DALLAS WILLARD’S “HEARING GOD:” EVALUATION AND CRITIQUE

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Photo of cover of "Hearing God"

       Dallas Willard (1935-2013) was a highly regarded pastor, professor, and Christian philosopher. His main influence has been on what I call Contemplative Spirituality. He partnered with Quaker Richard Foster for a number of years, including working and teaching with him at Foster’s Renovare Institute for Christian Spiritual Formation.

       Due to time and space limiations, please keep in mind that much has been left out in this article. The article focuses on what is the most concerning and what has influenced the church at large. There are also areas I am in agreement with on Willard, but these are eclipsed by the troubling issues.
       Specific areas of concern about Contemplative Spirituality/Practices have been addressed in CANA articles hereherehereherehereherehereherehere, and here, as well as in articles and programs on John Mark Comer. Additionally, there is a two-part article on two popular books by Contemplative teacher Ruth Haley Barton here and here.
       Hearing God was first published in 1983 under the title In Search of Guidance: Developing a Conversational Relationship with God. The book used for this article is Hearing God: Developing a Conversational Relationship with God, (2024 paperback, Intervarsity Press.)

Assumptions

       Willard makes assumptions about God, and what constitutes a relationship with God, assumptions that I do not think are based on Scripture. For example, he writes on page 9:
“Being close to God means communicating with him, which is almost always a two-way street.” We need to “learn to perceive what he is saying to us.”
              How can we know God is speaking to us? asks Willard.
“The answer is that we learn by experience.”
              He cites biblical texts to support his view that we should expect to hear from God such as Ex. 33:11:
“Thus the Lord used to speak to Moses face to face, just as a man speaks to his friend. When Moses returned to the camp, his servant Joshua, the son of Nun, a young man, would not depart from the tent.”
       And he cites Hebrews 13:5-6.
       Willard writes that people are “meant to live in an ongoing conversation with God” like Enoch and Moses, and should think that they can have the same experiences as Elijah or Paul.
       However, the fact God spoke to prophets in the OT like Moses offers no reason to expect such communication today. Nor does the Hebrews passage about God never deserting believers mean that one can expect to hear from God in the way Moses and the prophets did.
       Willard writes:
“My strategy has been to take as a model the highest and best type of communication that I know of from human affairs and then place this model in the even brighter light of the person and teaching of Jesus Christ. In this way, it has been possible to arrive at an ideal picture of what an intimate relationship with God is meant to be and also come to a clear vision of the kind of life where hearing God is not an uncommon occurrence” (16).
       Willard uses as his model his own ideas for what he thinks “an intimate relationship with God is meant to be;” the texts he appeals to do not provide that model since he is taking them out of context.
       In one of his guidelines for hearing God, Willard, referring to people in the Bible who heard God, states that “we must prayerfully but boldly use our God-given imaginations” as we read these stories and ask what it must have been like for them. We must pray for the faith to believe that this can also happen to us (46). However, there is no scriptural support for this idea.
       Willard continuously states or implies that one is not having a close relationship with God when one is not hearing God (outside the pages of the Bible).
       All of this ignores the glaring fact that God has spoken clearly and sufficiently in Scripture.
       I think God “speaks” and answers prayers mainly through Scripture and when we see him at work in our life or in the lives of others we have prayed for. But this is not what Willard is discussing.

Why Christians May Not Be Hearing God

Christians need to prepare the ground so that they can hear from God, asserts Willard (30-31). But even if God speaks, most Christians would not recognize it as being from God because they have “so little clarity” on what that would be like. This may be why God is not speaking to them, contends Willard (35).

       Willard later writes that our ability to hear God’s voice is based on effort and “experimentation” – both on God’s part and ours. In fact, claims Willard, people may not understand God’s message or may get it wrong (256). This view of God experimenting is unbiblical. God does not “experiment” since this implies he has imperfect knowledge and does not know outcomes. (Willard also uses this term of Jesus).
       If Willard is uncertain about whether God has spoken to him, he asks God for clarity and puts a limit on it of two or three days (261). One might not hear because of a hindrance to hear, so one of the things Willard recommends is this:
“Be quiet and listen to the inner forum of your mind for any indication you are blocking his word” (279).
       Throughout the book, Willard’s advice is to go within your mind to hear God speaking, usually through your thoughts. However, nothing in Scripture indicates such an idea.
       Willard cites John 10:4 where Jesus states that his sheep hear his voice. This verse is one of the most misused verses by Contemplatives and others because it is not about Christians hearing the voice of Jesus. It is about the call to salvation and, moreover, Scripture itself states in verse 6 that this “voice” of the shepherd is a figure of speech.

