s why now it more important than ever to get a close relationship with the Father, and learn to hear His voice and what He wants to speak to you in this season that we are in spiritually.
 
 
Quotes:
 
“Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God”. So that just says that the sustenance for our life really comes from the things that God says.
I’ve been on a mission to help people know that they can hear God.
I think you can make trying to hear God too hard. It’s really pretty simple. One of the most important things is to stay in the mode.
I’m a huge proponent of taking time where it’s just you and Him, but we can also hear God on the run, in our daily lives.
I told the Lord recently while waiting on Him that He always shows up. In a still small voice He told me, “I never show up. I’m always here. You’re the one who shows up”. There’s never a time that God doesn’t have time for you.
Anytime you want to get together and spend time with the Lord, He’s always game for it. There’s never a bad time for it. It’s always a good time.
 
 
References:
 
Matthew 4:4
John 6:44
Romans 3:23
Romans 6:23
 
 
Take Away:
 
There has never been a more important time than now to develop a relationship with the Father and learn His voice. All that God created boils down to one thing; that He have a people that He can love, can commune and talk with, and have a close relationship with.
 

Listening To God - Worship - What Is The Lord Saying To You? #7

Summary:
 
Coming into an ability to hear what God wants to say to us should be one of the greatest things we ever reach into the Father for. Any good conversation should be two sided. Always talking and never listening won’t get you very far in your walk with God. It’s not our pastor’s or shepherd’s responsibility to go and get a word from God for us. We have to develop an ability to hear from Him for ourselves, and the directions He wants us to take.
 
 
 
Show Notes:
 
We are encouraged to pray to the Lord, but we need to also listen. Listening is a tough skill to learn. A good conversation should always be two sided.
It’s natural for people to want their opinions heard, so they tend to talk over others. But when you’re listening to the Lord, who are we, to talk over Him?
One of the biggest challenges when trying to hear God are distractions and how to deal with them. As we keep reaching in to hear Him, the blessings, favor and power of God start to come through.
A key to help you with these distractions is worship. Just start telling the Lord that you love Him, praising Him and showing Him adoration, which calibrates your heart and lifts you up into a better place.
Andy learned early on as a shepherd to encourage people, especially younger ones, who expected him to tell them what to do concerning situations, to go to the Father themselves for their direction, rather than having him tell them. This caused them to connect and interact with the Father.
 
Quotes:
 
I believe there’s a steady flow of information pertaining to us, about us, coming from the throne of God all the time. So we need to learn how to get into a place where we can hear that.
When you start to hear the Lord and see the blessing, favor and power of God in the things that He says, it really helps.
We learn through repetition and leaning into that relationship with Him. We learn the sound of His voice and the ways He speaks to us. It’s learned behavior.
People think that the holy guy, the pastor, the shepherd, apostle, prophet, or evangelist is the one who is supposed to hear God. My responsibility is to tell you that you can hear God as well as I can.
God would rather talk to you about you than He would like to talk to someone else about you, which makes sense from just a purely logical position.
 
References:
 
Hebrews 13:5
 
 
 
 
Take Away:
 
It’s not the responsibility of your pastor or shepherd to go to God for direction for your life; it’s your responsibility to hear God and to know what He wants you to do, and where He wants you to go. To do this, you have to learn to listen for His voice and allow Him to speak to you, as you commune with Him. Being able to hear His voice is one of the most treasured things you can ever have from the Father.
 
 
 

Hearing God - He Wants To speak To You #6

Summary:
 
God longs to have sons and daughters that He can commune with, who can be functional contributors to what He wants to bring forth. He is doing everything He can to draw us in close enough so we can hear Him speak to us. There are many ways that He speaks, and it so very important that we take the time and stay close enough to Him to hear Him. The problem is not whether God is speaking or not, it’s whether we are listening or not.
 
 
 
Show Notes:
 
Andy’s book, “Reading The Bible For All It’s Worth”, is written in bite-sized format, with each chapter being three to four pages long. You can read very few pages and get little keys to help yourself understand the word. This is important because you’re not going to enjoy the Bible if you don’t understand it.
Andy recommends the New Kings James Version of the Bible because it’s easier to read than the King James Version, but he found it to be really, really true and close to the King James Version.
It’s so very important that we understand that God wants to speak to us and He communicates to us in a wide, wide variety of ways.
The more you make it a priority to hear God, the more it will happen.
Going to the Father with no agenda is so much better than going to Him with a long list of things you want Him to do. Rather, just come in and say, “Here I am, Lord”.
God tells us everything that we need to know, in precise timing. Andy suggests that we should approach our time with the Lord that way.
There are times when God, even though He is always with us, seems to get lost for a season where you don’t feel Him. By doing that, He helps us to draw closer to Him.
 
