Have you wondered why God feels like he's a million miles away? Have you ever wished you could not only be heard but actually hear him talk back to you directly? Strahan Coleman will share tips with us on how to pray effectively, how to experience God personally and how to hear his voice clearly.

Strahan Coleman is a musician and the author of several books including his latest book Thirsting. He is also the founder of Commoners Communion.

You can get his latest book here: https://amzn.to/40ewXy9

To learn more about Strahan Coleman or his music visit: https://www.commonerscommunion.com/

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Transcript - How Dads Can Encounter God

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Today we are talking about identity and purpose, specifically how you find your identity

and purpose through prayer. And I have brought an expert with me on the program who is built an

entire ministry and even written a book specifically about prayer and how to connect with your

creator. And he will join us in just a moment so don't go anywhere.

Welcome to the Father the Challenge, a movement to awaken and inspire fathers everywhere,

to take great pride in their role and a challenge society to understand how important fathers are

to the stability and culture of their families environment. Now here's your host, Jonathan

Guerrero. Greetings everyone, thank you so much for joining me. I have a guest on the program,

his name is Strahn Coleman. Strahn is an author and he is also an expert in helping people connect

personally with their creator. Strahn thank you so much for being on the Father the Challenge.

Hey Jonathan and absolute pleasure thanks for having me my friend. Strahn what is the story behind

how you got connected with God? What was your first experience and really understanding who God is

and inviting him into your life and to a relationship? Well I kind of had a few experiences

kind of notched along my life that I think probably transformed my understanding of God but

I think just as a kid I had a real openness to the love and the life and the hugeness of God and so I don't

it's not a particular memory so much as a residing sense of this world is massive and it was created

by a massive God and that God is beautiful and good and loving and I don't really know where I

got that from. I think my mother probably installed that in me she was a praying one but I can remember

thinking that way from you know seven eight years old so it wasn't such a particular experience so

much it was a residing acceptance in the wonder and the beauty of the cosmos and the God who made it.

So you mentioned that you experience God's love how do you experience God's love what does that

feel like to you? Well you know sometimes it is a feeling you know sometimes I can spend time with God

and feel just I guess what we might say emotional love or feelings of love but a lot of the time

what that sense of God's love is for me is actually mostly about an acceptance so I open myself

up to God and one of the things I do when I'm praying that's really really important is I focus

on receiving God's love because when God revealed Himself to Moses most of the show me your glory and

what did God say? He appeared to Moses in his full glory and he said the Lord the Lord gracious and

compassionate, slow to anger and a bounding instead of us love. That's his character that's who he is

and so when I when I come to pray I'm like I need to to kind of bring my mind into submission of

that reality which I don't always I find that difficult to do you know I've got parts of myself

that I don't think are very lovable I do things that are not very lovable and so in prayer when I

want to experience God's love I fix my mind on him as a loving person and I meditate on that and then

I think what does it feel like to receive that love into my body and and sometimes that love

feels like a piece sometimes that love feels like a stillness other times that love expresses in me

crying and confessing and feeling comforted and God's presence and his compassion towards me

and sometimes it's a feeling of emotional love but most of the time it's me slowly every day bringing

my body to the reality that he loves me and whether I feel something or not just kind of allowing my

mind my soul my nervous system my body to kind of relax and exhale into that experience.

The answer that you gave seem very very nebulous and so what I get out of that is the fact that

it has to be it makes every sense that it is because the reasons why you need God's love

are different from every single time you are reaching for it yeah and so the way God responds

to you and offers that love is custom tailored to that specific need at that moment is that

it sounds correct yeah this correct and I think I think too it's really hard for us and we think of

the love of God it's hard for us in our sort of cultural moment where we we really see love as a

heightened romantic emotion which isn't actually true of how people have seen love for you know

thousands of years that really is quite we've got a Hollywood version of love and so when we say

receiving God's love a lot of people imagine an overwhelming feeling of romantic or romantic

emotional sensation but biblical love is far wider and deeper than that and so I like every day when

the sun rises if I feel the sun on my skin I am experiencing God's love because God causes the

sun to rise on the good and evil as friends and as enemies because why he loves them and so part of