Lectio Divina

The Lectio Divina exercises in the book are written by Jan Johnson. Johnson, who is now chair of Dallas Willard Ministries, has been a contemplative for years. Johnson also appears to be a student and/or fan of heretic Richard Rohr. See here  and here.

       Towards the end of chapter three, there is a Lectio Divina exercise (these Lectio Divina exercises are given throughout the book). The passage is from First Kings 19, which is where Elijah hears the “still small voice” (in other translations it is “gentle whisper, gentle blowing”). According to the lexicon on Bible Hub , this word can mean a voice, noise, sound – animal or human –, and any noise or sound of music or nature. It can denote the voice of God although not always; however, God speaks to Elijah after Elijah hears this sound. I have written on this passage in other articles (links given further down).
       Willard’s assumption about this verse is that we can hear God as Elijah heard him, assuming this was a voice and not just a noise God used to get Elijah’s attention (which is what it seems to be from the context). The fact that chapter five in the book is based on this passage illustrates the weight Willard gives it. Similarly, Ruth Haley Barton uses this passage as a theme in her book Invitation to Silence and Solitude.
        The Lectio Divina exercise using the 1 Kings 19 passage instructs the reader to read this passage slowly, then “listen with the ear of your heart” for a word, phrase, or special detail that “stands out to you.” One is to also ponder where he or she finds themself in the passage – whether as Elijah, Jezebel, the angel – or even identifying with the cave, the earthquake, etc. I have a hard time seeing how a person can identify as a cave or earthquake, or what the purpose would be (other than maybe for creative writing).
       One then reads the passage again and then reflects on the word or phrase that stood out and on who or what one identified with. After reading again, talk to God about “what the Spirit said to you or what came to you.” Then you pray and “wait on God” by further pondering. There are several other Lectio Divina exercises in the book using the same methods.
       Lectio Divina is a technique that treats the Bible as an esoteric book with private meanings hidden in the words. It is very similar to how New Agers and those in the occult read books they believe are spiritual . The approach and resulting experiences are subjective, rather than based on the context or meaning of the passage. This is mysticism, and it results in self-focused subjective experiences which could also include or lead to distorted views of God or Christ.

God’s Guidance: Feeling God’s Presence

              Willard starts building his case for hearing God’s voice with a lengthy quote from Thomas A Kempis (1380-1471), which Kempis claimed was from Jesus. (60-61). Christians are missing out on the “presence of God,” contends Willard. Willard refers to and misuses Ephesians 2:12  to say that people are lonely and without hope. But the context of that verse is about how the Gentiles had been alienated from God because prior they lacked the promises and covenant that Israel had had with God. Here is yet another example of contemplative misuse of Scripture.
       “Blind faith” is not enough, asserts Willard (62). This is a fallacious argument because 1) he uses the term “blind faith” as a pejorative and straw man; and 2) he writes as though hearing from God should be the norm for Christians.
       “Blind faith” is not a term or concept in scripture. It is a straw man argument. No sound Christian teaches “blind faith.” The Bible extols faith because faith by God’s grace is what saves, and faith pleases God.  Jesus came so that the blind may see, so it ironic that Willard would use such an invalid term.
       One must go beyond “mere faith” (63), claims Willard, and have a “powerful sense, feeling or impression of God’s presence.” A response to this would be the words of Jesus:
“Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” John 20:29b
       As well as:
“Though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory.” 1 Peter 1:8b
       Perhaps chapter 11 of the book of Hebrews needs to be read as an antidote to the endless Contemplative teachings that one must hear from God, feel God’s presence, experience God’s love, sense God, or whatever similar is being taught.
       Willard’s basis for understanding this “powerful feeling” of God’s presence is this idea; if someone stares intently at another, that person will sense it. Therefore, concludes Willard, we should “not be surprised” that “God’s attention to us should result in our reciprocal awareness of God’s presence.” I find this to be a strange and unreasonable concept that is almost occult in nature.
       One must also note the supernatural effects of God’s presence. For this, Willard offers anecdotes as well as events from the Bible. He then suggests that this is not enough. Since God is personal, “would he not also talk with us?” queries Willard.