Quotes
 
If you stop and think about it and boil it down to the simplest element, it’s your relationship with the Father. God is what He is, but Father is who He is. Knowing He is Father is not the same as knowing Him as Father.
Dads want to talk to their kids, they want to communicate.
I believe there’s a steady flow of information from the throne of God, from God toward us, about us, and to us all the time. So I get tuned in, get into the Spirit, pay attention, and start learning the ways that God speaks to me.
This could be the greatest move of God that there’s ever going to be, and, you know, time will prove whether we’re right about that or not. The worst thing that can happen in our household is if that doesn’t happen. To me, if it doesn’t, our people just got over prepared.
People who pray hear God better than people who don’t.
Recently I said to the Lord, “You always show up”, and He said in a still small voice, “I never show up. I’m always here. You are the one that showed up”.
Sometimes people are not hearing what God is saying because He’s not saying what they want Him to say. We have to understand that everything that God says to us brings life.
 
References:
 
Matthew 6:5-6
John 10:27
 
 
 
Take Away:
 
The Father is doing everything He can to draw is in close enough so we can hear Him speak to us. There are many ways that He speaks, and it so very important that we take the time and stay close enough to Him to hear Him. The problem is not whether God is speaking or not, it’s whether we are listening or not.
 
 

Reading Your Bible and Being Born Again #5

Summary:
 
It’s through being born again, reading the Bible, allowing the Holy Spirit to come along- side as our helper, and using the measure of faith that God has given, that we are able to grow, become mature in the Lord and find our significance in the Body of Christ. For most of us, it’s not being religious about reading the word, but it’s about enjoying what we are reading that makes us reach in for more.
 
 
Show Notes:
 
Andy talks about the first book that he wrote, Reading Your Bible For All It’s Worth.
Most people prefer to read books with shorter chapters so they can feel some sense of finality without having to read 25 to 35 pages to get there.
Most of us really want to hear from God, and one of the key ways is through reading the Bible.
To be able to understand the Bible, it’s very important that you be born again.
The Holy Spirit is our teacher and starts to give us the mind of Christ, because the Spirit of God lives in us. He’s always there to help and comes along side of us.
We all have been given the same measure of faith, the same measure of faith that Billy Graham has. It’s whatever you do with that faith that dictates whether it grows, or whether it lays there dormant. You have to use it or it has no effect in your life.
Quotes:
 
God’s gifted all of us in certain ways. One of the ways God has gifted me is to take some pretty complex scriptural issues and make them really, really simple. So that’s what I’ve done in the book.
So my book, Reading Your Bible For All It’s Worth, has no chapter more than three to four pages, so you can pick it up anywhere, thumb through it and find a tip that will help you.
People are not going to read their Bible if they don’t enjoy it.
If we are going to find our significance and find our place where we can function in the Kingdom of God, we have to get into the word until the word gets into us.
When we get this awareness brought on by the Holy Spirit that we need to be born again, then it’s a simple matter of just receiving it.
Most people have a spot in their life where they really felt like God drew them. No man comes to the Father, unless He draws him. It’s not our doing, it is the Father’s doing through Jesus with the help of the Spirit. All we have to do is just cooperate with the plan of God.
References:
 
Romans 12:3
Romans 10:17
 
 
Take Away:
 
“Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God” (Romans 10:17). It’s only by us enjoying God’s word and desiring to grow and become what it says, are we going to mature and find our place to function in the Body of Christ.
 
 

Where To Start Reading Your Bible and Hearing God #4

Summary:Learning to read and grasping an understanding of the Bible opens up that ability to starthearing God’s voice, the reality of becoming one of God’s sons and coming to knowGod as Father, and not just about Him. So you can see how the Bible becomes thegateway to just about everything that God has for us.
 
Show Notes:• Andy explains how he started reading the Bible.• He prefers the book of John as a starting place because it refers quite a bit moreregarding the Father than the other three gospels.• Andy has made hearing from God a huge priority for many years.• He encourages beginners to not to read a lot at one time. Better to read just achapter at a time.• We are encouraged to meditate at times on the word, in that you just read to let itsink in a little.• Understanding that God is Father and starting to relate to Him as such sets everyother thing, both spiritual, and non spiritual in perfect perspective.
 
