Prayer Unfiltered: How Do We Practically Hear God's Voice? (Part 2): Discernment, Stillness...Oh, look! A Squirrel!

How do you actually hear God’s voice in everyday life? And how do you know it’s really Him speaking?

In Part 2 of our conversation on hearing God’s voice, Kimberly Roddy and Elizabeth Powell move from stories and theology into practical ways to grow in listening prayer, spiritual discernment, stillness, and intimacy with God.

If you’ve ever struggled to quiet your mind, wondered if you’re “doing prayer wrong,” or felt unsure whether God is speaking to you, this episode offers biblical encouragement, practical wisdom, and grace-filled guidance.

In this episode, we discuss:
✨ Practical ways to slow down and listen to God
✨ Why stillness is difficult in today’s world
✨ How journaling helps discern God’s voice
✨ The difference between God’s voice, emotions, and personal desires
✨ Why discernment takes time and spiritual maturity
✨ How God often speaks through peace, presence, Scripture, and relationship
✨ Why prayer is more than talking — it’s practicing the presence of God

This conversation is honest, practical, deeply encouraging, and filled with wisdom for anyone longing to grow closer to Jesus and hear Him more clearly.

Listen now and join the conversation. If this helps you, subscribe, share with a friend who’s trying to discern God’s voice, and leave a review so more people can find the show.

Transcript

Discerning God Starts With Scripture

SPEAKER_02 0:00

Is there a verse specifically for every time you think you hear God's voice that it's going to tell you, yep, that was him, or no, it's not? Unfortunately not, but we do have scriptures. Nothing that you hear God say is going to be in contradiction to scripture. There is an order to things. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are speaking. The Holy Spirit dwells within us. It is our connector piece, and our spirit connecting to God's Spirit is how we hear from Him.

Welcome And Why This Matters

SPEAKER_01 0:30

Hey friends, I'm Kimberly. And I'm Elizabeth, and this is the Father's Business Podcast, born out of Sylvia Gunter's heart for people to know who God is and who they are in him.

SPEAKER_00 0:41

So wherever you're listening from today, we pray that you will sense his nearness and know that you are his beloved sons and daughters. We're really glad you're here with us today. Hey everyone, welcome back. This is part two. Last week we were talking about how do I hear from God? How do I know it's him? How do I talk less? We shared some stories and we talked about scripture, but we wanted to do a part two where we really came in and said, okay, practically, how do we do this? Because this is a question a lot of people are asking. A lot of people want to know how do I hear from God and how do I stop talking? How do I talk less? It's like they do. People are emailing us this and letting us know this is a real question.

Stillness Without Self Shame

SPEAKER_00 1:18

The first practical thing to remember is to not shame ourselves in the fact that we can't stop talking. How about that? Psalm 46, 10 says, Be still and know. And that is the deep knowing that I am God. A deep, deep knowing, not just an intellectual knowing, but a deep knowing. Be still and know that I am God. Um he goes on, I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth. So we actually have to be commanded in scripture and told to be still and know that he is God.

SPEAKER_02 1:49

Yes, we do.

SPEAKER_00 1:50

So it's it is common to not know how to be still, especially in our technological age, where we have little devices all the time dinging on our wrist or in our pocket or wherever in our ears. I think it's always been hard to slow down. I think it's just hard in a new way to slow down. And so be encouraged, our friends, that we actually have to be commanded to be still. That's the first practical is don't shame yourself that you can't, because you can, just like self-control is a fruit of the spirit. We don't get to say I can't control myself. We have to choose it. And so let's choose to obey God and hear God say, be still.

