dr Alfred tomatoes in his 50 year career of studying hearing and nose throat, doctor had the most unique case when an opera singer stepped into his office, this opera singer was in the height of his career and out of nowhere found himself unable to hit certain notes that was well within his vocal range. This opera singer had visit other specialists but they believed that he was dealing with a vocal cord issue. But dr tomatoes had another theory using a tsunami. Er he found out that opera singers project at a decibel level Equal to that of a military jet taking off from an aircraft carrier at 140 decibels. As it turns out this particular singer in a sense, sung himself death. He literally could not hear certain certain notes within his range. And what they found is that if you cannot hear a note, you cannot sing a note. Now. The french Academy of Medicine has since described this phenomenon as the tomatoes effect. And so it wasn't so much a speaking issue as it was a listening issue and without knowing it, he was deaf to certain sounds that he was used to in the same way I want to ask you the questions that are you facing any spiritual levels of deafness in your life? Are there areas that you cannot seem to hear the voice of God? Well, before we even talk about the voice of God, what voices are you listening to? Maybe maybe you're just being surrounded by noise, we live in a culture where it seems like everyone has something to say, But who's really speaking, truth, what voices are you listening to? Maybe you've been listening for far too long to the voice of self indulgence or the voice of self doubt or the voice of self deprecation. Maybe for far too long. You have been having continual conversations with shame and guilt in a poor self image. Maybe you've been influenced, bye social media or the news around you or a negative voice that's speaking into you. But where God has moved, we have to understand that God is speaking, which is why we want to talk about hearing the voice of God. So if you're taking notes that today's message is entitled the power of a whisper, The power of a whisper and whether you're watching here or you're joining us right now online, we're gonna spend the next several weeks talking about how do you hear the voice of God? For those that might be interested in a growth group along with scriptural teachings, we are using this as a launch pad for our series. It's a book by Mark Patterson that's entitled whisper. We're gonna be walking through this as a growth group ministry together or if you are interested in this, we have these books available for you at our information table after the service. But right now for the next 20 or so minutes, 20-30 minutes I want to talk about this idea that if you cannot hear the voice of God then you won't sing God's song and your life will be off key. If you can't hear God's voice, then you won't sing God's song and your life will be off key. So I want to encourage you to lean in and listen up to what is God speaking to your heart today and talking about the voice of God. We're gonna share what are different ways that God speaks and how can you position yourself to listen to God in your life and what voices other than scripture should you even be listening to? So we're gonna take a deeper dive into those for weeks to come. So I want to encourage you to be back next week or tune in next week with us online. But for today, I want to share with you three truths about hearing God's voice. three truths about hearing God's voice. First is this When God speaks, he creates when God speaks, he creates The very, very first book of the Bible Genesis. Chapter one verse 3 reads this and God said, Let there be light and there was light. four words, Let there be light are still creating thousands of years later and expanding in our universe and our Galaxies God could have chosen many different ways in which he created the world as we know it. But he decided to use the very power of his word and that power of his word. That power is available to you and to me. And if you know me, if you if we've been friends, there's chances you've heard me say this phrase before, but it still blows my mind and I can't wrap my brain around it. And so I want to share it again with you. And that's this that think about it for just a second that God commanded nothing and nothingness obeyed him. Think about that God spoke into darkness, spoke into nothingness and out of nothingness, everything that we know was created. And the reason that's important is because for some of you this has been a very tough year and you feel like you have nothing left to give but understand this. That when you have nothing left to give to God, God is still ready to create something within you. And so I want to ask you this question, What is God creating within you? What has God called you to do? What is God speaking or whispering into your spirit right now? What dream has he laid on your heart? What relationship? What conversation that you need to have with someone that God is prompting you, leading you speaking to you right now? What is God doing to create in your spirit? God's words are powerful, but we have to know that our words are powerful. I remember while in college taking my first few bible classes and teaching the bible for the first time, getting some positive feedback from people that I was interacting with and those small words spoken at the right time changed my destiny forever. Think about yourself. Has there been a time in your life Where one conversation, one word, one moment that was placed at the exact moment that you needed change the course of your destiny. It's because powers are words have power and there are power within our words. So parents think about that and how you speak to your kids, teachers think about that. Speaking to your students or if you're in your workplace or business speaking to employees or employers, your words have power and have the ability to create in somebody else. Something new. Just as God's words spoken to you right now could create something fresh in your spirit and I don't know about you but I feel like I think our world has had enough of 2020 and I think we're ready for something new. But let us remember let us take courage and the fact that when God speaks god creates and God is still speaking today and I'm here to tell you that I'm listening and I hope you are as well remember the second thing, the second truth that I want to discuss with you today is that when God whispers, he is close, When God whispers, he is close, when he speaks he creates. But when he whispers, he is close. There's a story found in the Old Testament in the book First Kings chapter 19 The