"there is a heterogenous group of experiences that is very similar to hallucinations. They are almost invariably associated with underlying severe emotional distress. The only major exception is a small group of individuals in the general population, neither evidently mentally disordered nor distressed, who have a strong religious faith and who hear the voice of God in their everyday lives. We recognise that they may be right about the origin of the experience, but we prefer to believe that it is due to some other, as yet poorly understood psychological process."
I first ran up against this issue in medical school - the issue that may cause other doctors to think I have an "as yet poorly understood psychological process," and normal people to think I am a bit loopy - the fact that I believe that I hear God speak to me. A hallucination is defined as a sensory perception experienced in the absence of an external stimulus. However, beliefs or perceptions which can be accounted for by the patient's religious or cultural background are not considered true delusions or hallucinations. Also, for it to be a true hallucination, you must be convinced that what you can see or hear is real, and perceptible to anyone close by. We had some examples to work through in small groups to force home these points, and had to say whether they represent hallucinations or not, eg "you are walking home alone late at night, and you are feeling anxious about being followed. you see a shadow in the trees and become convinced it is a person" - that kind of thing. (not a true hallucination by the way) One of the examples was "you have a friend who is devoutly religious. He tells you that he talks to God and God talks back to him." The group started to debate it, but I said "no - that's normal." They knew I was a Christian, so looked at me weirdly and left it at that. A Muslim girl in the group said that this would not be normal for a Muslim, as God spoke only to the prophet, not to other people. (Not sure whether this is the mainstream Muslim view or not, by the way.) Came away from this session feeling slightly uneasy, as I normally do when people think I'm mad.
Now I have never heard God speak with an audible voice that I can hear with my ears. I know of people who have, but for me it's a lot harder to explain than that. It kind of comes like the internal monologue that most of us have all the time. I think I may have this inner voice more than most, because whenever mr me asks me what I am thinking about I can tell him the 2 worries, one random wondering thought and the plan for the curtains in the back bedroom that were chasing each other around my head. When I ask him what he was thinking about, he normally says "dunno - football I think." Anyway...when God speaks, the internal monologue suddenly seems to turn into a conversation - i.e. an answer comes back at you different and faster than what you would have thought for yourself. That is my experience sometimes. I can normally tell it's God by what He says - it is in line with the Bible and what I know about His character, it's frequently something uncomfortable or out of left field, but when I try to follow it or pray into it or whatever action is required, I get a peace about it, which is again difficult to explain.
It's not always like that, and particularly if I am praying for guidance about a specific thing and waiting for God to talk to me like that I can become very confused between my own thoughts and His voice. Sometimes God speaks through reading the Bible - I can be reading and suddenly something jumps out of the page at me and applys itself to my life - I think a lot of Christians have that experience. Sometimes God speaks more through feelings and emotions - normally to let me feel His love or a sense of peace at leaving things in His hands. This happens mostly when I'm worshipping and open to Him. Sometimes God speaks through circumstances in my life, and I know some of the times when I've been closest to Him have been when I'm going through a really hard time and having to depend on Him completely. I'm not one of these Christians who prays about what colour socks to put on in the morning etc - I believe God gave me a brain to decide that kind of thing with, and sometimes I think even the bigger decisions can be taken with some common sense, a background of what kind of things God wants for you and a willingness to hear Him if you're going the wrong way. I think sometimes the decisions which are most significant to us (eg which job should I take?) can be different to the ones which are significant to God (eg He might want us to forgive somebody because otherwise we will do something which hurts them or us and will somehow affect the rest of our lives.)
So anyway - this is my confession. I hear God talking to me. Do you think I'm mentally unwell, or subject to a poorly understood psychological process? (feel free to say so) If you're a Christian, do you hear God's voice and if so how?
"The watchman opens the gate for him, and the sheep listen to his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes on ahead of them, and his sheep follow him because they know his voice." John 10:3-4
12 comments:
Since you asked...
I'm a Christian, and I don't hear God talking to me as such. I have on occasion had a very strong sense that I really should do some particular thing for no apparent reason. Other than that, and what I glean from the Bible, I'm rather short on divine revelation.
So I think you're mad? No, not really. People experience things in different ways. Anyway, if God was an actual voice in my head, how would I tell him apart from all the others?
No, I don't think you are mad. :)
I don't hear God as a voice (audible or otherwise) (I did know a few people at uni who very much HEARD God and were very clear and confident on that). I experience closer times with God through worship, reading, walking in beautiful countryside...I experience less close times with God through stubbornness, stress, over busyness, unconfessed sin...
A few years ago someone doing a lent course at St Matts said something that resonated so clearly with me and made so much sense that I think this is how I hear from God:
If you are walking along a road with someone and they know where you are going and you don't, you don't need to ask at every step or even every turn "which way? where next?" because you can tell where they are leading you. If you are walking closely to God, he can guide you by linking arms with you, holding your hand, just walking next to you as much as by you saying "do I turn left now?" and getting an audible response.
I guess this is the same kind of thing as getting peace over decisions/ideas that you mentioned.
stephen - welcome to the blog, thanks for your comments. when you mentioned the strong sense to do something - did that thing normally work out well?
jen - like the analogy - helpful one
No sweetie, I don't think you're mad, far from it. But then as an agnostic I guess I'm kind special - having been brought up in an evangelical household and studied religion at Uni - so generally very little god stuff freaks me out.