Date Nights And Intentional Listening

SPEAKER_02 2:26

Yeah, Kimberly, both of the stories we shared last week, you in the woods and me taking a moment to have a conversation with God, there was an intentionality on our part to say, okay, I'm setting aside time to hear because it's just like in any friendship or relationship. I mean, think about for any of us that are married or you know have roommates, whatever, like you have to intentionally plan time on the calendar for date night sometimes. And that in some ways for me, I was like, I shouldn't have to plan a date with my husband. Well, yeah, I do, because there's so much life and work and parents and everything else going on that if we don't say, okay, this night is sacred, we're setting it aside, it's just not gonna happen because something's gonna fill that space. So when I was single, I had date nights with Jesus. I was like, hey, no one else is asking me out, Jesus will. And so we would either stay at home and sit on the couch and talk, or I love to go out to a park and get on a swing and just sit in a swing in beauty. And sometimes that was listening to worship music and sometimes it was just being quiet, but it's about intentionally slipping away. You see that even Jesus did that in the New Testament. There are times where he slipped away from the crowds to be with his father. So I think, yeah, I have to be commanded to be still. I will say that stillness is not always still. Yeah. So you can be still in motion, and sometimes sitting still is not stillness. So that it is this understanding of a deeper quieting on the inside, and whether you need to be in motion in a car, walking, driving, running to be able to get to that place, or you need to be physically still to get to that place. I mean, that's like you said last week, Kimberly, God speaks to us uniquely because he's designed us uniquely. And and for me, I like to be in passive motion, is what I call it. A car, a swing, somewhere where not much is required of me, but I'm also not physically a hundred percent still. And God seems to speak there. How about you?

SPEAKER_00 4:16

Yeah, I mentioned last week that I love the ocean. And one thing I love about the ocean is it's moving. I like to see things and hear things moving. I like to be around things that are moving. I may not want to be the one running. I do like to walk and and be in motion that way or driving or whatever. But yeah, I think it's a it's a stillness of our spirit and our soul, just a calming down and an ability to be quiet at a deep, deep level so that we can know who he really is and hear from him. And Elizabeth, you were also hitting on the fact that it has to be intentional. You mentioned that last week when I shared my story. You said one of the things that I did was I intentionally took time away with my friend to go and hear from the Lord. You and I can share stories of times that we've sensed his voice in the day-to-day, and other times where it's like, no, I had to intentionally carve out time. Like you said, carving out time for a date. So a practical way is paying attention to if you like stillness or if you like motion. You've talked about some people that need to be totally still and other people that need to be in motion, and they need to be in separate places listening to God. Yes, they do. I've tried it and it does not work. Right, right. So our physical uh preferences and abilities matter as well as our intentionality and our choices of practically choosing to carve out time, to set aside time, even if it needs to be 15 minutes, even if it needs to be a

Timers And Mornings Without Your Phone

SPEAKER_00 5:45

day.

SPEAKER_02 5:45

Yes, sometimes I have such a hard time trying to focus. I mean, that's because that's the other thing. Okay, speak, Lord, your servant is listening. Look, there's a squirrel. You know, so I can have a hard time focusing, or as you say, talking too much. I I'll be quiet for a minute, but then I want to jump in and start telling God things. And there have been times where I have set a timer for 10 minutes, five minutes, 15 minutes, whatever. And I have said it on my phone and I've started it, and I have said, I am not going to move or say anything. God, I'm just gonna listen until the timer goes off. And do you know after about two minutes, I'm like, it's got to have been 15 minutes by now. So it is hard to be still, but that may be another practical way. It's the discipline of it. You mentioned last week about sensing that God is saying, call your friend and and being obedient in the little things. And I think that that's part of it. It's not waiting till it's the life-changing moment where you need to hear from the Lord that we practice this. It's in the little things. So maybe I need to practice being just still for 15 minutes, no internal dialogue, no talking out loud, just stillness before the Lord.

SPEAKER_00 6:51

Yeah, if we're honest, I've heard a lot of people recently in the worlds that I listen to talk about how the best thing we can do in the morning when we first get up is not go to our phone, not jump to the other person that we live with or people we live with. I mean, sometimes there's responsibilities, I get that. But if we can choose to set aside those things and quiet ourselves, it's not just good for us spiritually, it's good for us physiologically too. So I think there are many benefits, and I think Jesus knew that. There's many benefits to quieting ourselves. Um,

Journaling To See God’s Patterns

SPEAKER_00 7:24

the other thing that we mentioned a couple of weeks ago, as well as some last week, was the practice of journaling. That is a very helpful way to hear from God because as I mentioned last week, if we journal even semi-regularly, you can look back and you can see the story taking place. You can see the story unfolding, you can see the patterns. And and God sometimes speaks to us and we aren't sure if it's him. But if we look back through our journaling and we see the repetition or the patterns or the connections, we can go, oh, okay, he has been prompting this thought or saying this or directing me to this idea or this scripture over and over again. And so journaling is a is also an active practical way to hear God's voice and discern God's voice. Discerning God's voice is hard.

SPEAKER_02 8:13

Yeah, so discernment is a key piece to answering that question that we were asked. How do I know it is God and not just me? There are principles in scripture, there are things that we have learned about how God has designed a spirit, soul, and body that we can help address this.

