← The Wake-Up Call
The Wake-Up Call
Hearing God's Voice, Part 2: Learn to Obey
00:20:23
In this episode, Dan Wilt explores the concept of awakening as a transformational journey of love, emphasizing the role of faith and risk in expressing God's love to others. He discusses how awakening involves a continuous flow of love from Jesus to individuals and through them to others. Dan highlights the importance of embodying the love of God in everyday interactions, encouraging listeners to take risks in faith, supported by the Holy Spirit. He shares insights on how faith, when expressed in love, can bring encouragement and hope to those around us, urging listeners to be active participants in this journey. Dan also shares personal stories and experiences that illustrate the power of listening to and obeying God's voice. He recounts moments where stepping out in faith led to meaningful connections and healing, emphasizing the importance of obedience in partnership with the Holy Spirit. Through anecdotes and reflections, Dan encourages listeners to practice obedience in small ...
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Good morning, Sower and Sower Nation. Today is Thursday, June 25th, in the year of our Lord 2026. I'm Dan Wilt and this is your wake up call. JD has a fresh way of talking about awakening that I just love. He says awakening is the transformational journey of love from Jesus to a person, through a person, to a person, through a person, and so on. Let me just say it again. Awakening is the transformational journey of love from Jesus to a person, through a person, to a person, through a person, and so on. And what we're learning to do is to, in some unique and special ways, be the love of God to people around us. That's why in the series so far, we've spent so much time talking about, well, what did Jesus actually do and then what did he commission us to do with him? What was the intent? Well, it was to continue his ministry through his, his apprentices. That's you and me. And I've often thought, you know, I love talking about, about the scriptures, I love talking about the word of God. I love talking about Jesus. I love talking about the Father and the Spirit. I love talking about everything that the kingdom of God is all about. But when it comes to doing it, that's just not as fun because I feel that risk, that it takes some faith. But what we see, and I'd encourage you to just embrace this, what we see is that this will always be a walk by faith and not by sight. And whether people are expressing faith out there in the world, taking a risk on their business, or they're, they're taking a risk of faith in, in some investment they're making or whatever it is, everybody is expressing some level of faith. We're just choosing to do it with the strength of the Holy Spirit moving through us to say, lord, I want to believe in the things that I hope for. I want to experience in fullness my confidence in the conviction of things that I don't yet see from Hebrews 11. And the world is longing for people who are moving in faith toward them. But faith expressed right in love. Faith expressed in love. It's been said that people are literally dying around us for lack of encouragement, for lack of just someone stepping into their world and saying, I'm here, I see you, you can do this, you're going to make it. And then to add in that layer of encouragement that is filled with insights from the Holy Spirit, where else can people get that? They're not, like I've said, they're not going to get it on the news. They're not going to get it on Wall Street. They're not going to get it from polit, politicians and celebrities and everything else. They're going to get it from their neighbor, from their sister or their brother or their, their, their friend in their network or their co worker, or they're going to get it from someone who in the secret place of their heart has said, jesus, yes, come, Holy Spirit, your will be done. Your kingdom come, your will be done. Who might even go to them and say, I know, I see you're going through a really hard time. Could I pray for you right now? Would you mind that? I'd love to just do that. My experience again. You know, again I'm saying I don't do this every day. I'm following a lot of the activations here. I'm gathering stories and I'll share some of those along the way. But I am still, after decades of learning how to hear God's voice, still learning to discern, still feeling that pause. And yet God does things. And then you kind of get addicted to that. When someone experiences the love of God and the encouragement of, of the Holy Spirit, Jesus, doing things that only he can do. He does things through things that come naturally to us and gifts that we've, and skills that we've learned and acquired for sure, through our hospitality and other things. But he wants to give extra gifts, these, these giftlets of grace, as some have said. Gracelets, excuse me, not giftlets, gracelets. It's from that Greek word charismata, that he wants to give these gifts of grace, these gracelets in people's lives. And I find that they're like little moments where Jesus gets to sing his song over someone and maybe for the first time they're hearing it. So we're, we're learning what it means to have faith be spelled R I S K. That could be small R I, S K or capital. But we're just learning to move forward. And can you imagine if God's people all over the world, in all the streams of the church, were just mobilized in this? We were listening for God's spirit to speak to us, for all of those around us, whether we know them well or and we've known them for decades, or we're just meeting them for the first time. So, all right, we're going to have a good session here today. So wake up, sleeper. Rise from the dead and Christ will shine on you. Let's pray our prayer of consecration together as we begin today's meeting with Jesus. Jesus, I belong to you. I lift up my heart to you. I set my mind on you. I fix my eyes on you.
