Listening for God In Your Difficult Moments
Sometimes it’s a struggle to pause and listen for God in the middle of difficult and trying times. When we’re hurting or scared, and we’re feeling so many emotions, it can be hard to settle our hearts enough to invite God into those moments. Quieting our loud souls enough to listen for God might even feel like the last thing we have time or capacity for.
But didn’t Jesus do exactly that? After the Last Supper, before he was betrayed by Judas, Jesus took the time to sit with his Father in the Garden of Gethsemane. He sought God in the middle of the hardest night of His time on earth, to listen for God.
Do you know why He made the time for that? I’m sure there are many reasons, but at the heart of them is this truth: He knew that God would meet Him in the hard. He knew God would speak to Him. He expected that God would guide Him, even in the most chaotic moment of His ministry and mission.
What if we knew God would meet us?
What if we were sure God would answer?
If we knew, with the same absolute assurance that Jesus held, that God will answer us in every difficult situation, seeking Him would be our natural first instinct.
So what if we made choices that show we do believe that? What if we choose Him, right here, in the middle of the hard moments?
If you are longing to hear Him louder in the difficult times, here are five postures that will guide you towards hearing Him louder in prayer. These postures are a progression, guiding us from a place of wanting to hear Him to a place of confidence and comfort that we will hear Him. Each statement and verse is a reminder to your heart that He will answer, and a prayer to Him that you’re ready to listen.
Five postures to help you listen for God even in difficult moments:
1. SEEK: Lord, I believe that when I seek you, I will find you.
Begin with the truth that is repeated throughout the Old and New Testaments: When we seek Him, we will find Him.
And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart. (Jeremiah 29:13)
2. KNOW: Lord, I know that you still speak and that you will speak to me.
Now add to that truth an assertion that you know this to be true. That you know He speaks. That you know, as one of His sheep, that you can hear His voice.
The sheep hear his voice and he calls his own sheep by name ... he goes before them, and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice. (John 10:3-4)
3. EXPECT: Lord, I expect that I will hear you.
Sometimes we remember to seek Him, and we share our hearts with Him, but we don’t expect Him to answer. Be sure to take the time to express your expectation that yes, you do anticipate hearing Him.
Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. (James 4:8)
4. LISTEN: Lord, I commit to creating time and space to listen for your voice.
As you pray, and share your questions and desires and confessions to God, be intentional about holding time to listen. Sometimes, we seek Him, but we don’t pause in our prayers to listen for Him, and sense His leading. Ask questions and then wait, and write down what you sense God is speaking to you.
I call upon you, for you will answer me, O God; incline your ear to me; hear my words. (Psalm 17:6)
5. CONNECT: Lord, I believe that when I listen for you, my heart will feel connected with you.
The continued practice of praying and listening will connect us with God more deeply. We will know Him more and hear Him louder.
When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. (John 16:13)
The more we practice the posture of listening — the more we make listening a practice — the more our hearts will recognize His voice, even in difficult times.