God’s Guidance: By Words from God

       Willard moves on to the second way he thinks Christians are led by God today, words directly from God (outside of the Bible). He uses examples from Acts, such as Ananias being told about Paul, Peter’s vision on the rooftop, and Paul’s calling to Macedonia in Acts 16. But these were visions given to apostles or for a special purpose having to do with an apostle (Ananias). They were singular events. Such events are not spoken of as the norm in the epistles and no instructions are given to the churches about expecting such ongoing revelation.
       Willard refers to the gifts listed in First Corinthians 14 and to Joel’s prophecy,  and writes that Moses wanted all to be prophets, “Would that all the Lord’s people were prophets, that the Lord would put His Spirit upon them!” (Numbers 11:29).
       However, none of those passages in context can be taken as a basis for the idea that Christians today should receive direct extra-biblical revelation from God. In fact, Scripture is clear that God’s word is complete and all that is necessary for spiritual information and growth.

God’s Guidance: Through Shared Activity

       Willard proposes that those Christians who are more “mature” and working with God may understand God so well that
“We often know exactly what he is thinking and intending to do” (71).
      He calls this having “the mind of Christ.”
       He then goes to Psalm 32:8:
“I will instruct you and teach you in the way which you should go;
I will counsel you with My eye upon you.”
       Willard seems to interpret this literally, because he writes about how people can be guided by the eye of another, such as the way a parent may look at a child, or those who work closely together, by seeing each, other can know “the intentions and thoughts if the other’s mind” (71).
       This is not only astonishing but baffling. Willard seems to be saying that not only does God know our minds but we can know God’s mind and intentions. His bizarre use of 2 Corinthians 2 (the “mind of Christ”) and Psalm 32:8 is confusing. He seems to be misusing biblical texts in order to support strange ideas of how God communicates with us based on his (Willard’s) theories about human communication.
       Moreover, it is offensive to say we can know the mind and intentions of God! Having the mind of Christ does not mean we can know what God is thinking. We know what God thinks of the things he has revealed in Scripture but that is not what Willard means.
       I had to read this page several times to make sure I was not misreading it because the content was so egregious.
       Willard seems to imply that Christians can be like Jesus in knowing the mind and intentions of God.

God is Speaking, We Just Don’t Hear It

       On the road to explaining how to hear God speak, Willard spends time discussing wrong views about hearing God and why some do not hear God even though he is speaking to us. We need to be “attuned to God’s voice” (91), writes Willard, but we are not.
       Another reason one may not hear God is that the person could not make good use of what God might say. One must be “devoted to the glory of God and the advancement of his kingdom.” If hearing God would be an intrusion on one’s plans, that person will not hear God (tell that to Jonah).

The Still, Small Voice

“The Still, Small Voice and Its Rivals” is the title of Chapter Five. I have written on this phrase from 1 Kings 19 in the article on Thomas Keating and in part 1 of my article on Ruth Haley Barton. This passage is one of the most universally misused texts given by Contemplatives, along with others (such as Psalm 46:10, John 10:1-6, and 1 Samuel 3:8-9) to support their teachings. Since I have addressed the First Kings 19 passage in those articles, and have an article on Psalm 46, I will not discuss them here. More on First Samuel 3 further down.
       Willard writes, rather astonishingly, that the medium through which the “still, small voice of God” comes to us
“is diminished almost to the vanishing point, taking the form of thoughts that are our own thoughts, though these thoughts are not from us. In this way…the human spirit becomes the ‘candle of the Lord.’” (116)
       Willard cites Proverbs 20:27 for the quote (see Proverbs 20 in its entirety).
        Notice how Willard has linked the passage from 1 Kings 19 about Elijah to the text in Proverbs 20 although there is no clear or reasonable connection.
       What Willard is asserting is that God’s voice can be our thoughts such that we may think they are our thoughts when they are not. He elaborates on this later (130-136; also 236-237), writing:
“God comes to us precisely in and through our thoughts, perceptions, and experiences…”
       Willard advises that if thoughts recur, to consider that this might be the “candle of the Lord” (from Prov. 20:27), that God might be “walking through one’s personality with a candle” (135). He cites Romans 12:2 and Psalm 139:23 to support this idea.
       Willard later suggests that Satan’s temptations of Jesus in the wilderness came through Jesus’ thoughts and imagination rather than an actual encounter (236).