the reason I gave such a nebulous answer is because I wanted to flate this idea that experiencing God's

love is always a kind of hyper-emotional romantic kind of experience but we can't live that way we

don't live our marriages that way we can't live without children that way we can't live with anything

in life that way depending on an emotional romantic love for something sometimes love is gritty

sometimes love is kind of forcing yourself to do what you don't want to do precisely because that

person or this thing is of greater value to yourself so I think in prayer what I want to say is

is if we think experiencing God's love always has to be a felt emotional thing then we'll see so much

of our prayer as failure but if we can see love as a sort of showing upness and a receiving and

upbringing ourselves to each other and sometimes that's really amazing and quote unquote spiritual and

and exciting sometimes it's hard work then either way we can see we have an experience of God's

love and that's what matters is that we begin to see God's love expressed in all of these dimensions

and not just in the emotions so I realize my answer was probably a bit vague but I'm trying to

yes suggest that we have to move beyond just an emotional love and into a deeper kind of soul level

embodied love with God if we really want to know and experience it yes yes it might seem nebulous

but your answer is very very real I think about practically you know if if all we experienced was

this romantic sensation that can be quite honest that can be exhausting on the nervous system

the other thing I want to touch on is is listening to God and hearing God so what is the listening

like I've heard some people talk that a good practice is journaling sitting down quiet in yourself

the meditating like you've talked about meditating on God's love

as you quiet down sometimes it's scripture you scripture to do that and if you calm yourself down and

you go into this deep meditation of God and who he is to you does he talk and is it a good practice

to journal when he does yeah I love journaling I mean journaling has been a really kind of

rock bed foundational practice in my life and for me when I pray journal by the way it's like I'll

usually try and journal in the morning first thing when you know to get my fresh thoughts in there

and I'll start by saying good morning father always father because that's the context in which Jesus

called us to pray and he said always pray within the safety and the security of our father

because when you say good morning father you begin the conversation and acceptance

so I start that way good morning father and I might pour my heart out to him and say this is my

emotions of feelings sometimes I'll just say speak Lord your servant is listening which is a

quote of Samuel the prophet or I might say speak Lord I'm listening we son is listening

and then I try and just you know if I sense him saying something I'll just start writing

and I don't try and filter it too much you know I can figure out later if it's just my weird brain

making something up or whether it's God but and then I kind of converse with him and I found

that to be really really amazing in the beauty of prayer journaling isn't so much in the one day

it's in the one year two years three years ten years where you slowly begin over time to see oh I

can see when God is speaking and then when I'm interrupting and I'm I'm discerning His voice and

midst my own and I think that's been really key for me you're right about scripture God speaks to

us so beautifully through scripture he speaks to us and you know in the New Testament

uh in Acts 2 Areed in Dreams and Visions so in pictures in our minds or um in the night if we're

listening and I think he speaks to us just in the in the depth of us you know I think one of the

things we we often undervalue is just the quiet pinch of something on our conscience like I shouldn't

have said that or sometimes the quiet little sense of I should just tell him that this person

you know I'm still going to someone the other day and I just I just felt to say to him man you

look good he goes to the gem a lot I know he's conscious about his body is like you're looking really

good he said no I'm over I feel terrible and I be am eyes out of way or something and I said no

and I looked him in the eyes and I just said mate you look good dude you're looking fit you're looking

healthy you should feel great and that was the leading of God as well and speaking to me to kind

of share with other people so sometimes it's just a little a little nudge in the very depth of

ourselves that we can't often tell if it's us or God until we act on it so there's there's lots in

there there's scripture there's journaling there's the little nudges there's dreams there's pictures

there's sensations and stuff and I I think we just we want the whole sorgas board you know I want to

fill our lives with as many little points and places as we can but I think the the main way that I

listen to God is just by sitting and just allowing his love peace patients gentleness self-control

the fruit of the spirit to fill my being and he speaks to me in his nature he communicates to

me through peace or stillness and in that it's like a hug with it's like an embrace with God it's

like body language it's it's less informational and transactional it's more we are with one another

and I'm just totally transformed by that it's such a beautiful experience the experience you

