God Speaks to You Each and Every Day

If you follow me on social media you may have seen that I spent this past weekend on retreat. This is my 4th retreat with the Sisters of Life and each year it is incredibly fruitful, so if I can make it, I’m usually there.

I have learned, anytime you go on retreat, you should head in without expectations. God surprises me every single time. I think I have some idea of how the weekend might go. Nope! Not even close. Some years it’s been filled with tears, as I worked through something. Sometimes it’s been filled with a mix of confusion and then peace.

This year, without a doubt, I would say it was filled with pure joy. And it was fantastic! And totally, utterly unexpected!

I’m not exaggerating when I tell you that I sat in the chapel, eyes shut in prayer, but with a smile on my face. I felt like such a weirdo! (I’m a total melancholic and we are really good at dwelling in the deep dark stuff. We’re also good at serious contemplation. But joy, nah, that’s a bit unfamiliar for me.) Truly, this smiling became somewhat of a joke with one of the sisters, whom the others affectionately nicknamed, Sister Smiley.

So what made me so filled with joy? The short answer is that Jesus decided that joy was going to be my grace this weekend. I wish I could give you a really specific answer, but I can’t. Even if I could, it wouldn’t make sense, in all likelihood, because each of us is a unique being. God doesn’t speak to or work in any of us in the same way.

But I realized that I can share with you a little about HOW God speaks to me with some specific examples from this weekend.

I thought this might be a good thing to share because if I think back to where I was in my faith life just 5 years ago, I didn’t recognize when God was speaking. I couldn’t really hear His voice. And when I thought I did, I wondered if I was hearing my own voice talking to me or if it was actually Him. And I would imagine there are many of you who feel the same way. So why not share a little about that, if it might help you.

First things first, a wide angle view of how God speaks to me is in order, followed by specifics. (And remember we are unique and he may not use the same tools to speak to you, but he might use some of them) Also, he doesn’t always use the same ways with me. But this is more so what I’ve learned is most common.

Ok – here we go.

This seems somewhat obvious, but He uses Scripture. I read the daily Mass readings every day. Not every day do His words “speak” to me, but there are many days certain words, phrases or images just jump off the page at me. I may note those in my journal if I have time. I may mull those words over during the day, or I may completely forget them the next minute because I have a 3 year old that NEEDS MILK RIGHT THIS MINUTE OR HE’LL DIE!BUT…if God wants to speak to me through those words a stubborn toddler that He’s plopped into my life is not getting in the way.

What I have found is that God knows that life is totally distracting. So he will generally use something else to hammer the message home.

Quick analogy for the parents here just for the fun of it. Think of it like this – when we ask our kids to put on their shoes, at first, we use a normal, calm voice. And we get no movement from them. We repeat ourselves. Still nothing. We try a third time. Nada. Finally, we resort to a louder voice, (or maybe like me, a crazed, maniacal voice) or perhaps tossing the shoes at our kids to get our point across. Now, I’m not saying God speaks to us unnecessarily harshly. But let’s be real, Jesus did call St. Peter Satan at one point, so I’m thinking He understands how maddening the shoe thing is. And sometimes God needs to throw the proverbial pair of shoes in our general direction for us to pay attention.

So to make the message clear to me, he repeats Himself, sometimes pretty loudly. Usually it’s through a book I’m reading, a podcast, or even scrolling through Instagram. It doesn’t matter. It could even be through another person or conversation, although this is generally less common for me.

As a side note, He sometimes works this process backwards. I might stumble upon a quote that appeals to me or a passage in a book that really moves me. And then, BAM! Gospel reading the next day has the exact same idea in it.

So, this is how He really started speaking in my life. Before I could truly discern His voice in silent prayer, he was so, so obvious. It helped me get a feel for what His voice was like. And he uses this tactic all the time still because I’m dense at times and because life is so very loud that I often forget to listen. And He uses this tactic when He really wants me to understand something.

In fact, He used this method just this weekend. So here’s a concrete example for you.

My penance from confession was to do an Ignatian scripture meditation. Without getting too far off topic, the basic gist of this type of prayer is that you reflect upon a particular scripture passage asking questions like: what might God be saying to me here? Are there any phrases that seemed meaningful? etc.

As directed I used a meditation book from the retreat house library. The meditation I chose “at random” (I write as God laughs) was the very famous passage from 1 Corinthians 13: “Love is patient. Love is kind.” BLAH!!! Yet, one particular phrase jumped off the page for me – “[love] endures all things.” This phrase had particular significance for me after my confession and previous prayer during the retreat. So I jotted down some notes in my journal. That was Saturday afternoon.

Any of you remember what the second reading at Mass was on Sunday?

YEAHHHHHH – 1 Corinthians 13. (There are those proverbial shoes being thrown at me.)

Basically, He was saying to me in no uncertain terms – what you realized yesterday as you wrote in your journal. That’s exactly what I wanted you to hear.

In this particular example, God had spoken to me in many different ways. First, He spoke to me through the priest in confession. Remember, he sits “in persona Christi.” Then he spoke to me through Scripture. Later that night, he spoke directly in my mind in my thoughts (which I can write about another time). But just to make His point abundantly clear, he used this repetition of the scripture at Mass. And lastly, he utilized the words of the priest’s homily and the lyrics of the recessional hymn to give me a final consolation and assurance of His words.

Talk about attention to detail! How could I not be joyful at that loving care He showed me throughout the weekend?

So all this to say – God is speaking to YOU each and every day. The challenge is learning how to hear Him. Do you have questions? Send them to me. I’m happy to help, if I can. But better yet, take your questions to Jesus. Ask Him to help you listen better. He will. Do not doubt it. And then get ready to dodge a shoe or two.