Quotes:• After being asked questions, I’d look in the Bible, I’d look, look, look, look, look.That’s how I learned my way around the Bible.• I think it’s really, really important that you get an early-on understanding of graceand the new covenant is that you start in the New Testament, Matthew, Mark,Luke and John, but first in the book of John. John refers to the Father quite a bitmore.• All scripture is given by inspiration from God.• I’ve never heard the audible voice of God, but that’s not the only way that Godspeaks. He’s got all kinds of ways of speaking to us. And one of the key ways isthe word of God.• The word says that the Holy Spirit is our teacher. And He lives in us. Hequickens and makes alive the words that we read• Prepare your heart, get in the moment and deal with the distractions.• When we hear God, you gotta at least assume that there’s more to it than what youfirst understand.• Learning to come into our sonship is one of the key elements of the Kingdom life.• A key thing in the kingdom life is learning that we’re a handpicked son, which isnot gender specific.• A key thing in the kingdom life is learning that we’re a handpicked son, which isnot gender specific.
 
References:Book by Dallas Willard, “Developing a Conversational Relationship with God”.Romans 8:14Acts 17:26Galatians 4:6
 
Take Away:Learning to read and grasping an understanding of the Bible opens up that ability to starthearing God’s voice, the reality of becoming one of God’s sons and coming to knowGod as Father, and not just about Him

How To Listen And Spend Time With The Father #3

Summary:
 
It’s having a relationship where you start to hear the voice of God, and the many ways that the Father can speak to you. It’s so important to set aside quiet time, where it’s just you and Him. There is no substitute for getting to know the Father through spending time with Him, to learn His voice.
 
 
Show Notes:
 
When we should make it a priority to spend time with the Lord. It’s just making time with Him and focusing on Him with no agenda.
When starting out having quiet times with the Father, it better to do it in short increments of time, where you can really focus on Him.
The more you practice these things, the easier it gets to get past the distractions and really focus on the Father.
In Philippians 4:8, it talks about meditating on things that are pure, lovely, noble right, admirable and excellent.
God can and does speak to us in so many different ways in including our circumstances, audibly, dreams, and visions,a word of wisdom and knowledge, but the two that stand out are that a small still voice and through God’s written Word.
When starting to read the Bible, you don’t have to read a lot. Find a place with some words that Jesus spoke would be great.
 
Quotes:
 
I don’t have a certain set time or day that I spend time with Him, but I do have some times during the week, several times during the week.
If we experience nothing more than His presence when spending time with the Father, that’s enough.
When reading the word, start with some of the words of Jesus would be great.
It’s always just you and Him. That’s the kind of commitment that God has made with us. And He’ll never leave us nor forsake us...
Don’t over try. Meditate, think and get in the moment and just listen. It’s simple.
 
References:
 
Philippians 4:8
Hebrews 13:5-6
Matthew 24:24
Proverbs 3:5
 
 
 
Take Away:
 
God is always here with us. It’s up to each of us to give Him time where He can speak to us and guide us every day. There is no substitute for getting to know the Father through spending time with Him, to learn His voice.
 
 

Introduction To The Father #2

Summary:
 
Relating to God as Father brings you much closer to Him than just relating to Him as God up there somewhere. So many people have a conceptual knowing that God is a Father, but not nearly as many folks really know Him as Father. If we can get past the distractions and start spending time with Him, we will come to realize that the prize is not what God gives, but the prize is God Himself.
 
 
Show Notes:
 
There are many who had a dad who was not there or one who was critical toward them. God said that He would never leave us or forsake us and He is always good to us.
In Luke 11:1-2, “Our Father”, Jesus gives us permission to relate to God, just exactly like He relates to Him as Father. It’s something we should take full advantage of.
When spending time with the Father, the prize isn’t what God will give to you, but the real prize is God Himself.
 
Quotes:
 
God is not looking for a congregation, He’s looking for a family. If He is looking for something other than a family, He would have called Himself something other than a Father.
It’s just a gamble of trusting God as Father and calling Him Father, Dad, Daddy, whatever, just starting that process, and engaging in the relationship.
It’s a stretch for some, but it’s the only fix for fatherless people or an orphan mindset.
Somewhere along the way, as I read and studied, He began to reveal Himself as Father.
You don’t have to have had a good father to be a good father, but you don have to be a good son to be a good father.
There is no substitute for time with the Father. I’m going to the Lord with no agenda.
My time with the Father now, and all the revelation that is coming, is from sitting in my living room by myself with no agenda. I usually tell the Lord, “I don’t know anything.”
Let Him speak if that’s what He wants to, or let Him not speak if He doesn’t want to, but enjoy the presence of the Lord.
 
References
 
Hebrews 13:5
John 5:39-40
Luke 11:1-2
Psalms 34:8
Philippians 4:6
 
 
Take Away:
 
Learn to relate to God as Father, rather than a God who is somewhere out there who is not attainable. Coming into an intimate, close relationship with the Father becomes all that you ever really wanted out of your walk with God. It’s not what He gives to us that matters as much as what He becomes to us as we walk with Him.