Elder Holland on How to Hear Him
I Hear Him by Trusting My
Feelings
Another way I “hear Him”
is to trust what I feel. I often get
asked, “How do I know that what I am feeling is coming from the Lord?” If
your searching is honorable and true and clean and noble, trust the feelings
that come. I encourage people to act on those feelings and to believe that
their instincts can be founded on truth. At that point you do not have to ask,
“Did it come from Him?” He will make sure that it doesn’t come from an evil
source.
God wants us to be like Him. We mature, and with effort we become more like God. We think more of His thoughts and feel more of His feelings. We are one with Him, and our impressions ought to be indistinguishable from His promptings. That unity is one of the things the Savior prayed for. By striving to live as one with Him, you will be more like God and you will “hear Him” and trust Him, even as you trust your own feelings when praying to Him.
Elder
Bednar, Temple and Family History Leadership, Feb. 2021, at 10:18 minutes
Many members of the Church think they have to be consciously aware of receiving revelation. In other words, “I have to receive revelation and I have to know in the moment that I am receiving revelation,” and that’s not always true. If you’ll think about Nephi when he was commanded to return to Jerusalem to obtain the Plates of Brass, he said that he went not knowing beforehand the things that he should do. In other words, he was just doing what he knew he should do. And as he was moving forward to Jerusalem he was guided and inspired, but in the moment, he didn’t really recognize or know that that was happening. So, sometimes we think that we have to gear up, prepare, get ready to receive revelation. If we are living the gospel and keeping the commandments, we’re living in revelation. It’s not a rare event where we have to stop and get ready, but it should be a very natural part of our life all the time.
