3 Ways to Know When God Is Calling You
Once we are saved and sealed with the Holy Spirit by putting our trust in Jesus, we have the rest of our lives to grow in Christ. This is called our sanctification. Sanctification happens through abiding in Christ and through obedience to the Spirit. So, this begets the question: how can you know when the Holy Spirit is calling you to do something? In my life, I’ve noticed there are three different categories: the walk, the nudge, and the idea.
The Walk
This is the call of discipleship that all of us are asked to pick up. It’s the obedience God commands in Scripture. It’s obedience to biblical wisdom and His ways, which requires putting our flesh to death. This also includes sharing the gospel because the great commission is a call to every believer.
Jesus tells His disciples in John 15:9-17, “As the Father loved Me, I also have loved you; abide in My love. If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love. These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full. This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends. You are My friends if you do whatever I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I heard from My Father I have made known to you. You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask the Father in My name He may give you. These things I command you, that you love one another.”
As believers, we want to be His disciples and friends by following His commandments and loving one another. A few verses later (26-27), Jesus promises them the Holy Spirit, who we have residing with us today: “But when the Helper comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify of Me. And you also will bear witness, because you have been with Me from the beginning.”
2. The Nudge
This is a prompt by the Holy Spirit to do something specific, and it is usually time-sensitive. For example, it might be a nudge to go pray for a stranger or it might be a nudge to stop a specific habit or a nudge to read a specific Scripture. His Spirit is within us to function as a compass and direct us to do something that, in our flesh, we would be oblivious to do. It may seem irrational or uncomfortable, but God wants us to practice trusting Him. This is usually something that we might wrestle with in our minds and question, “Is this God or is it me?” As long as this prompting doesn’t contradict Scripture and it can only bring glory to God, it doesn’t hurt to step out in faith. Hebrews 11:1 says, “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” Stepping out in faith requires believing even when you can’t foresee the outcome.
One time, when I was on a mission trip in a big city, I felt a strong urge to go talk and pray with a woman who was sitting alone and looked scared and somewhat sad. Although I’ll never be able to confirm for sure, I got the impression that she might have been a victim of human trafficking. She was with a man who was older and they didn’t seem to belong together. When he had stepped away to smoke a cigar, that’s when I went up to her. She was extremely appreciative of the prayer and I told her how much God loves her and sees her. There were tears in her eyes. You never know what people need to hear, and so it never hurts you to step out in faith even when it might feel uncomfortable.
3. The Idea
This is an idea to do something that pops into your mind and won’t go away. You might start to sense confirmation in different ways such as through conversation with other believers, coming across a Scripture, listening to a sermon, or seeing a certain phrase or word that confirms the idea. It may not always happen that way, but the point is that the idea keeps coming to mind. It’s not particularly time sensitive, but it will eventually require action on your end. It may be something specific to serving God, or it might just be regarding direction in your life. Oftentimes, you may not even realize it was God who put that thought into your mind until after the fact. This somewhat reminds me of the story of Esther. Although her life was at risk, she knew she had to stand up for her people, the Jews. Through prayer, fasting, faith, and obedience, God used her to preserve the murder of many Jews.
As an example from my life, the summer Matt and I got engaged, I remember distinctly that we were driving across the desert and Matt brought up the idea for this ministry. He mentioned the idea of hosting zoom calls and doing online discipleship. To be honest, this intimidated me at first, but now we can see how this idea was 100% from God and His hand has been upon this journey.
I want to talk about the failure to answer any of these calls. I know that all of us can relate to that to some extent. When we fail to obey a call, it’s important to know that that doesn’t change our “salvation” or change God’s love for us. Ephesians 4:30 says, “Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.” This gives us two important principles. First, it’s possible to grieve the Holy Spirit by disobedience and by walking in the ways of the world instead of in the Spirit. Second, however, even if we do, we are still sealed with the Spirit for the day of redemption.
We may think we are “letting God down” when we don’t obey a prompting, but it’s important to remember that He doesn’t need to use us, He wants to use us. When we disobey, we are the ones who miss out on the blessing. Yes, it does hurt God when we disobey, just like a parent is hurt to see their own children disobey them. But, it doesn’t change His love for us. The more we continue to disobey the Spirit, though, we may grow less sensitive to His promptings and that’s a place where we don’t want to be. With all this being said, when you fail to disobey, use it as a learning opportunity and next time step out in faith!
There’s one final thing I want to add that I’ve learned recently when it comes to obeying a call from God. We usually expect that the outcome will be good and if it isn’t, then we start to question if we even heard from God in the first place. This has happened to me more than once, but I’ve realized that just because the immediate outcome of obedience wasn’t what we might have expected, it doesn’t mean we “misheard.” God promises us that He “works all things together for the good of those who love Him, those who are called according to His purpose” (Romans 8:28). Sometimes the process of obedience hurts, but that doesn’t mean He isn’t working or that He wasn’t speaking. In order for all things to work together, sometimes there have to be bumps in the road. At the end of the day, though, we have comfort in His promises for ultimate good.
What other ways do you hear God calling you? I’d love to hear your stories!
-Alina