How do we listen to God?
All that�s been said up until now is still incomplete, for which there may be a doubt remaining: If God speaks through external, material things, does he say the same to all of us? If God is so intimate, why is it that some people don�t hear him when he speaks?
| God speaks through the external and material, but he speaks in the interior of each person. God has a personal way of being with each one of his sons and daughters, from Person to person. And that is found in the interior of each one of us. That�s why, although things happen to everyone, only those that consider these things in their heart are the ones that hear the voice of God. |
This isn�t anything strange at all. The same happens among people. For example: I receive a kiss from another person. The person speaks to me through an external act. However, only if I consider this kiss, if in my interior I value that I have been kissed, only then do I know myself to be spoken to and cared for by that person: that kiss has said and can be worth many things to me.
Another example. A friend tells me that he has no time to do a particular thing. If I take a moment and consider this in my heart, I will know to listen that he may be really asking me to help him realize it. Perhaps I�m really being asked for help. My reaction can also be different: I can go on with just hearing (not listening) and simply say that� �that�s too bad�� �I�m sorry�� �Don�t let it get you down�.
In this way, selfish people lack this intimacy. Someone who doesn�t let their occurrences enter into their heart to contemplate is someone who doesn�t really know how to listen to others. Neither will he know how to listen to God.
How can I listen to God? Carrying in my intimacy, in my heart, and considering the things that happen around me. There is where God lays and he speaks to me, telling me what he wants to say with these things.
And, how do I know if it�s God or if it�s my own conscience? There is no distinction. God normally serves himself from our own psychological structure, and speaks in our conscience. If I am open to Him, it will be He who acts and speaks within me. The conclusions we arrive to, when we are open to his presence, are really his own.
If God listens, why doesn�t what I ask for come to happen?
To answer this, we have to be aware of the way that God listens to us. In many occasions, I�ve come across people that have decided to leave their faith aside because, on some occasion, they had asked God for something and that �didn�t work out�: things didn�t turn out the way they had wanted. We may ask God for things frequently, and that petition may have appeared to fall in vain, since what happened was maybe the opposite of what we�d been hoping for. Does God really listen? There�s a psalm that says in a more or less ironic way: how is He who created all ears not to listen? If we exist in his loving desire and he loves us like the best of Fathers, how is he not going to listen to us? I pray to God as the person I am, as his creature, according to what seems the best for me. But I have to be aware that my vision is quite partial and against the wall of what is my personal experience. With the information I have, it seems that what would be best for me would be a certain thing, and so I pray for that to happen. But I ask Him, who has a more complete vision of reality, who has before his sight my present, but also my past and my future. He wants what is best for me. That is why Jesus taught us to pray: �thine will be done�. In this prayer of Our Father, we ask him for things to be things the way He wants, and that we may know to do things the way he wants us to. God listens, but he�s not a magical genie. He isn�t bound to our every desire.Does it make any difference whether I pray or not? Will God always do what He says is best?
In this case there are two distinct ideas that sometimes mix. About the first one, it does make a difference whether we pray or not: God has not written tomorrow�s paper yet. God is creating in every moment; that is, creation begins in every moment, according to the free acts that men have realized. And among those free acts are our petitions. He considers them, but he considers them taking into account many elements that simply escape us.
About the second idea, that God will always do what he wants, that is partially true. But he will do what is best for us taking into account the things I have asked for. It is not incompatible that he listens but doesn�t do what I want. I, with my prayers and petitions, influence in his decision. At the same time, every time I pray, He is more �obliged� to make things the way He really wants, which is for the better, even when it doesn�t coincide with what I want. And every time that I pray, if I pray well, I am more capable of accepting his will, of loving all things the way that He has made them come to be. In C.S. Lewis�s biographical movie the main character prays to God, asking for his wife to be cured of a cancer that she suffers. His wife�s condition doesn�t improve, but he comments: �I need to pray in my needs� This, my praying to God, doesn�t change Him, it changes me!� God takes into account everything I tell him, but praying changes the one who prays, if he prays correctly. And it may be this better good what God really wants for me: something more precious than what I may be asking Him for.