described is very very different from let's say new age for example I look at things like creation

and you when you mention creation new age is also about creation but the difference is that

in a lot of new age and spiritualism thought processes nature and creation is a God

yeah and instead you are experiencing God through nature so when you're in nature it's the other way

around you are actually moved to a desire to worship the creator of that nature

and that's where the difference lies it's like when you're in nature it's like your home because

you're in you're among the very things that the same God that created you created

and so there there is a sense of of attachment just because you're you're around you're surrounded

by his creation yeah all that does is make you feel closer to him you doesn't make you feel closer to

nature it makes you feel closer to the creator yeah yeah that's so good and I think too as well like

we live in a world that's full of kind of mindfulness and meditation and you know where I live I've

got quite a few friends who are getting heavily into ice baths and they do these aren't believers and

they go on weekends to take sort of a kind of a mushroom and go on trips to encounter themselves and

and I think what I said that the biggest difference you know they'll say what's the difference

between meditation and prayer you know in terms of them they're just kind of sitting there trying

to reach nirvana and for me it's like the biggest difference between say meditation or Buddhism

or New Ageism and in what we're looking for is we are looking for a personal relationship with a

person we are not trying to reach a just state of love or state of peace or state of nirvana and

we're not looking for like you say God in creation like creation isn't God it's sort of as a means to

which we experience in a minute's beautiful but when when we come to prayer when we're talking about

experiencing love and peace and kindness and gentleness these are not mindfulness states this is

an experience of the person of God and I think that's why prayer is so difficult because if it was

just meditation we could kind of force ourselves into it whenever we wanted right it would be we

would just kind of pull the levers and meditate and do the different things and we would kind of

reach the quote unquote state but we don't believe that as Christians we are encountering the living

God and so at least half the relationship I would argue the majority of it is God engaging with us

interrupting speaking you know withdrawing his presence so we would cry out to him loving us filling

us and so we this is this is vital and alive and exciting because we are not in control and so when

that's why for me when I come to prayer it's like I want to understand that I'm experiencing God no

matter what I think I'm experiencing because he's a person who's engaging with me as he desires

and you can't you don't have that same exciting generative relationship with the living God

in the new age or in sort of Buddhism which is primarily about reaching a nirvana or mindfulness which

is just about calming yourself we're moving beyond that into a a relationship with God as a father

which is so beautiful in the dynamic a very common question I hear from people when it comes to

hearing God's voice is how do you know the difference between when you're hearing your own thoughts

you know and by the way on the same exact theta wave that God communicates Satan can also

communicate on that same wave so can other non-experience so how do you know it's not a

demonic experience and or your own thoughts that's such a good question I I am I mean there's no kind of

simple one trick hack on that and and if you read the church throughout history they've offered a

few different ways but a couple of them are really simple you know scripture we always bank things

against scripture the only slight issue there is that even the devil knows how to wield scripture

do you know what I mean like and in some ways you can you can almost make scripture say whatever you

want it to to you and and people have throughout history so it's got to be more than scripture also

has to be community we have to work out okay is this voice correct against the truth of Christ

and the truth of scripture and does that is there consensus amongst Christian community so

that means community present like the church I belong to in my spiritual leadership but it also

means like the church historical you know it has the church historically understood this scripture

or this truth this way is another another safe place and and then thirdly for me I think it's just

practice you know I think we have to practice hearing and she hearing from God and shearing it

and hearing from others okay this didn't this now this was a bit off it really does take time we

have to be patient with ourselves which is human you know me we're figuring out this stuff and I

think we have to be patient with ourselves to say I'm going to vulnerable share what God's speaking

to me with others so I can be safe you know reading in scripture but I am gonna act on it and I'm

gonna see the fruit of those actions if the fruit is love joy peace patients kindness gentleness

and self-control if it fruits goodness in the kingdom of heaven then it was God if the fruit is

pride and fear and anxiety and broken relationships and withdrawal from God's people

then it's then it probably wasn't God and I think a lot of the time if the fruit of the

voices anxiety fear and condemnation we can say that's not of God but if the fruit is love joy

peace patients kindness gentleness and self-control and the desire to give oneself away more we can say

oh yeah that's that's the familiar voice of God one meditation I like to focus on is the concept

of the good shepherd or read scripture I will think about my relationship with my father and focus

on that and then as a quiet myself my thoughts will I let my thought drift over to to Jesus

and the common thing I hear is that I am the good shepherd my sheep know my voice and then

is usually where that conversation starts to happen and right after that that's usually where