prophet Elijah and he had just finished defeating 450 prophets of bail a literal mountain top experience. But right after that awesome spiritual high in victory his life is threatened and so he runs away And if you've ever had a spiritual high sometimes that's followed by a spiritual valley. And so he literally runs 40 miles away into a mountainside into a cave and he tells God, I'm done. I'm done. Ready end it in this life, I'm done. The guard wasn't done with him even though he might have been done with God. And he speaks these words starting in verse 11 and God said go out and stand on the mount before the Lord and behold the Lord passed by and a great and strong wind tore the mountains and broke in pieces the rocks before the Lord. But the Lord was not in the wind and after the wind an earthquake but the Lord was not in the earthquake and after the earthquake of fire. But the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire the sound of a low whisper when Elijah heard it he wrapped his face in his cloak and he went out and stood at the entrance of the cave and behold there came a voice to him and said, what are you doing here Elijah. Now we could preach a whole another message on how when Elijah received his voice when Elijah I heard the voice of God again, he stood up and he went on to accomplish his mission and his purpose. But for today I just want to focus in on how God spoke to Elijah because you notice there was earthquake, wind, fire, not in those yeah, Earth, wind and fire. Do you remember The 21st Day of September? Okay, sorry, that's bad, sorry, sorry, that was bad. It must be being in a comedy club. I don't know, I don't know, love was changing the minds of the pretended, Okay, I'll stop chasing the clouds. Okay, I think I'm done. No, God could have spoke through the earthquake through the wind and through the fire, but he chose the whisper and I believe he chose the whisper because it's personal. When someone whispers something to you, you lean in right? The whisper outside of a personal relationship with someone is a little bit awkward. Like I don't picture you this week going into your business meeting. Okay, open up the fourth quarter numbers, I want to draw your attention. The slide # three, like that's just weird. Okay, do you know when you whisper, that's About the decibel level, about 15, 15 to 30 decibels just slightly above the decibel level of breathing when God created man in genesis chapter two verse seven said out of the dust formed adam. But then what did he do breathe? And so God moved and God breathed and you have in second timothy Chapter 3: verse 16 that all scripture again is God breathe everyone just for a moment with me, everyone and everyone at home watching right now, just take a deep breath, breathe in. That's all it takes for a whisper, you know God's name? Yahweh is so revered and and and it's revered in a way to the point where people wouldn't speak it, but yet could be uttered in a breath because he got us close and got his near my crazy spunky daughter Chloe when I took her in at night we have daddy daughter time and I love to for her to go to sleep when I whisper affirmations into her ear. So we do this almost every single night after we snuggle up and I just whisper, you're brave, you're strong, you're beautiful, you're right, daddy loves you and I just put that on repeat, You're beautiful, okay, you're strong, daddy loves you. Then one night she looked back at me and she smiled and she goes, daddy, I want to tell you something and I was like, again, I just finished your beautiful, you're strong, daddy loves you. And she goes, daddy coming now lean in, she cuts her hand, she goes poop emoji, wait, wait, I didn't hear that. Right, what poop emoji? And then she starts cackling laughing really loud and starts laughing and she thought she was so funny and I realized in that moment not every whisper goes as planned, okay, But then I also thought about the fact that how often as as much as I love her being a crack up. How often am I with with God? And God's trying to speak to me and God's trying to talk to me and God's trying to prove that he is close and I push away and I fight or I joke or I switch the topic and I do something completely different than what God has called me to do, which was to lean in and listen up. So my question to you is are you close enough to hear God's whisper? Are you close enough to hear God's whisper? He's here present now and he's speaking if we are listening. So when God speaks, he creates when God whispers, he was close. But third, I want you to know that when we receive jesus, we are God's Children. Now wait a second john what does this one have to do with the others? Well God spoke the world into existence. He spoke and shipped the 10 commandments to Moses. And other times spoke through people like Abraham or no or David or the Elijah Elisha. And then we get to the new testament. And then the gospel of John Chapter one, we see this in the beginning was the word, the logos, the purpose of life. The reason for existence in the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God and he was in the beginning with God and we continue on with this passage and all things were made through him and without him was not anything made that was made in him was life and the life was the light of Men. Now, I want you to catch this in verse five here that the light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it in the same way that God spoke light into darkness in genesis one, in john chapter one, God Came and brought the light because he was the light into the darkness of our world. and John chapter one And so then we have in there in verse 12, we see this, but to all who did receive him, who heard his voice, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become Children of God. So for those that here for those that are listening, it changes everything. You know, First service when we have kids ministry available, we had a lot of babies in here which is fun to see babies and fun to see babies that don't go home and keep you up at night. Oh, they're so cute from a distance training. But these babies, how do they learn how to talk? They learned to talk by listening and some of us are too busy trying to tell God what to do instead of listening to what he has called us to do and who he has called us to be. And that if we listen to what God has done and what God is doing and who he is and who he says we are there, we are going to be more apt to speak or to sing God's song and to have our life on key, you know, finding your voice starts by listening to God's voice by pausing, stopping in your tracks, taking that deep breath and asking God, what