At the moment the voice I often here in my head is my blog voice... which is probably why I haven't been posting so much lately as it is all 'talked out'!
Yes, you're clearly mad. But that has little to do with hearing the voice of God.
I loved this post!
I think that often, the best way of explaining the way I hear the voice of God, is just through a feeling of peace. If a big decision doesn't make me immediately terrified, then I can be a little more sure that it's coming from the right place.
There's more to it than that, for sure, but I think that it's a pretty good indicator.
Stephen, I suspect that this feeling of doing something is quite probably the voice of God. Certainly Holy Spirit prompts me to do things sometimes. Don't write off conversations with God just because they don't work quite the same way as a conversation down the pub.
That's my two cents.
MM- you are very special! know what you mean about thinking in the "blog voice" as well - sometimes I have to remind myself that real life is not just material for my blog and I am supposed to be living it not commentating on it inside my head.
Mark - well obviously I am mad.....
welcome to the blog!
feel compelled to comment again - I've always been a "commentator" even before having a blog - as in a lot of the enjoyment I get from a situation can be from recounting and sharing it with others later. I guess that may be why I used to text a lot too - in the "saw this and thought of you" sort of way...I wonder if it is some fundamental personality flaw that means I don't enjoy things as much on my own/the first time round?!
I am a Quaker, (by conviction rather than by birth) and have had God talk to me in a very intense way a few years ago. My wife (mainstream C of E) thought I was going insane, and I did wonder myself. I was having some ideas of reference (such as grafitti on a wall having special meaning) and I was sleeping only a few hours a night for a week without feeling tired. If I was hypomanic, I had some insight and if my ideas slipped further over the dege then I felt I would have to see a Quaker psychiatrist who could distinguish between psychosis and religious experience. It is quite possible to have both.
Quakers have always held that not only can you experience God directly, that this is the only true religious experience.
It is important therefore to distinguish the voice of God from your own ideas and conscience.
Quakers have evolved methods over the years to discern whether Leadings are really from God.
I agree that Leadings are often uncomfortable, but in time leave a feeling of peace.
Ooh, tricky. On the one hand, you're not having an actual audio or visual hallucination and insisting it's real (or becoming terrified when told it's not), but on the other hand, you believe that you are recieving instructions, advice or guidance from a higher and unseen power.
I remember in a psychology class we spent several lessons (and a whole term of coffee breaks) discussing the concept of psychological abnormality. What falls within the remit of healthy human experience and variation, and what is a medical problem? Our tentative conclusion was that it's a problem when it has, or is at very high risk of having, a noticeable negative effect upon the individual or those around the individual.
Frinstance, if God tells you that it is a good idea to give up chocolate for Lent, and to impose same upon your children, it's not a problem (although the children may view it differently). If God tells you to completely fast for the entire 40 days and nights of Lent, and to impose same upon your children, that is a problem. And if you don't have enough... control?... to be able to say "no, that's a bad idea and will have a detrimental effect, therefore I will not do it", and you go ahead and starve yourself and your family into hospital - that's a BIG problem and really needs treatment.
It just is your brain which you see at work here, for some reason (or another) you have started to fork your thought processes and it almost seems like there is another entity 'inside' of you, which is independent. It isn't, and 'God' here is yourself, you probably are someone who is trying very hard to do the right thing in life, and so, what you're experiencing is yourself being 'motivational'.
As for people who have 'God's voice' in their head being insane, well, no, they are just not as developed in their sense of self-responsibility -- having a God around to blame, argue, discuss and plead with helps people who still need parenting in their adulthood.
Can/should it be 'healed'? Yes and no -- once you realise that it is you yourself who is tricking you into doing the 'right thing', the magic is gone and life is a little more boring than it was, and doing the right thing will probably get a bit harder as you now have to argue with yourself AND win -- arguing with yourself to do the right thing is harder than accepting the wish of God.
So my advice to you is not to worry whilst your still in charge and God only makes helpful suggestions and argues nicely. ;)
Thanks very much everyone for your comments and opinions. Glad that this post sparked an interesting debate. Just to clarify - since I believe that God is an ultimately loving and good being, if I heard a "voice in my head" asking me to do something destructive such as starving my children etc I would not believe that it was truly God. Since of course I have my own thoughts all the time, and as I mentioned, sometimes it becomes difficult to distinguish between my own thoughts and the voice of God, I think it is very important to carry out certain checks on any "leading" I might feel. These normally go along the lines of 1)does it go against anything in the Bible 2)does it fit in with what I know about God and His character and 3)is there any reason I might be subconsciously trying to persuade myself this is what God wants to say to me. If I was unsure I might run it past someone that I trust. So whatever you think about my mental health, don't worry that it's going to become a major problem.
Great post!
I recently took a Sunday school class called God Will Speak If You Will Listen. Very good stuff and it's so true! For me it's very similar to what you described the answer comes too quickly and is clearly not what I would have said (and is also in line with the character of God). I'm also trying to study for my psychopathology exam tomorrow which is how I came across your post. Blessings!
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