My friend, Beth Cutter

Beth is a good friend and neighbor. We met at church. If I were pressed to offer one adjective that describes Beth, it would be kind. Over the years I have seen her kindness lived out toward others, and I have personally experienced the gift of her kindness at many times and in many ways.

Thank you Beth for sharing your words on Echoes this week and next.

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At a birthday party recently, the honoree introduced us to a friend who had just moved to our state. “What brings you to Colorado?” someone asked. Her one-word answer, “God,” was not detailed enough for us. We pressed her for the backstory, which entailed not only a number of coincidental circumstances but also an experience where she heard an actual voice – from the back seat of her car as she was driving alone – surprising her by declaring “You need to move.”

As the new Colorado transplant went on, I started to wonder. I have never heard an audible,
disembodied voice of any kind, much less one I would identify as God’s, and I started to wonder. Whose experience was more common, hers or mine? And if the Lord ever did want me to do something out of the blue like that, could I expect him to tell me out loud?

From Genesis to Revelation, all kinds of people heard directly from the Lord in Bible times. He
interrogated Adam and Eve, instructed Abraham, directed Moses, and commissioned Joshua. He spoke directly to prophets and kings, to Job, Isaiah, David, Paul, Peter, and John. He spoke through angels or theophanies to Hagar, Jacob, Gideon, Daniel, Elijah, Joseph, Mary, and Zechariah. And – of course – God spoke through the person of Jesus Christ to the disciples and everyone else he encountered during his ministry on earth. “Lord,” I half-thought, half-prayed, “am I missing something?”

Here’s the thing about inquiries like that:

“If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God,
who gives generously to all without reproach,
and it will be given him.”
(James 1:5, ESV)

Over the next several days, God answered me generously – not out loud, but through his word, through preaching and teaching, and through the input of godly friends.

I thought about Jesus, the incarnation of God’s word (John 1:14). Historical estimates of world
population say that between 170 and 400 million people were alive in the first century. Of those, only the fraction who happened to be in Galilee in the right places at the right times heard Jesus speak in person. Today we have 24/7 access to all four gospels – on our laptops, our phones, and in hard copy in dozens of translations. As John Piper 1 has observed, “We have the wholeness of the revelation that Jesus meant to communicate, and it is speaking to us every time we read the Bible.” We also know this:

“ . . . the word of God is living and active,
sharper than any two-edged sword,
piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow,
and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.”
(Hebrews 4:12, ESV)

Reading the Bible has sometimes had that effect on me, stopping me dead in my tracks with a word, phrase, or passage that had never spoken to me that way before. The margins of my Bible are sprinkled with dates memorializing some of those sharp, piercing, and discerning experiences.

A missionary friend recounts the time she was praying about a change of assignments, one that would require her and her husband to move over 7,000 miles away from home. “I didn’t really want to go,” she says, “but I was reading Psalm 126 and felt the Lord saying, ‘This is for you’”:

“Those who sow with tears will reap with songs of joy.
Those who go out weeping, carrying seed to sow,
will return with songs of joy, carrying sheaves with them.”
(Psalm 126:5-6, NIV)

Today she recalls that call with joy – and, she says, with tears of gratitude for their eight years of fruitful ministry in that region.

Since the party guest’s anecdote about hearing God speaking aloud, I have asked around among other trusted Christian friends to see if they have had auditory experiences like hers. Almost all of them have said no. Many of them have admitted that they are cautious enough as it is about discerning the difference between that “still small voice” of God and their own thoughts. All of them, however, have been quick to add that they have had experiences where strong impressions have come to them while praying, or where previously-memorized verses or passages have come to mind at just the right time. That has happened to me, too – in a moment, as it happens, that also involved the back seat of a car.

Ten years ago, a catastrophic wildfire spread through the forested area where we live. I was alone in the house when the call came to evacuate. My first task had to be to remove the two bulky car seats I kept in the back seat of my car for our grandchildren (who were safely at their house) to make room for our dogs (who were anxiously circling my legs). The car seats were latched to hooks deep behind the back seat, and try as I might, I could not get those clips undone. I continued to strain and twist, sensing precious minutes ticking by, when suddenly my mind was filled with a passage I had never intentionally memorized, just read so often that it came flooding back. I didn’t hear an audible voice, but sure as anything I knew

“God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.
Therefore we will not fear though the earth gives way,
though the mountains be moved into the heart of the sea. . . .”
(Psalm 46:1-2, ESV)

“Lord, I panted, “I need your very present help. I can’t get these latches to unhook!” And just like that, there was a click. The first latch released, and the second one followed. That unmistakable sense, that the Lord had brought just the right words to my mind and answered my prayer almost before it had left my lips, was all I needed in the hours and days that followed to be reassured that God was indeed my refuge and strength.

Reflecting on my evening at the birthday party and my half-question/half-prayer “Am I missing
something?” I believe the answer is No. In his second letter to Timothy, Paul teaches:

“All Scripture is God-breathed [given by divine inspiration]
and is profitable for instruction,
for conviction [of sin], for correction [of error and restoration to obedience],
for training in righteousness
[learning to live in conformity to God’s will, both publicly and
privately—behaving honorably with personal integrity and moral courage];
so that the man of God may be complete and proficient,
outfitted and thoroughly equipped for every good work”
(2 Timothy 3:16-17, Amplified).

In a sermon a few weeks back on going where the Spirit leads you, my pastor talked about the number of young people who come to him asking how they can discern God’s will for their lives. “The short answer,” he said, “is that most of it is written down.”

If I never hear God’s audible voice, I still have the word he breathed right here on my desk – and on my laptop and on my phone – equipping me for every good work. If only I will study and listen to it, the instruction, conviction, correction and training he provides is more than enough.

1 https://www.desiringgod.org/interviews/should-we-listen-for-the-audible-voice-of-god

Copyright, Beth Cutter, May 2023