1st Bible study, God Talks to us  6/15/13

- Prayer:
	•	Lord God, Father almighty, Be with me as I speak your word, do not let me be proud, I desire to be your humble servant.  Let your word speak through me, without falter.  Give me the power to be effective in my choice of words and style as a serve you and spread your  word.  You created the universe, the stars, the earth, the mountains and all the creatures in it.  You granted us free will to choose right or wrong.  Please give us the good conscience to choose right, even when it is easier to submit to temptations of the devil and do wrong.  Please kick down the door in our hearts and allow the Holy Spirit complete it's purpose by killing the old natural self in each of us and birthing a new and improved self with Jesus as our guiding light.  We  can try, and you expect that, but we fail miserably.  We know this, but we also know you don't expect us to be perfect, you just expect us to genuinely try our best.  Not 10%, not 90 %, but all our effort. in everything we do, everything.  These things we ask in the name of your son, Jesus Christ, Amen.

- Dramatic Entry:
	•	Blow a normal whistle loud...  Did everybody hear that, does everybody believe that I exist?  Ok, now lets rewind, and I will do it again, but with a high frequency whistle, Ready? (use a dog whistle).  Did anybody hear that?  Well, believe it or not, there was a sound.  You are gonna have to believe me.  You are gonna have to have FAITH.  Because not everything in this universe can be seen with your eyes and heard with your ears.  That doesn't mean it doesn't exist, it just means that it is not visible to everybody.  If you had a special device to hear it with, you would know for sure it exists.  Our built in device is our intelligent brains to research and learn the law of God, our free will to choose to follow his laws, and repentance to ask God to forgive us sincerely and let God enter our hearts.

- Bible reference for how God spoke to his people in the Bible:
	•	Joseph and the dream from the old testament: Genesis 41

- Why doesn't God just talk to everybody with a huge miracle?
	•	Why not just change the sky orange and write in the clouds, I AM GOD, LISTEN TO ME!  Because he doesn't believe in coercing people.  He wants to separate those who are worthy of knowing, those who choose to know Him from those who refuse him, and find ways to change his communication into lies and turn away from him.  The old testament is filled with this, and it didn't work.  Did you know that it really only takes 8 weeks to travel the distance through the dessert out of Egypt to the promised land?  But God took 40 years to show the people that he wanted to make a lasting impression.  He did this out of love, so we could be convinced.  After leading the israelites slaves out of pagan filled Egypt with the miracles like staff to snake, plagues, river of blood, famine, death of Egyptian firstborns (passover) parting of the red sea, etc., this happened:  Genesis 32.  The old testament is FILLED with this denial, that is the human nature, this is also the result of God's own gift to us when he granted us free will, hoping for good, and not evil.

- Modern day communication:
	•	How does God actually speak to us today?  3 ways.
	•	1. He speaks to us from the inside, through prayer.  Believe, or at least make pretend that you believe.  Because if you doubt, then God cannot be heard.  Doubt is a 12" thick sound proof steel wall between you and God.  Not for 1 minute, or two, but for a few minutes.  When it is quiet, stop and ask God a question.  Be still, be quiet and listen with your heart, not with your ears.  Wait, be patient.  Search, ask the question you need an answer for.  Be honest with him, don't be embarrassed or confused.  It's just you and Him and he has been waiting for you.  Let it all hang out.  put your palms over the sockets of your eyes and relax your lids, get comfortable.  Be quiet with your mind, don't talk in your mind.  Just listen.  Have trust in God that he will answer you, be eager to listen.  He usually answers in a simple short statement.  If you wonder if that is God or not, it is ok, just wake up from your prayer and have faith that he spoke to you.  You will have a strong hunch or gut feeling that he wants you to do what he told you.  As you get closer to God, His words become more secure, and doubt begins to fade away.  Try that tonight.
	•	2. He also speaks to us through the outside environment, with apparently coincidental experiences.  Like finding a note that has Jesus' name on it, or through the radio, or through the TV, even through scraps of paper on the street.  he is everywhere.  He talks to us through random strangers.  We are constantly being tested with people in traffic, with people who let us pass, or give us the finger.  He talks to us with lessons in life.  When we get to proud, he humbles us.  When we do a good deed, he rewards us.  When we do a bad deed, he trips us up.  Sometimes its not so obvious and we get chills.  Sometimes he is so blatantly obvious is is mystical.  Like when we say something and a door slams in the middle of the night from the wind.  He speaks to us through dreams, He speaks to us through injury.  Sometimes he will hurt is mildly to prevent something more devastating from happening.  Sometimes we will take a different route to work, for no reason.  And we realize there was an accident we just missed. or someone needed us.  After all, he can present us with options, but ultimately we have to choose what we will do.  We can ask for something so bad and not get it, in this case he is protecting us from a bad investment.  He is EVERYWHERE, even something as simple as smiling at a person may open up a door that we would normally pass as coincidence.  God created the world, he surely has the ability to make two people run into each other.  Did you ever have something happen where you say to yourself, if I had been 2 seconds late, I would have missed that accident, or opportunity?  Well, it's never a coincidence.  You get the idea.

- Group Participation:
	•	Encourage others to raise their hands and explain their encounter with something that may have been God talking to them.
	•	End with my own personal experience (boxing with Tommy, too much pride)

- The 3rd way he talks to us.  Through our desire to learn.  With the Bible, Church and each other (with the Holy Spirit) in bible study:
	•	Does anybody feel like something is missing? (get them to raise their hand and say the 3rd way is missing).
	•	Today God is talking to us.  Here's an example, My sister bought me a book for fatherday.  I kinda blew it off.  But I read it, God told me to give it a try.  I found something so captivating and inspiring.  I opened right up to it.  Page 133.

- End with the story from Ravi Zacharia about the vietnamese interpreter / prisoner.
	•	Search youtube.com, Winning the nightline debate, FF 4.40

- Prayer:
	•	Father almighty, Please kick down the door in our hearts and allow the Holy Spirit to do it's duty by killing the old self and birthing a new and improved self with Jesus in the driver's seat.  We  can try, and you expect that, but we fail miserably.  We know this, but we also know you don't expect us to be perfect, you expect us to give it our all.  Not 10%, not 90 %, but all our effort.  These things we ask in your name, Amen.