DISCERNMENT: TESTING MY OWN VOICE
In recent days I have been thinking about our dialogues with God and how we weigh them. I started noticing that when the prayer conversation alternates: God, then Brad, then God, then Brad, and son on, I was diligent to test what God is allegedly saying. I test to see whether the voice of God is really God or not God. I check that voice according to the three-legged stool of the Word, the Body and the Spirit, as recommended in Can You Hear Me? Tuning in to the God who Speaks.
But I neglected to test MY voice. And why should I? After
all, it’s my own voice, isn’t it? Or is it? But when I began to categorize the
themes that came under the umbrella of ‘my voice,’ I noticed something. On the
one hand, there was the voice that agrees with and responds to God in faith. We
could call that the voice of my ‘true heart,’ or the voice of the ‘new
creation,’ or the ‘new me.’
On the other hand, there are these other voices that I
assumed were my own as well: The voice of condemnation (beating myself up) that
would then trigger the voice of self-pity (feeling sorry for myself), and the
voices of shame, self-hatred, fear, worry, anger, and so on. In my head, I
would hear and say, ‘I am afraid; I am angry; I don’t like myself; I’m not
worthy,’ etc. Perhaps you know those voices as well.
THE VOICE THAT IS NOT EVEN ME
And then it occurred to me, esp. as I read the dialogues
from prayer journals of about sixty Bible school students, if the voice of my
true self loves God and responds in faith and love to the voice of Christ, what
are these other voices? On occasion I suppose I could have been hearing an
unclean spirit. Or I suppose I might have been dealing with a wound in my
heart. But mostly, I found these voices could not be cast out like a demon nor
could they be healed like a wound. In fact, my greatest discovery was that
those voices were NOT ME at all! ME is my true self. ME is the heart Jesus gave
me. ME is the new creation. So what was I hearing that masqueraded as ME?
The Bible calls it the old nature (Rom. 8), the old Adam or
Eve, the flesh or desires of the flesh (Gal. 5). In modern terms, we refer to
the false self, the ego. My mentor, Ron Dart, calls it ‘the craver’ that
underlies all of my cravings, demanding that I feed it but knowing it’s a
bottomless pit. It is that vacuous demanding echo of something that was
crucified with Christ; something to be reckoned dead (Rom. 6) but still far too
talkative in my head; something to be disowned and discredited; marginalized
and silenced as far a possible.
DISOWNING AND DISCREDITING THE VOICE OF THE FALSE ME
How do we silence the voices of the
flesh or ego? We’re half way there when we begin to recognize that voice and
declare, that’s not me. That’s not the beat of the new heart Jesus gave me. We
can step back and hold it at arm’s length and begin to make a practice of
disowning it—even to the point of refusing to call it my ego or my flesh.
It is an ‘it’ of days gone by.
Besides disowning it, we can
discredit the ego’s voice by challenging its motives and its fruit. The flesh or ego always has a motive. For example, when it is
accusing you, its motive is pride and self-righteousness and it is punishing
you for not living up to its standards of perfection. Your stumbles embarrass
and offend the ego, triggering a barrage of condemnation. OR when the flesh
lapses into self-pity, its motive is to seduce fleshly sympathy out of others—a
deadly counterfeit of compassion that brings death rather than life. The ego
can multi-task, both accusing and sulking at the same time, but when we step
back quietly and watch that ludicrous inner dialogue, it ceases to be credible.
We also discredit the ego/flesh by
challenging its fruit. Jesus called us to test everything, including every
voice, by the fruit it produces. In testing the fruit of the ego, we see that
when we have listened to it, NOT ONCE has it ever produced a smidgeon—not the
slightest sliver—of goodness in our lives. So why give it a voice at all, much
less the freedom of speech it currently enjoys under the guise of being ME just
because I hear it beaking off inside? It is as if we’ve said, ‘As long as you
don’t claim to be God, you can say whatever you want. By pretending to be me,
you have free rein because I don’t discern MY voice. I only discern God’s
voice.’ The resulting fruit has been most rotten.
I have also noticed that when the
dialogue is between God and my true, restored heart, God tends to take the lead
in the conversation and I find myself following, responding, led by the Spirit
to listen. Conversely, when the ego/flesh dialogues with God (when it lets me,
for it aggressively tries to unplug from the conversation through doubt or
shame) it consistently tries to control the conversation, attempting to argue
God into corners, silence or defensiveness. Here I see his relentless patience
on the one hand and the complete waste of time on the other. I want to say,
“Ego, would you just get over yourself and listen to what God is saying?” Of
course, it never does. The flesh/ego does not really listen and its innumerable
arguments are a distraction from where God would like to take the prayer time.
