The Sound of His Voice

After I posted Kelly's Quiet Sacrifice several months ago, many of you have been joining me in prayer for my precious friend with 2 small children, whose husband is currently serving in Iraq. As the Holidays are approaching, I know this is an especially difficult time for those with loved ones away from home. In the midst of this trying season of life, Kelly continues to rely on God and look for opportunities to grow in her faith. She wrote about something God has been teaching her and I hope you are blessed by it, as well. In her own words:

A few days ago I got a call from my husband.

For most people, this wouldn’t be anything more than a normal, every day event. But for me, whose husband is deployed in the Middle East for a year, a phone call is anything but normal. I know that he can’t call very often, but that doesn’t keep me from waiting and hoping and praying that he will. Each time it rings, I answer the phone wondering if it will be what I’m waiting for: the sound of his voice.

My husband’s voice. That voice that I know so well. That voice that tells me if he’s happy or sad; if he’s doing okay or bummed out; if he’s staying strong or growing weary. That voice is so important to me, because in our situation, the words don’t always communicate exactly what he’s thinking or feeling.

This is due to the fact that the location from which he calls is not at all private; instead, he calls from the middle of an “office” occupied by many other people. In fact, the room formerly played the roll of bathhouse, and so, as you can imagine, the acoustics are phenomenal (which is great if you’re belting out the second verse of “Climb Ev’ry Mountain” in the shower, but if you’re trying to have a personal conversation, it is less that preferable.)

By the time you consider security concerns and the “there-are-twenty-other-sweaty-Army-guys-listening-to-every-word-I-say-so-I-can’t-exactly-profess-my-unyielding-love-for-you” factor, our conversations can be less than worthy of a Shakespearean poetry award.

But that doesn’t mean that I can’t tell that my husband loves me, or that he misses me, or that he’s sad. I can tell all of those things not so much by what he says, but through his voice, because I know him – we’ve been married for over 7 years -- and that makes all the difference.

My ponderings on the sweet sound of my husband’s voice led me down the path of thinking about hearing God’s voice. And I thought, “Oh, God’s trying to teach me to listen to His voice.” But the more I thought about it and tried to complete the metaphor I was sure God was painting for me, the more confused I became. We don’t really hear the voice of God so much anymore.

Don’t get me wrong. I truly believe that God speaks to us in many ways these days – through Scripture, through His Spirit, through other believers – but I don’t think that many people actually physically hear God. They don’t look down and see God’s caller I.D. on their cell phones. (And by the way, if you do, would you mind forwarding that number to me please?) So as I thought about it, I decided that maybe God wasn’t trying to compare hearing my husband’s voice to hearing His voice.

And I was about ready to chalk it all up to me being a former English teacher just trying to find symbolic meaning in everything, when it hit me.

I might not hear God’s voice. But you know what? He hears mine. He knows it. Each time I pray, He can tell if I’m happy or sad, if I’m doing okay or if I’m bummed out, if I’m staying strong or growing weary. Just like I wait for my husband to call, God is waiting for us to talk to Him. He loves us; He loves for us to tell Him what’s going on in our lives, to share with Him our hurts and our happiness, to ask Him for help and direction and wisdom and hope. But unlike the phone calls with my husband, our conversations with God are private and personal and can be as long or as short as we like.

Through all of this, I realized that God doesn’t just want me to come to Him with a quick list of everything I want, but He wants me to talk to Him, to have a conversation with Him. He wants to hear my voice. Can you believe it? God knows my voice! The Creator of the World picks up His phone when He knows I’m on the other end of the line. He doesn’t just let it go to voicemail, He picks up and listens. And it doesn’t matter so much what I say, or if I get the words exactly right or say things in the right order, because God knows me, and that makes all the difference.

So I encourage you to make that call. Pray. Talk to God. He’s waiting to hear your voice today. He wants to know what you’re thinking and what you’re feeling because He loves you and He loves the sound of your voice.

And don’t worry if it’s been a while since you’ve talked. After all, He’s known you since before you were born.