Learning to listen with discernment means that you begin to recognize the voice of God so well that other voices sound unfamiliar.

In John 10:5a, Jesus told his followers, “Yet they will never follow a stranger.” This statement needs to become a reality in your life. It takes practice and requires that you learn well the lessons in listening with discernment offered to all of us by the Holy Spirit.

Don’t be so overly zealous, that instead of making the time to take driver’s training classes, you quickly get into the fastest car you can find and go off to the races.

Some, sad to say, end up in a ditch or become a casualty of driving without a license! But you can avoid the ditches.

First, get your permit while being mentored by others, and then graduate to driving alone. Where hearing God is concerned, driver’s education consists of discernment lessons.

The Need for Discerning of Spirits

The gift of discerning of spirits, which is listed in the New Testament as one of the gifts of the Spirit, is desperately needed in today’s church culture. This gift helps you distinguish what motivates spiritual activity. It helps you see through the gray areas and differentiate light from darkness.

The following are some examples of the gift of discerning of spirits in operation:

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