Spirit Soul Body Discernment

SPEAKER_02 8:27

But is there a verse specifically for every time you think you hear God's voice that it's going to tell you, yep, that was him, or no, it's not? Unfortunately not. But we do have scriptures. I think of Hebrews 4.12, which is one that we use a lot when we're talking about Ruach journey and the idea of spirit, soul, and body. It says, for the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of spirit and soul, joint and marrow, and discerning the thoughts and the intentions of the heart. And that again goes back to what we keep trying to stress in this is that nothing that you hear God say is going to be in contradiction to scripture. And it is the word of God that is living and active that is able to speak to us through that. But I want to talk a little bit about spirit, soul, and body, not necessarily teach all of Ruach Journey in in a podcast here, but there is an order to things. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are speaking, right? The Holy Spirit dwells within us. It is our connector piece and our spirit connecting to God's spirit is how we hear from him. So there may be times that God downloads something into your spirit or speaks to your spirit that you may not fully understand what he means in the moment. And so this would be my great encouragement to anyone who's going, how do I know if it's God or not me? Is don't hurry, don't rush. If you are sensing something from God, sit with it. And even before you go to other people, I mean, go to the go to the word, make sure it lines up with that. But even before you go to other people, sit with it. Because here's what's happening on the inside. God is speaking something deeply to your spirit. And I I've had seasons like this and even one recently, where it's like, I know God is saying something. I just don't have words that I can say out loud to describe what God is saying to me. That talks about in the Psalms where David says that God instructs him through the night watches. And that is when God's spirit is speaking to David's spirit while his soul and body are resting. And there's a lot of times, you know, Kimbally, I I've had this experience, I'm sure people have, it's a common phrase, where we say, Let me sleep on it when we have a decision, right? And we wake up the next morning and there's more clarity. I believe in those times God's spirit is speaking to your spirit, and then somehow it is getting translated in a way that your finite mind can understand. So as we sense God saying something to us, we don't want to rush it. We want to hold it closely and loosely at the same time, because what can happen is there can be something that God is saying, and then our human mind, which is finite and does not have complete understanding, starts trying to interpret it and understand it and make it make sense. And as we say through scripture, Kimberly, a lot of times God says things that don't make a whole lot of sense. Like he tells people to walk around Jericho for seven days and the wall is going to come down. He, I mean, how many times in scripture did he tell people to go do something and then he showed up in a different way? So we wanna be careful that we allow the word of God that is living and active to divide between spirit and soul for it to help us interpret what God might be saying to us. And this happens a lot. I think I've had several situations, especially younger girls in their 20s think they hear God telling them that they're gonna marry this particular person. Maybe they are. Or I've had young, young married couples say, you know, God told us we're gonna have a baby, like like big, heavy things. And it is so needed to be so tender around those things because is it God saying it? Maybe. Is it their heart's desires screaming so loud that they feel like God is saying it to them? Maybe too. Don't know. And that's where we have to, that's where slowing down, as Mary did, ponder things in your heart, take time to see what God unfolds and continues to confirm. Not with shame or condemnation that I didn't hear him right, I didn't do it right, you know, I didn't hear him, but just knowing that we are in communion with a otherness of God. And so sometimes, much like the disciples did not, I mean, Jesus was standing right there in front of them, explaining things to them, and it says in scripture, they did not understand what he meant when he said it. How much more so when we don't have Jesus right here in front of us talking to us, do we need to be careful to hold those things closely and allow God through his word, through other people, eventually through our own peace, the things that we talked about before, confirm to us that this is of God. Because not everything that happens to you is God speaking to you. The squirrel was not God speaking to you, Kimberly, and the tree was not God speaking to you. But at the same time, we want our ears to be open for that gentle whisper when it comes. I know this is where people don't like us. It's the tension of the two, right, Kimberly, where where we have to be open that God is speaking, but also wise to know that not every emotion or feeling that or thought that rises up in us is is Him. And that just comes with practice. It's easier for me to know when Kimberly is in a room talking because I've heard her voice a lot. And so if we were in a crowded room and she said something, I would immediately know it was her. Same with God. The more we listen, the more we spend time with him, the more that we'll be able to understand. His voice does have a certain tone to it. It's not condemnation, it's not shame, it's love, it's peace, and like the fruit of the spirit, Kimberly, that you talked about before. And so you begin to tune your ear to hear him easier over time.