SPIRIT TO SPIRIT CONVERSATION
Finally, I do not silence the
voice of the ego/flesh by obsessing over it. That only feeds it. Rather, I am
learning to give it a brief, passing nod: “I see you, you blood-sucker. But I
know what you’re up to and I’m not listening to you today.” And then I quickly
move on to listen to the voice of God’s Spirit interacting with the responsive,
faith-filled and loving voice of my renewed spirit. 1 Cor. 6:17 goes so far as
to say that in uniting with Christ, his Spirit and my spirit become one. I.e. I
don’t even need to distinguish between the Holy Spirit and my spirit, because
they are in an ascending spiral of heavenly agreement.
True discernment simply means
refusing to listen to all that is not God AND all that is not me. To me, this latter half was an ‘aha moment’ that I
hope will upgrade our discernment and bring readers fresh freedom as well.
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Brad Jersak's new book, Her Gates Will Never Be Shut: Hope, Hell and the New Jerusalem is now available. The book attempts to tackle head-on the difficult issues of divine judgment and hell. For a summary and endorsements or orders, visit www.bradjersak.com/hergatesfeature.html.
An example of what Brad sheds light on here is how we read Romans 8:11-17. The Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead dwells within us to give life to our mortal bodies. It is this self same Spirit that within us cries Abba! Dad!
Many of us however listen to that inner voice that says, “I don’t hear this Abba within” or massage a self pitying rejection in some other way. We desire with a passionate longing to be consummated by Dad’s love, but our ego won’t allow it because it would shatter the lie that somehow I am beyond God’s fathering love and adoption.
Paul shows us how the Spirit provides an a priori answer to this drain from the flesh:
‘When we cry, “Abba! Father!” it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God.’
Co-witnessing – his Spirit witnessing with my spirit to an eternal truth. When I actively co-witness with this spirit that raised Jesus from the dead, his dynamic adoption life kicks in. When I choose not to allow or I’m not in agreement with this life giving Spirit then it is all of death, theft and destruction.
That part of ‘me’ that is not in agreement with this life giving witness must be brought into submission, through repentance and choosing not to listen to it.
Repentance is not merely a turning away from believing a lie, it must also be a co-witnessing with his Truth brought to life by the Spirit.
Surely this is that living sacrifice and spiritual service/reasonable service that Paul commends to us, that leads to a renewed and transformed mind and life? This is the way to knowing his good pleasing and perfected will in ‘my’ life.
Moses put it this way: Deut 30:19
“Choose life so that you and your descendants may live”
Another take on Mark 4 is Jesus tells us to take heed to what we hear/listen to. The thrust of his teaching is very much that we need to give a large measure to listening to his kingdom word, that we may receive a large measure of kingdom mystery in revelation and understanding. However it is surely as true that we should take heed what we should not listen to, that may grow up and choke the word planted and received within us.
In this way, the disciples should not have ‘heard’ the voice telling them they were about to drown, and rather pay heed to Jesus words of intent that they were to cross over to the other side.
I’ve spent the last few months in a serial moment of ‘getting over myself’.
I read this article quite some time ago but I want to take a stab at commenting. I too have been in an extended season of learning “it’s not all about me”. I recognize the work of the craver in it due to it’s fruit but somehow I never named it for what IT was (perhaps too caught up in the layers of learning that Abba Father was bringing me through). I only want to add an experience to what has been said as that is all I have to offer. In rereading your article Brad I was stopped short when u talked about the fruit of the craver. I had a dream one night that stayed with me, which is my cue to pay attention and bring it to Jesus. I wrote it out but was at a loss for an interpretation. Over a few days I gradually understood in part but it seems now, the craver’s fruit is the clearer interpretation. I experienced the effects of pride and self righteousness but the hardest fruit to swallow was the attempt to gain another’s sympathy. I was literally sick with embarressment at what I had done when it was exposed but even then stumbled poorly over an apology. Now the part of my dream that I was left with, however, was after acknowledging those false voices I was left with such a thrill of freedom. The words that kept going through my head was “I am free to just be me loving You”. No matter what life had thrown at me or how I’d responded I had that option! I couldn’t figure out that ending as completely as now. Abba Father sent me a picture that would stay with me enough to get written down and thought about… only to be later blogged recently which served to bring it again to the forefront of my mind, and to coincide with Brad sharing this link. My Dad is willing to interpret and help me understand things at the right time. You know just when you think you have learned a lesson He teaches you the same thing again but at a deeper or clearer level. My “it’s not all about me” instruction has turned from acceptance of it, to survival through it, to now battling in His Spirit and power… the act of co-witnessing the Truth. I love the comment about having more of the Kingdom word ringing in our ears for I have been captivated by his words in the beatitudes and let me assure you all that none of it is attainable without learning to listen to Jesus’ voice and turning our back upon the craver. Perhaps that’s why He started with … (The Divine life is when we die to self) a.k.a. blessed are the poor in spirit FOR theirs IS the Kingdom of heaven (for they can start to become like Jesus live like Him). I don’t know if you have noticed but the way I’ve been hearing it without that first one none of the others will be taking place.