I read an article wherein a minister described himself sitting at his computer, staring at a blinking cursor on the screen, waiting to hear what God wants him to say to believers. He posed the question: “what is God saying to you right now?” The question became the topic of his article; in essence, he was asking himself – what is God saying to ME right now?

This is a good example of a minister wandering in the wilderness, waiting for inspiration to come to him to impart something spiritual to believers. At some point in the article, the minister places the mantle of responsibility on believers, charging them to follow in his example in the same intuitive “hearing of God’s voice”. He says, “When you know it’s God’s voice, start moving in that direction.” I’m sure you can see how open-ended that statement is and that it doesn’t tell you how God ministers to His people, or how to recognize the voice of God.

God is breaking this bad habit of teaching people that their intuition or gut feeling is His voice. What such instruction does, is perpetuate the wrong example, leading believers down a track hoping to hear God’s voice their own way, but in fact, leaving them vulnerable to mistake the many voices of self, Satan and the world for that of God.

Apostle Eric vonAnderseck addresses this in the IDCCST Course Handbook:

When the old man is accepted as the new man in Christ, believers are taught to develop their spiritual muscles by developing an ability to better tune into their gut feelings, to better hear the voice of their “inner man” (the natural man, the old man). They are told that this is God’s voice, and that God uses this voice of intuition as his inner guidance and that this inward witness is his light to them. How dangerous to preach this self-centered gospel! (p. 75. Week 4 The Flesh You Were Born Into.)

Without the proper scale of knowledge, believers are left ill-equipped to rightly discern the voice of God’s grace by which to progress with the anointing. This describes a problematic experience common among believers that are not yet walking in a covenant relationship with God. Man’s own signature, moral code, God-Code, principles etc. are all voices that speak to us; but this is not the voice of God.

Wilderness ministers’ instruction, though it may appear to earnestly encourage believers to seek God’s voice, in the end only points the believer back to themselves. The believer is not pointed to the new covenant terms and conditions that God established in Jesus to direct faith to build for God.

God set His voice in His elect stewardship to equip the faith of believers by the measure of His truth as an accurate scale. But where this due order is side stepped by ministers volunteering their own ideas, the believer is nudged to tune in to a voice that leads them in whichever way their inclination leans in any given circumstance.

This is a harmful and confusing experience because it sets their affections on the circumstances instead of resourcing the knowledge of the covenant to learn of God, and bear fruit for His glory. The world teaches circumstantial faith. This is not God’s way but is the result of Satan’s influence upon the false religious system, which resists God’s voice in His steward speaking about the covenant of Jesus Christ. Jesus is the Voice, Oath and Word of God, and as such, speaks within the boundaries of the covenant He designed with holy fellowship and communion in mind.

Always remember: Jesus’ covenant is the perfect environment He designed for faith to confidently and cognitively function through the pillars of His stewardship and priesthood. This is why grace (God’s voice) calls to believers to enter into covenant with God and accept His terms of contact and increase, so that we would truly know and please Him, and have access to the anointing for pure discernment; never again mistaking another voice for God.

Those who are still searching for God’s voice are not laboring with His covenant instruction which means they are still in the wilderness, outside of the boundary of His precious promises. God’s great and precious promises are His covenant promises which we partake of as we use the things of His covenant. Apostle Peter brings this to our attention:

2 Peter 1:3-4
³ According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue:

⁴ Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.

Lust speaks of what we covet, meaning what we center our affection on; we either covet spiritual things or things that work with the inclination of man to seek peace & security in the flesh.

What did the children of Israel set their affections around in the wilderness outside the land of Canaan?

In Numbers chapter 13 we read of the wilderness of Paran and Kadesh which was outside the boundary of the land of Canaan; this speaks symbolically of the wilderness outside the covenant of Christ.

The Spirit lifts out that just like the land of Canaan represented a land or place of promise that had to be entered, so too it symbolically spoke of Jesus’ covenant as the place we must now enter into to partake of the promises of divine fruit bearing and eternal life.

By the command of God, Moses sent spies to scope out the land and ten of the twelve came back with an evil report, warning the people not to go in:

Numbers 13:26,32
²⁶ And they went and came to Moses, and to Aaron, and to all the congregation of the children of Israel, unto the wilderness of Paran, to Kadesh; and brought back word unto them, and unto all the congregation, and shewed them the fruit of the land.

³² And they brought up an evil report of the land which they had searched unto the children of Israel, saying, The land, through which we have gone to search it, is a land that eateth up the inhabitants thereof; and all the people that we saw in it are men of a great stature.

These witnesses represent the witness of man, doubtful and fearful of what the carnal eye observes and the imagination projects, which are the things Satan seeks to exploit. These witnesses were not reflecting on the revelation of God which He has manifested continually to the children of Israel through His servant Moses (the steward God appointed to speak for Him and lead them).

In contrast, two witnesses, Caleb and Joshua gave a good report saying the land was exceedingly good and that the Lord would be with Israel, and they should enter in – as it was the land God promised His people. And the Lord in so many ways did show that He was with them: in setting them free, leading them through the red sea – parting the sea, providing them a cloud by day and fire by night and manna to eat; all divine provisions which were signs as a witness for their faith to labor with (reflect on), in the presence of Moses (representing God’s stewardship) and Aaron (representing the priesthood).

But the people were discouraged at the evil report of the ten doubtful witnesses and abandoned all hope of entering into the Promised Land. In reality many unconverted Christians are at such a point in the wilderness; saying the same thing the children of Israel did, as recorded in Numbers 14:4 where they said, “Let us make a captain, and let us return into Egypt.”

In other words: Let us select our own leaders because we don’t like the results (of God’s election) as seen from our perspective. In reality God is asking us to embrace His voice in the stewardship of His restored apostles in order to see from His perspective. And as the stewardship of Moses and the priesthood of Aaron were murmured against in Israel, similarly, those who murmur against God’s election today follow the witness of man, making their own captain (leadership that reflects themselves) to explore other avenues that they are curious about:

– Seeking God your own way = the wilderness

– Jumping from one inspirational spiritual author to the next = the wilderness

– Receding back into the comfort of your tradition and religious upbringing = the wilderness

You can tell when believers are in the wilderness, because these avenues are not equipping them to progress with the anointing, but rather they are ministering questions in support of the journey towards a progressive truth (which is not God).

1 Timothy 1:4
Neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies, which minister questions, rather than godly edifying which is in faith: so do.

2 Timothy 3:7
Ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.

It is only after they exhaust themselves in the wilderness that believers cry out to God and seek Him. When God answers this prayer and grants them the spark of His grace (the revelation of Christ), God intends for their faith to build upon His complete and wholesome truth (the apostles’ doctrine), in the absence of which the spark of grace soon fades. Your faith needs sound doctrine (covenant truth taught by God’s living apostles) so you can progress with the anointing. Grace needs truth so that the spark that was provided to ignite your faith turns into a bonfire by the anointing.

Truth is the framework God has restored again today through the restoration of apostolic oversight in the church, for His grace (God’s voice) to enter into to keep your faith and hope burning brightly.