Misuse of First Samuel Passage

       As all contemplatives do (maybe having learned from Willard), the passage in First Samuel 3  is cited by Willard to support his teaching that we may hear God but not know it is God. We need to learn how to recognize God’s voice.
       Notice the first verse of this account states:
“Now the boy Samuel was ministering to the Lord before Eli. And word from the Lord was rare in those days, visions were infrequent.”
      In light of this, it is no surprise that when God spoke to Samuel, he assumed it was Eli and goes to Eli. After the third time, when Eli realizes it is God calling Samuel, he directs Samuel to wait for the Lord to speak again. As it turns out, the revelation is about and for Eli, not Samuel.
       Willard rests his theory on this one passage, and makes astounding assertions:
“So when you hear God’s voice, you do not automatically know God’s voice. Indeed, I believe it is possible for someone who regularly interacts with the voice of God not even to recognize it as something special. The Scripture teaches that the less dramatic the message, the fuller the content, and the more advanced the person who is receiving the message.” (118-9; the words starting with “less dramatic” to the end of the sentence are italicized in the original).
       This exact idea is expressed by Willard in an interview with Richard Foster at the Renovare headquarters.
      Willard writes that studying the lives of Abraham and Moses will bear out what he has said. How could that be when they always knew it was God speaking to them? Secondly, nothing in the text leads to a belief that they had to be “advanced” to hear from God. In fact, Abraham was a pagan in a land of pagans worshiping false gods when he first heard from God.
        And what basis is there for Willard’s assertion that one who “interacts regularly” with the voice of God will not view it as “special?” These kinds of puzzling statements are typical of Willard; they seem to come from nowhere except Willard’s own thinking (this is one reason I could never get past the first half of Willard’s Spirit of the Disciplines as younger believer – younger in Christ, not in years).
       Also puzzling….
       Did God not give plenty of what are viewed as “dramatic” messages to both Abraham and Moses? Furthermore, the accounts of Abraham and Moses are narrative and those accounts are not about hearing God or how to hear God.
       Did Abraham or Moses ever not recognize God’s voice? There is zero indication of that.
       Later, Willard seems to use the case of Samuel as an example of hearing God’s voice in our own thoughts (125), what he calls the “inner voice” of God (118), and claims that if Eli had not helped Samuel know it was God, that it might have been years until Samuel heard God (143)! Can one really think that God would have “messed up” in calling Samuel if Eli had not been there? God used Eli but the calling of Samuel did not depend on Eli.
       Taking the case of Samuel, which was an exceptional situation, and misapplying it in a teaching about hearing God, is not just misuse of the biblical text but it is presumptuous.

The Bible is Not Enough

       We must, insists Willard, consider the possibility that God may speak to us just as he did to Elijah, Moses, and Paul since they were humans like us. Willard sees no distinction between their situations and ours.
       Willard writes that God has continued to speak to people today and that the fact that the canon is closed should not cast doubt on that. To deny this is to “substitute safety and deadness for living communication from God” and we should not
“resign ourselves to hear what only God has said in Scripture rather than to listen for the specific word that he might have for us today.” (137)
       So God’s communication to us in the Bible is “deadness” by implication according to Willard’s statement, and looking for God’s sufficient word in Scripture is to “resign” one’s self.

      Willard scoffs at the belief that the Bible is sufficient as God’s revelation (140-142). He knocks down this idea with a straw man argument and calls it “Bible Deism.” He unfairly compares it to the views of the rationalist Deists, who believed that God created the world and then stepped away, and to the teachings of the Sadducees, who rejected revelation after Moses.
       Indeed, Willard sees this Bible Deism as an “unbiblical teaching about God’s relationship to his children.” If one thinks he speaks only in and through Scripture, then God is distant and impersonal, and not interacting with Christians, according to Willard. Ironically, or maybe confusedly, Willard does state some positive and helpful things about the Bible in chapter 7, “Redemption Through the Word of God.”

