Vital Signs: Tuesday, April 8, 2025

Expect God to Speak to You

“Ask me and I will tell you remarkable secrets you do not know about things to come.” — Jeremiah 33:3 (NLT)

In other words, your expectations of God speaking—and your own ability to hear—will likely prove true.

God is the same yesterday, today, and forever. He has been speaking for generations; why would He stop with you? The answer is: He wouldn’t.

In the mid-1960s, there was a man who went hunting in the wilderness of the Pacific Northwest. He was so confident in his ability to go in, camp for a couple of days, and get back to his vehicle that he did not take a map or a compass. When the days of his trip came to a close, he began to make the trek back to his car. He walked and walked for hours on end. It was only when he found his own tracks that he realized he had been walking in circles.

He was a man of God—a husband, a father of five, a pastor, and a denominational leader for nearly 50 years—but in that moment, a fear rose up in him that caused him to cry out to God into the trees:

“Oh God, I need Your help. I have to get home… I have a beautiful wife, five wonderful children, and a growing church.”

Following his cry for help into the thickness of the forest all around him, he heard a voice come out of the trees. The voice called him by name and answered assertively:

“You wouldn’t believe me, even if I told you.”

Hearing the response may have startled him slightly, but it didn’t deter him or keep him from continuing the conversation.

He had felt God’s voice before—experienced the power of God’s voice through the Scripture—but had never heard God audibly. That is, until that day. Before the moment passed, he responded, “Yes God, I will believe You.”

God quickly spoke one more time: “Go 50 paces that way and turn left.”

But before God could even finish, the man interrupted, “I’ve already been that way a hundred times…”

Realizing the error of his ways, he quickly relented and repented. Then he turned his steps toward the direction God had indicated. He began to move. Fifty paces—and then he turned left. As soon as he did, he broke through a clearing, and there was a sign directly in front of him. It said, “Logging Road Exit This Way.”

He had parked his vehicle at the exit of that same logging road.

When we expect God to speak to us, our experience will be God speaking to us.