I hear God's voice talking one of the things that you mentioned I think is so important to understand

is that you you've said at least twice maybe three times in this conversation we're having

that it takes time getting used to the voice of God I've heard him often through thought

I have heard him powerfully powerfully through scripture a handful of times and dreams

and many times through other people there isn't just this one magical formula or way that God speaks

and you said very correctly you said he's a person yeah just like you have your own ideas and

preferences and things that you prefer to do the same thing with God yeah and it's a real relationship

and that's what a real relationship looks like there aren't these predictable patterns to go off of

that's why I love what you said about the different way how we understand when it's him when it's

his voice that we're hearing and the other thing is this takes time yeah and I love that you know

and it changes over time you know I love your kind of reminder he's a God as a person

and you think about like a child right how a child hears and understands their parents been

there a baby it's like go go go go it loves a cuddle you know what I mean it's like parents are like

doing all the work and communicating and they're being kind of you know express so much attention

but then in order for the child to grow up the parents has to change their communication styles and then

things change and then the language enters them and then it's okay like this and then and then as the

child grows into an adult it's like things change again and I think one of the things we need to settle

into in life is that our relationship with God is not some static thing whereas the way we heard God

yesterday is going to be exactly the same in 10 years and the next you know I've been through periods

where the predominant way that God has spoken to me has been in dreams and visions

you know and and lots of it and then I've gone through periods of time where I haven't had a single one

for like five years and God's spoken to me through prayer journaling and then that's shifted

and it's shifted again and you know it's not they're not clear boundaries but I think we have to be

prepared for God to change how he speaks to us as we change and we grow and we become ready to hear

and see him in new ways too so I think one of the things I've had to let go of in hearing God's

voices the idea that it's just the same all the time and I've tried to be flexible and say God you show

up however you want and there are definitely ways in which that have been consistent through my life

but there have been plenty of times where I've just not heard God for a long period of time in any

kind of conscious way and yeah I've had to go to scripture I've had to listen to to God's people

I've had to really pay attention to the stillness and so I think that's okay too and it's kind of fun to

just think how out of control we are in this you know how we really have control kind of we're just

the big learners you know yeah we are absolutely not in control and even inside of one specific

way that he communicates it's not always the same going back to journaling using that as the example

I've had cases where I've journal pages of information that of what I'm what God is saying to me

and I can hear his voice clear is a bell yeah and everything makes sense and I had one instance where

I came prepared excited waiting to hear God's voice yearning to hear his God's voice

and he spoke but it wasn't in in a page long speech or however you want to look at it it was short

it was just a few lines that's all he had to say and in that specific moment that I'm recalling

all God said was go back and read the very last thing that I said to you go back and read that

read it several times that was it that's all he had to say to me amazing and so I went back and I

read it and that's where the experience was when I went back and read it it was like reading it for

the first time the words felt different everything felt different and everything felt relevant to where

I was in that moment of my life so stront I want to really talk about your book thirsty and you just

wrote a book tell me about thirsty what is this about and why would dads want to read this first

thing is a book about really about desire to book about what it means to be people who ache and long

and how we live in that ache and longing with God but I also tell the story of that the origin of that

longing and the longing and desire of God and so I think there's an important emphasis in the book

that God actually longs for and pursues us as a father as our father he doesn't just kind of sit back

and wait he pursues us he has like a vital longing aching love to be with every human that he's made

and so I kind of suggest that man if this is who God is then desire is really good

and we have to figure out what it means to bring ourselves to God in that same way to know him

and so I kind of have in the book I have these kind of three sections one is it's based on the

scripture that Jesus said if anyone first let him come to me and drink and so the first is if anyone

firsts and it's about recognizing the different ways in which we are dehydrated by the world

and the different ways in which we spend our desire and our longing on far less of things than God

and and what we do about that the second is let them come and it's about what it means to live a life

shaped by communion with God what it lives to live a life of fidelity to understand the depth of our

soul and and how God longs to live with us there and the invitation to be sold equal God

and then the third part is come and drink and it's really about how do we actually drink God

during because it's a quite a fanciful idea we say this kind of stuff all the time so oh I long for God