Advanced Spirituality

       Christians must learn to recognize God’s voice “through their own personal experience and experimentation” (143, 256). It is important to recognize the “superiority” of the “still, small voice within the silence of our minds.’ To recognize this, one must be in an “advanced spiritual condition.” Hearing this voice “is what lies at the heart of a relationship with God” (155).
       So one must recognize something that we are not even sure was a voice (from 1 Kings 19) and are never told to seek after we reach an “advanced spiritual” state, or we do not have a good relationship with God.
       Hearing God this way is superior to dreams and visions, Willard states, which take place when the mind is not conscious or alert. The less spiritually mature are those who seek and receive dreams and visions.
       The problem with Willard’s view is not whether dreams and visions from God are for today or not (that is another topic), but that his view rests on a distinction between God speaking in dreams or visions versus words, and correlating that with what Willard terms the spiritually mature vs. the spiritually immature, a view not found in scripture.

No Words

       But then we have no words at all as superior. Willard asserts that “one of the highest forms of communication” is when no words are needed, a communion with God “beyond communication.” He then quotes two poems. One would hope that Willard would have a biblical reference for this, but he does not because this idea is from men (perhaps influenced by Thomas Keating , who famously said “Silence is God’s first language”)?
       This reverence for silence as holy and superior is from mysticism . Mysticism essentially seeks direct unmediated experiences with the Divine (however that is conceived). Mysticism is not so much about having experiences as it is about seeking those experiences, usually using man-based methods. Mysticism elevates ineffable experience and undermines Scripture (this a long-time observation from this writer which has been demonstrated in many examples: see CANA articles on contemplative practices).

Words Are Spiritual

       Willard writes about words having a spiritual power, and how Jesus imparted that power to his apostles. Jesus did this “experientially,” first with his disciples (I guess Jesus had to see how it would go?), and then with the seventy. Willard writes about a passage in Luke 10:
“It was apparently only at this point that Jesus saw Satan in defeat, through the transfer of the word of God to ordinary people who could then speak for God….” (174).
     This asserts that Jesus did not know how things would turn out and that he did not see “Satan in defeat” until that time. Nothing in the passage suggests that. Willard later writes that God also experiments in getting us to hear him (256). However, experimentation is totally out of character for God. Experimenting would mean that God does not know outcomes or makes mistakes in his plans. This view not only means God changes and is fallible, but places God in time, a view found in Process Theology and Open Theism. Whether Willard was influenced or not by either, many of his statements about God in this book would fit one or both of those.
       Willard writes that it should be possible to speak words “on behalf of God and in the name of Christ how things are to be.” There are “degrees of power” in speaking God’s word, and prayer “heightens that power.”
       Willard explains this is not like magic or occult power, but is based on spiritual power in words from God and spoken on his behalf. However, I do not think Willard makes a clear distinction. The power is not in the words themselves; the power comes from God.
      This idea from Willard reminded me of Agnes Sanford, admired by both Willard and Richard Foster. Foster was mentored by Sanford. Sanford, an apparent follower of many New Thought beliefs (which she had been involved with prior to becoming Episcopalian), taught about the power of words in a New Thought manner. This is also found in parts of Foster’s book, Celebration of Discipline.
       At this point, Willard enters a confusing discussion of God’s word, stating that the Bible is not the “word of God eternally settled in the heavens” as stated in Ps. 119:89 nor is it what is referred to in Acts 12:24.
“The inerrancy of the original texts is rendered effective for the purposes of redemption, only as that text….is constantly held within the eternal Living Word” (185).
      Although some things he states are true, Willard makes distinctions between the Bible and God’s word “in the larger sense portrayed in the Bible” that is “available to every person through the Bible” (187). He continues making what appears to me to be a false choice between Jesus as the Living Word and the Bible, While it is true that Jesus is not the Bible and, as the Living Word is God, there is no basis for creating a higher-lower tier between Jesus and the Bible, which is what Willard is doing.
       This false choice was/is a common tactic with the Emergent Church and the Progressives. There is no conflict between God’s word and Jesus, nor does one obscure the other. Scripture points to Jesus and Jesus pointed to Scripture throughout his ministry.

How Do We Know God’s Voice?

