Jesus says, "My sheep hear my voice." And again He states, "they that have ears to hear, hear, and those who have eyes to see, see." Hearing the voice of God is something we strive to know clearly all the days of our walk with Him. There are many competing voices declaring His methods. I simplified some of the things Martineau said about the way we hear the true voice of God.

He never speaks to us as strangers as though we are a race of slaves who must do things we don't comprehend, because His tones are directed, not to overpower, but to penetrate our very souls.

Christ appeals to us as souls that bear a kindred spirit with his own.

Christ addresses us in the imperative voice of divine right; but not till it has made the whisper of our own conscience speak in the very same tones.

He asks for obedience, but on the basis of communion with Him.

His sternest law is mellowed by the voice of Him that bare our woes, and they are turned from the crash of Fate into the music of love.

He pronounces with the calmness of inspiration, on the sublimest truths. He transposes us into a temper in which His truths evidence themselves.

He abolishes the infinite distance between us, and shows us that what is dear and beautiful to Him are the very things we hold sacred.

He does not bear down against our resistance, but touches the natural spring of our inner desires.  

He appeals to us as to souls that bear a kindred spirit with His own; that we secretly know the right way from which, in a misery of delusion, we have turned from: we deeply love the purity and power of heart that we have sadly lost; and feel the shame and sorrow of an alienation; an alienation that we may have boasted of as a freedom, but lamented with the sighs of exile.

 This is how everyone born of the Spirit perceives the Holy and can vow allegiance to the Divine.

"My sheep hear my voice."