I desire God I want to go God you know we can come and drink him but what does it actually mean and so

I actually get into some vulnerable stuff of of what it really means to open up and be to be seen by God

to be known by God and in return to actually enjoy his presence there and I think what's critical

about that for fathers what's critical for me as a father and as a husband is that it helps to

unlock these deeper parts of me that I can then offer to my children to my wife that I can live

from a place of deeper acceptance and if I can live from a place of deeper acceptance and communion

with God then I'm exemplifying a kind of a peace and a love and a stillness to my children and to my

wife that that is otherworldly and I can be for them who God has been for me they can experience

that me as a pursuing loving father that accepts them and all of who they are and wants to go deep

with them so yeah so that's that's kind of the heart behind my desire behind this thing.

You're also the founder of a ministry called Commoners Communion what is Commoners Communion

and why did you start it? Commoners Communion actually started out of my when I got really sick

and I'm a musician so I've been touring for years but I couldn't do it anymore I couldn't sing

couldn't write so I started sort of writing blogs and podcasting a little bit for other people who

were trying to reckon with God in the in the in the liminal space like how do we know God when

when when we kind of feel like we're struggling in the gap in the walls maybe through suffering maybe

people who are experiencing difficulty in the world and are just connected with people and so I

started writing prayers and eventually ended up kind of teaching people about prayer and about

communion is something more than just conscious mental dialogue but an actually you know full

body experience of God in our daily lives and and I've I discovered really a lot of people don't know

how to pray and so for me it was like yeah okay let's explore this together and that's Commoners Communion

it kind of just was a happy accident that has kind of kept going which I feel really grateful for.

Strang how can dads listening learn more about what you're doing maybe learn more about

Commoners Communion and how can they get thirsty? Well you can find thirsty wherever kind of books are

you know if you want to sort of go deeper in in this kind of prayer also have written prayer books

so they're like one page a little prayer I sort of one paragraph devotional thing to kind of help

people leap into a deeper experience of God so I have three volumes of prayer books that you can

engage with but otherwise you know anywhere you'll find Commoners Communion you'll find my work I do

a podcast called the Beholding Prayer Podcast and it's just guided meditations on prayer for people

who really struggle to pray and that's available resource too so all of those places you'll kind of

hopefully find some ways to engage with God. And just to make things easier if you go to the fatherhoodchallenge.com

that's the fatherhoodchallenge.com if you go to this episode look right below the episode description

I'll have all of the links posted there for your convenience. Strahan as we close what is your

challenge to dads listening now? Ooh yeah challenge to dads my challenge would be to be the eyes

the voice the face and the arms of love to our children. I don't mean just in what we say but I mean

in the embrace in the way that we look at them that when they look into our eyes that they would see

the love and the peace and the compassion of God. Easier said than done you know with children

but I think I have not seen anything transform my children more than a loving godly temperament.

Strahan as we wrap things up would you offer a prayer for dads now? I'd love to yeah it's praying.

Father first of all we thank you for being a good involved present and willing father you've loved

us and so I pray now for everybody listening to this conversation to everybody who can hear my voice

that in this moment in their minds and hearts they wouldn't counter this you God the God of Moses

the Lord the Lord gracious and compassionate abouting instead fast by the slowdown.

May they have a full body experience of who you are that they would be rec- that they would receive

the grace to awaken you with you day to day not just for them for their wives for their children

for this one and Jesus name. Strahan thank you so much for that prayer thank you so much for being

on the Father and challenge and I enjoyed the conversation and I know that's there too. Thank you

Jonathan it's been a pleasure. Thank you for listening to this episode of the Fatherhood Challenge

if you'd like to contact us listen to other episodes find any resource mentioned in this program

or find out more information about the Fatherhood Challenge please visit thefatherhoodchallenge.com

that's thefatherhoodchallenge.com

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