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I offer my body to you as a living sacrifice. Jesus, we belong to you. And we're praying. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. Our entry today is titled Hearing God's voice. Part 2. Learn to obey. And our passage is from Acts 9:36 to 42. Hear the word of the Lord. In Joppa, there was a disciple named Tabitha. In Greek, her name is Dorcas. She was always doing good and helping the poor. About that time, she became sick and died, and her body was washed and placed in an upstairs room. Lydda was near Joppa. So when the disciples heard that Peter was in Lydda, they sent two men to him and urged him, please come at once. There's a lot of faith in this man. Peter went with them, and when he arrived, he was taken upstairs to the room. All the widows stood around him, crying and showing him the robes and other clothing that Dorcas had made while she was still with them. Peter sent them all out of the room. Very interesting. Then he got down on his knees and prayed. Turning toward the dead woman, he said, tabitha, get up. She opened her eyes and seeing Peter, she sat up. He took her by the hand and helped her to her feet. Then he called for the believers, especially the widows, and presented her to them alive. This became known all over Joppa, and many people believed in the Lord, the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. What a moving, moving story. And I love that he sent them out of the room for it all to happen. Consider this the speaker, my mentor and friend, Gary Best, was running an experiential prayer clinic with a few thousand of us in the room. And at one point he asked if someone had a picture in their mind and if they would come up front and share it. Now, this was a special conference that was for learning how to hear God's voice. He would then ask if anyone in the room could relate to that picture that someone shared or or sense that it might be from God for them. Gary was very disarming and lighthearted about hearing God. A long line formed at the front, and people felt free to try without feeling a need to get it right. I got in line, and when I reached the front, I said this. And I swallowed hard as I did. Friends, I saw a picture. It was a picture of an upside down brain. And Gary laughed and everyone in the room laughed. And that took a lot of courage for me to get up there and say something like that. He laughed and he said, well, does anyone here resonate with this picture of an upside down brain? And we all laughed. But a woman at the back of the room quickly jumped up, and eagerly, she virtually ran to the front. And Gary paired me and another woman on the prayer team with this woman to pray. And, yeah, she looked at me with a smile, her face beaming, and she said this to me. My doctor just said to me two days ago these very words, it's like your brain is upside down. It's just not functioning right. We laughed out loud together so hard. And then we prayed into that image as we prayed for God's healing. He wasn't saying literally that's what was happening, but he was like, everything's just going wrong. And that was the metaphor he chose to use. And the Lord spoke that to me in order to say, I see you to her, and what a joy that is. Now that was in a conference setting. That was a very special thing. That sounds very dramatic, but there are moments like that where God may give us something that's a little bit beyond us, and then we just have to learn and grow over time. That came for after years of learning to hear God's voice. Well, if we first learn to listen, then the second part of our partnership with the Holy Spirit in ministering others is to obey with it. All prayer must begin with an invitation asking God to intervene and bring his kingdom. Implicit to it is the question, God, what do you want me to say and do? When Peter was asked to pray for the kind woman Dorcas, who had already died, the first thing he did was to get on his knees and pray the prayer of invitation. When we do that, however, there is the distinct possibility that God may answer us. And that is a quote from Gary's book, Naturally Supernatural. And so what a powerful, you know, moment there to recognize that if we're going to say, God, what do you want me to say and do that he actually might answer us. When the image of an upside down brain in our story for today popped into my mind, I had a choice. Keep this to myself and silently pray for the person, or to go up at this invitation. And I sensed via a simple impression in my heart that made me feel open to God, even though I was simultaneously a little afraid. Am I going to be embarrassed? I felt that way whether I was in the airplane story you heard or whether I'm just with a neighbor offering a word of encouragement or in that hair salon or Wherever I might be in the grocery store or with the waitress, I always feel hesitation. Even if I'm not giving something that might be strange or unusual, but I always feel some level of hesitation. But then I say that word of encouragement. I just feel like I should say to you, finish the degree you started. And then when you see someone's eyes light up or, well, I'm actually not doing a degree. And then you go, okay, you know what I'm saying? Like we're just, if we're coming in love and we're coming in kindness and humility and gentleness, like we're learning, we're growing. So this is a bit deep end of the pool. But just stay with me here. What I want to say here is that I had a choice in that moment. I had a choice in that moment. And the reality is if I would have just said, I'm keeping