SPEAKER_00 13:44

Yeah, it's it's a process. Like we're not always gonna get it perfect. We're not always like sometimes I try to go into another conversation and describe the conversation I had with you. Maybe I go talk to another friend, say, Oh, Elizabeth was telling me this, and then you're like, No, it's not exactly what I said. Like sometimes we just don't hear it the same way, right? And so it's okay, but but clarifying and seeking to further discern and ask the good questions. Unfortunately, we've lost the art of asking good questions and really listening to the rest of the answer. Yeah. Um and so I think that's part of it is just asking God good questions. And it's okay to go, God, it is it really you? Is it really you? Is it really you?

unknown 14:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:22

Because you don't want to take action if it's not really him. You don't want to move forward until you've paused enough to listen. You know, you've got to slow down and really notice. And that's not always easy to know. Like, think about if you're in your house and you hear a noise, sometimes it could be the washing machine, sometimes it could be the refrigerator, sometimes it could be the dishwasher, sometimes it could be the sink, sometimes it could be the toilet. Like I don't really know what it is. I need to, I need to kind of figure it out and process it. As we have said, one thing we can stick with and know without a doubt is that when he speaks to us, it will be in agreement and alignment with his

Freedom Inside God’s Good Boundaries

SPEAKER_00 14:59

word. We have a mutual friend, Julie. We have heard this two different ways that we recall, but it's the same principle. You can share your way, I'll share mine. What I remember Julie sharing with me is it's like God holds, it's like the guy holding all the balloons, and the balloon guy is saying to the child, which color would you like? You can have any color, which color would you like? It's almost as if God is saying, All of these are good. It's okay to to pick any color. All the colors I'm offering you are good. You get to pick, you get to choose, you get to decide. And there is some freedom when when God speaks to us. Sometimes He doesn't say, I need you to go left at the stop sign and then right at the red light. Sometimes there is specific direction. There is. Sometimes there is. But other times it's, hey, those are all of that is good. I'm gonna let you decide which color balloon you want, because you're my child and I love you. I just want to give you a balloon.

SPEAKER_02 15:51

Yeah. I mean, Kimberly, I think back to your analogy of the pool from the episode from last week. That gave you a direction. It didn't tell you where to go work and what to go do and what church to go to and how long to stay there and when it was time to leave for seminary and then what to do after seminary. Like it jay it gave you a broad picture. And yeah, our our friend Julie, she was in a season where she was trying to figure out what she was gonna do with her next step. And uh, I happened to be in her life at that time as well. And I remember her telling me the wisdom that someone else gave her that has kind of stuck with me was uh another friend of ours named John. Let's just bring up all of our friends on the podcast. John said to Julie, because she was really struggling with, do I take this job or that job? They both, both in ministry, both fit her calling. And he finally said to her, Julie, when I take my kids to the playground, as long as they stay within the fence of the playground, I don't tell them where to play. Like they can go on the slide if they want, they can play on the swing if they want. Within these parameters, they can choose what they want to do with the general direction, which is be safe and go play. Because, but the minute if my child started running for the street, I'm gonna step in and I'm gonna stop them. And that spoke to her, and then she didn't even know how much that spoke to me at the time. And that has been kind of a guiding principle for me. Oftentimes it's not, Kimberly, as you say, specific direction. Thou shalt go do this. It is a general feeling of this is the way you should kind of go this way. Lean into your strengths here. This is where I see you working and doing things. And within those parameters, that's where, as you talked about as teenagers, they sometimes just need to figure it out. So what John was saying to Julie that day was your loving father has put two opportunities in front of you. Both are great. You can do either one. Which one's going to bring you the most delight? And allowed it to be more of a relationship. It's not master to servant being told all the time where to go and what to do. It is father to child who delights in watching us grow and learn and become stronger in that. And I think that's the beauty of picking whatever color balloon you want or playing on whatever piece of playground equipment you want to be on, knowing that if we're really gonna walk off a cliff somewhere, the good shepherd's gonna come and catch his sheep before they go diving off the cliff. He's still there, he's still present in the field with us, but sometimes he's not right there in our ear telling us every step of what we should be doing. And that and that, I hope, brings some peace and some comfort to people who are might be a little concerned about how do I do