       The burning question is how does one know if the thought they have or if the “inner voice” they hear is from God? Willard answers that one learns this “by experience” (63, 218, 221, and several other places). We may not even realize it is God who is speaking to us unless we learn how to know it is God. With the help of those who have had experience in hearing God’s voice, one can learn to recognize God’s voice, Willard confidently explains.
       Willard offers three points of reference to indicate it is God’s voice and writes that this can be dangerous for the one who is “without a deep experience and communication with Christ” (223). Willard returns to his admonition that this is for the spiritually mature.
       At this point, the book begins to delve into esoteric explanations of learning how to recognize God’s voice.*
       Willard offers markers for God’s voice such as quality of sound which has weight and is authoritative; a certain spirit that is calm and peaceful; and a matter of content; discussing each one. While he acknowledges that the Bible is “the permanent address at which God’s voice may be found” (238) and that God’s speaking occurs most often along with Bible study and reflection (256), his many other statements about the need to hear God beyond scripture as necessary for an authentic and living relationship with God drown out his more reasonable thoughts.
        God’s voice will usually come in a way that “approximates the experience of an audible voice” (239). Yet Willard repeats his claim that God’s voice comes through our thoughts and even suggests it as the way the Bible was written. He cites Second Peter 1:21 and writes:
“With very little exception, the form such inspiration took was nothing more than thoughts and perceptions of the distinctive character that these people had learned by experience to recognize the voice of God in their own souls” (250).
He misuses what Paul writes in First Corinthians 7:12 (“but to the rest I say, not the Lord”) to assert that Paul distinguished between what the Lord said from what Paul was saying as his own view. This passage is often misinterpreted this way, but what Paul writes in its entirety is from God because he is writing God-breathed words. The distinction is not what God said versus Paul’s own opinion, but rather between a teaching not given prior expressly by Christ but that is now being given through Paul. See brief explanations of this here, here, and here.

Conclusion

       While Willard writes correctly about waiting on the Lord and not trying to force God to speak, it remains true that Willard believes hearing from God is an essential for the Christian to have a close and “living” relationship with God. Willard makes strange unbiblical claims such as:
1. One may not hear God because he is not ready to hear him
2. One my not be willing to use what God tells him so he will not hear God
3. On may not recognize God’s voice if God speaks to him
4. One who hears God does not necessarily consider it special
5. Visions and dreams are for the more immature while words from God are for the spiritually mature
6. God’s messages are not dramatic
7. One must be spiritually advanced to hear God
8. Christians should expect to hear God
9. One cannot have a close or vital relationship with God unless one is hearing from God on a regular basis (outside of Scripture)
       There is a gaslighting element to the book because of many positive, biblical statements made by Willard about God’s word. Yet his very theme and many remarks in the book undermine the Bible’s sufficiency and authority. I have found this to be the case with many books I have critiqued.
       My thoughts:
1. If hearing God speak beyond Scripture is a key to a vital relationship with God, why is this not taught in the Bible?
2. If this is so important, why are the guidelines offered by Willard not in the Bible?
3. If what Willard claims is true, then apparently God has left an essential teaching out, and God had to wait for various people such as the mystics and Willard to come along and inform the church of this missing information.
        The book is tainted by taking Scripture out of context, misapplication of Scripture and biblical narratives, and misunderstanding that a primary building block for a close relationship with God comes precisely through through knowing God’s word and following what is given there, such as prayer modeled on biblical prayer, worship, fellowship with believers, and being transformed by the Holy Spirit.
       Willard’s teachings such as found in this book have contributed to a menacing tsunami that is washing through the church.
* Willard quotes and strongly recommends Frederick B. Meyer (1847-1929), a leader in Keswick Theology (also called the Higher Life movement) which was heavily criticized for its teaching of a “second blessing,” thus creating two classes of Christians. Willard’s emphasis on hearing God’s voice being only for the “mature” Christian echoes this division.

Related information

An assessment of Dallas Willard’s Spirit of the Disciplines by Bob DeWaay
Program on John Ortberg and Dallas Willard from Chris Rosebrough (Go to 40 minutes)
Program, “Is Dallas Willard a Christian?” from Chris Rosebrough
Tim Challies on Lectio Divina
Short link for article: https://shorturl.at/gtsGF