that to myself and, and I left it there, it's okay, Jesus would not be knocked off his throne. I'd get another opportunity to learn and to grow. But in that moment there was a sense of openness to God, like, this is you. I really sense this is you, Lord. And then it was just this moment, well, do you want to obey? Do you want to see something happen here? And it was a safe environment where I could learn. And there was, it was light hearted. It wasn't, you know, all this pressure. And so I tried and I, over the years, now, over the decades, have learned to sense and intuit more and more by increasing practice when to lean in a bit. So it's about practicing in the little things. When everyone else, while everyone else went forward to share. I felt more like maybe I missed it. But faith brought me to the front, kept me walking in the line just saying, I'm going to say this thing. And that evening, here's the result. A woman went away feeling seen and loved by God. I went away encouraged. The other woman who prayed with us went away feeling like she could take risks of obedience. So when we step out in faith, there's the possibility of failure, but there's also the possibility of a tremendous freedom for someone. And that's why even the small risks are worth leaning into practicing along the way. Okay, so it doesn't have to be be an odd story moment like that for you. And again, that was in a particular conference at a particular time, particular place designated for learning in this. But I'd encourage you just lean in and then when the Lord says and you feel like you're openness of Heart, I want you to take a risk here. I want you to obey me. I just want you to do this one thing, say this with love to this person now. And as we do it, we grow a little bit and over time we just keep growing in it. So here's our prayer for today. Join me in it, Lord Jesus. Like Peter, I want to pray for direction and then I want to act on what I believe you're showing me. Give me joy in obedience. I want to partner with you in seeing people set free. In the name of Jesus, I pray. Amen. Amen. And again, I'm just thinking here, even as we were praying that prayer there, there's someone here who you might be listening. And there's this sense that you're to do a particular thing that relates to giving someone some resources you have. And it's the same thing, whether it's that odd picture I had or this sense of leaning. It's. And just practice leaning in Jesus, is this you? Then I'm going to obey. Even if you don't have those resources, I'm going to obey. A cumulative life of obedience adds up to a life of partnering with the Holy Spirit and some really fun things that God wants to do in you and through you in the lives of others. And so here are some journal prompts. What is the most unusual experience you've had with the Lord? Speaking into your life or the life of someone else in a less than conventional way? Secondly, what were the results? Write down your reflection on the situation and what you can learn from it. And then our activation for today, this beautiful Thursday, is this today? Practice obeying. Pray God. What do you want me to say and do with this person? And if it's nothing great, but if there's something he gives you, then go with your sense of what he says. If it resonates with the character of Jesus, gentle and humble in heart evidences, the fruit of the Spirit rings true to God's love and word. Then take a step of faith and see what happens. You know, so much about a gift when we're giving it to someone is about how it's presented. If I give a gift and I give it harshly and I give it in a weird, you know, way in some way, or it's wacky, or it feels strange, etc. It's going to be hard for the person to receive the gift I'm giving. But if I'm coming in gentleness and humility, moved by love, and that's my primary way of approach in the way of Jesus, then someone will be able to receive that gift in a way that just makes it very accessible, makes them believe that they're being loved by a person and by God. All right, well, today we're going to sing the song, contemporary worship song. Great are you Lord? It's not in our great Redeemer's praise, but. But I'd invite you to join me in it.
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You give light, you are love. You bring light to the darkness. You give hope, you restore every heart that is broken. Great are you Lord? And it's your breath in our lungs so we pour out our praise. Pour out our praise. It's your breath in our lungs so we pour out our praise to you only. It's your breath in our lungs so we pour out our praise. Pour out our praise. It's your bread in our lungs so we pour out our praise to you only. Great are you, lord. Great are are you, Lord? Amen.
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You know, there are so many stories of obedience that led to your life coming fully into the arms of Jesus. Led to my life coming fully into the arms of Jesus. In my story, the prayers of my grandmother and grandfather, in my view, got me here today. Loving Jesus in my early 60s now. And I believe that there are people that God wants to touch. Those who follow him, those who don't yet with his love through your simple act of obedience. So let's get our seeds together. The word of God in us, the love of God, the Spirit's tools moving through us. And let's plant them as JD Says, sow them liberally, because some of them are going to take root on very good soil. And we get to be a part of what Jesus is doing in the lives of others today. All right, I'll see you on the field for the awakening. I'm Dan Love.