would you have me to do today? In 1990 there was a Stanford grad graduate student named Elizabeth Newton who ran an interesting experiment with people called Tappers. And listeners, she was testing something known as the curse of knowledge and that is that if somebody hears something in their head or knows something in their head, they can't unhook here it. And oftentimes speaking away or act in a way in which other people don't hear the song. And so what they did was that they had this group of tappers would tap out the rhythm to a song and then the listener had to guess the song. So just for fun, let's play that right now. Okay, so I am going to tap out a song. I hear the song in my head, You don't hear the song if you do awesome, we're connected. But you're gonna try to guess the song purely by me tapping out the rhythm. Here we go, you're listening, here we go, Eye of the Tiger right there. See I knew Jacob was on the same wavelength as me, don't. Okay that was good. That was really good. That was really good. Alright let's try one more, I'll try one more. Here we go, You guys don't get that one. It was clearly living on a prayer by bon Jovi. Well we're halfway. Okay. Anyway What was interesting about this study is that the people who were tapping, they thought that 50% of people would get their song because clearly they hear it in their head clear as day Actuality out of 120 songs only to a little over 2% got it correct. And so now they talked about the curse of knowledge is that that unless somebody else hears the same music as you, they're not gonna get it. And that's why I love that in Christianity in faith as we know it. People who don't yet hear the voice of God do speak the language of love which is why we have been called to love people the way that God has loved us to help them hear the music for the first time and while there is really this idea of a curse of knowledge, there's also a blessing of knowledge because once you hear something, once you know something, once you believe something it completely changes the way that you tap out life when you hear the voice of God when you believe in him receive him and the holy Spirit comes to dwell inside of you. It changes everything. Your marriage taps differently, your relationships how you speak, how you act tap and sound different when the world speaks of darkness, God speaks of light when the community speaks of Brokenness, you sing the song of blessing when someone comes at you with the song lyrics of shame and sin, you respond with the song of Salvation and that when you are battling the noise of guilt, God comes in and sings the song of Grace And for those in the room that have a relationship with jesus. You know what I'm talking about when you hear it, when you hear the voice of God, it's different. So I want to ask you do you hear God's voice And when I asked that I specifically mean do you believe in him as Lord and Savior? I want to close with a story here about really one of the most prominent NBA athletes right now. His name is Anthony Davis. For those that know me know I love basketball tonight. We got NBA finals game six, Anthony Davis paired up with Lebron James, we're gonna try to win the championship. He's one of the top five top 10 players in the entire world. Well back in 2012 He'd just been drafted but he had yet to play a single NBA game. He got to take part in the 2012. London Olympics. The us had a history of taking their all stars and then selecting 1-2, just out of college players to join them and they selected Anthony Davis. And so there was no way he was gonna get in the games because he was playing, he hadn't even played in a single game yet. And he's got Lebron James, Kobe, Bryant kevin Durant and all the world's best. But he was just happy to be in the room to practice with these guys. one of the early games of the Olympics USA was playing Nigeria and they were up by like 60 or something like this. And coach K. Goes Davis, you're in the you're in the game kind of shocked. He's like, all right, this is my moment. I mean right out of school like 1920 year old kid never played an NBA game. Now. Was playing on the world stage in front of his peers and the people who he looked up to and the coaches to show him what he's got. And he got to the scorer's table and he went to pull off his warmup jersey and he looked down and uh huh and all of his excitement, he forgot to actually put on his jersey. This is true story. He put on the warm up but he didn't put on the jersey. And so as quickly as he ran to the scores table, he ran back to the bench and sat down like nothing happened and it goes like what are you doing? It's his coach and he tried to, we didn't, I can't play why I don't have a jersey on to which the other players overheard and this is the picture you see Kobe Bryant and peeking in and making fun of him and he would go on and he would play future games but he didn't get in that game. And even when he heard his name called, he heard the Voice and he was ready to respond but he never went as far to actually put on the jersey. And so here's what I want to ask for you guys is that when I talk about hearing the voice of God and if you can't hear God's voice, you can't sing God's song and your life is gonna be off key. So the question then is if you hear the voice of God, are you willing to respond, are you willing to put on the jersey not look like let's not have the worm ups on, not go through the routine but actually say I am committing my life to him, I'm ready to get in the game. I am ready to respond. Because if that's you, if you hear God speaking to you right now, I'm going to encourage you to put your faith in him. So right now in this room or if you're watching online, I want you to close your eyes and bow your heads for just a moment and I want you to pray with me, dear Heavenly Father God. I know I'm a sinner, but I want to hear your voice. I believe jesus that you are Lord and your savior. And not only do you offer eternal life, but you offer abundant life now and that is the life I want. You got to come into my life. I want to hear your voice. I want to sing your song today. I am committing my life to you. I'm putting on that Jersey God, I want to get in the game. Mhm I commit my life to you. Thank you for saving me. Mhm Thank you for loving me. Mm hmm. Help me to hear your voice. Help me to sing your song when you whisper. Help me to lean in because you are the word and it's in you, I believe and you tell us in your word the same word that created the universe that when we believe in you, we are your Children. Thank you for saving us. Thank you for loving us. I had my life to you God. It's in your son's name. We pray. Amen