When God Answers With Presence

SPEAKER_02 18:21

it right. I think the vast majority of it is showing up. It's making the time, it's setting aside date nights with God or moments in the morning before you pick up your phone. And that one is hard, Kimberly, especially because your phone is sometimes your alarm. So I've thought about getting an old-fashioned alarm clock like we used to have before we had phones, so that I don't even have the temptation to see the notifications popping up on my phone as I try to turn my alarm off in the morning. Because it does feel like, okay, I need to figure out what's happened overnight and go. But at the same time, needing to stop and remember, my spirit's just had a delightful conversation with God in the night watches. Maybe if I'm quiet enough, I can kind of tune in to what Father, Son, and Holy Spirit want to whisper to me at the beginning of my day. But it's real easy to tune that out with busyness and noise.

SPEAKER_00 19:08

If you think about the end of a day and the beginning of the day just in nature, I think we have the picture of God calming us in both of those pictures in a different way. His His sunset will calm us, and it's the end of a day. It's setting the day, it's winding down. And then the startup of a day is a process. It's the sun rising, it's the creatures coming to life. Both you and I have different but beautiful views from our backyard, which I'm very grateful for. And when we pause enough in the morning or in the evening to look at that, like God will speak through those things. And and he will not even give us a word, but he will calm us. He will prepare us for the day. He will prepare us for the night. And so again, a lot of it is just sitting quietly and paying attention. I often say, even with our relationships and our personalities and other things in life, we have to pay attention or we're just on autopilot, you're kind of going through life. We've referenced Samuel where he said, speak for your servant listens. The other piece to that is when you were just talking, I was thinking, yeah, we've got to expect God to answer. We've got to expect him to respond. And sometimes in our skepticism, like I mentioned last week, I'm afraid to expect him to respond because I don't want to be disappointed. I can get crusty as I get older and jaded, you know, and just go, I don't know, I don't know. But I I want to come to him with that childlike faith that Samuel did and that children. And so I do think there's an attitude there of expecting him to respond because he does promise to answer us. Again, we've talked about it. May not look like we want or like we expect, but there is a promise to answer and to show up in his way and his time and to be able to be okay with that. And so part of that's again just the practice of sitting and preparing ourselves, discerning, expecting him to respond, paying attention to the peace that he gives us, and then choosing to obey when we when we hear something and we sense it, and being able to walk in that obedience and truly respond in the obedience, whether it be the small thing of calling the friend or the big thing of making a move that that seems scary or big or life-changing.

SPEAKER_02 21:13

Sometimes how God answers is not with words or impressions, it's just his presence. And as you talked about sunrise and sunset, I do. I have an amazing sunset view, and I love the feeling that just comes over me when I am intentional to go sit where I can see it, put the phone down, not even really even ask God a question, but just sense the beauty of him as creator, as as I just enjoy his presence. So sometimes we go looking for an answer, and what we get is him, which honestly is better than any answer that he could

Half Day With God And Closing

SPEAKER_02 21:43

give. For people who have not tried this, that this is a new concept to you of sitting with God, I do want to mention that in prayer portions, there is a section, a portion as you call it, towards the end of the book that is called A Half Day of Intimacy with God. And it is simply an outline of scriptures. And then suggested things to meditate on. And you can give yourself a half day, find some time on your schedule and commit a half day to doing it. I also have just taken it a section at a time and done one a day for a week, but it might just be some of the training wheels that some of us need to understand the depths of what can be heard when we read a scripture and then choose to stop and pause and meditate on what God might want to say to us through that. So I want to encourage you to go and look at that in prayer portions. It's called the uh half day of intimacy with God. There's several things in prayer portions that are great, but that one in particular is one that I have used to help people just begin to know what it feels like to hear God and to sense his presence.

SPEAKER_00 22:40

As we close out today, I want to read a quote that I have from Sylvia from when we talked with her about listening prayer. And one of the things she said was we don't have a realistic understanding of what prayer really is because we think it's talking to God at a base level. And so she said, you gotta take the spookiness out of it and you got to realize the most important part is him speaking to you. And this is what stood out to me the most as we close today. I want you to really hear this and listen to this. Prayer is practicing the presence of God and allowing the deepest parts of us to come to rest in his presence. That's what prayer is. It's that relationship, and it's practicing the presence of God and allowing the deepest parts of us to come to rest in his presence. So sit in his presence today, talk to him, allow him to speak to the deepest parts of you so that you can rest in who he is.

SPEAKER_02 23:27

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