“Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away.” Luke 21:33 (NIV)

Sometimes it’s hard to know if an idea is an instruction from God, a deception from Satan, or just something you want to do. You need to learn to recognize the difference and know how to discern God’s voice—because it can have eternal consequences.

A lot of evil gets blamed on God. People will even do bad things and then say, “God told me to do it!” The Living Bible paraphrase says, “Don’t always believe every message you hear just because someone says it is a message from God: test it first to see if it really is” (1 John 4:1).                                                             

God’s will will never contradict his Word. So you can ask yourself, “Does this idea in my mind agree with the Bible?” God doesn’t say one thing and then change his mind and say another thing. If he said it, it’s true, and it will always be true.

Truth doesn’t change. Opinions, scientific discoveries, and technology all change. But God’s Word doesn’t change. Truth never changes. In fact, if it’s new, it’s not true. What do I mean by that? If it’s true, it’s been around forever. It’s just that sometimes our discoveries catch up with something that’s always been true.

God is consistent. He isn’t moody. He doesn’t change his mind. He will never tell you to violate a principle that he’s already given in his Word.

So the first question you need to ask is, “Does this thought line up with what God has already said?” If what’s in your mind contradicts something he has already said in the Bible, then you know it’s wrong.

For instance, the Bible tells us to pay our taxes. Jesus said in Luke 20:25, “Give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar, and give to God what belongs to God” (NLT). If all of a sudden you get an idea that God is telling you to not pay your taxes, that idea isn’t from God. Since God has already said to pay your taxes, he’s not going to contradict it.

The Bible says that even if an angel shows up and says something like, “By the way, I’ve got some stuff to add to the Bible. The Bible is good, but this is new and revised information.”

God says don’t believe it! In fact, Paul said it like this in The Living Bible paraphrase: “Let God’s curses fall on anyone, including myself, who preaches any other way to be saved than the one we told you about; yes, if an angel comes from heaven and preaches any other message, let him be forever cursed” (Galatians 1:8).

Jesus said in Luke 21:33, “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away” (NIV). God’s Word is eternal, because truth never changes. If something was true 5,000 years ago, it was true 1,000 years ago, it is true today, and it will be true 5,000 years from today.

People might say, “God said it, I believe it, that settles it.” No! God said it, and that settles it—whether you believe it or not!

So if you’re wondering if an idea is from God, the first question to answer is this: “Is this idea in line with the truth of God’s Word?”