Katharine C Giovanni : Sample Chapter

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Chapter 1 -- A New Road
HAVE YOU EVER WANTED TO CALL GOD ON THE TELEPHONE and have a conversation with Him? I have. In fact, I have dozens of questions that I would like to ask Him on all sorts of topics. I suspect we all would like to have a real conversation with God. Not simply a one-way chat where you talk and He listens, but a real conversation with real words! If God really is God, then it would be a simple thing for Him to answer me in a way that I can clearly understand-words.

For years I have listened to sermons, read books by New Age authors, and asked people questions in hopes of finding a way to actually talk to God. What was I searching for? I wanted God to answer my questions in real, honest-to-goodness English. I wanted to hear actual words that I could understand. I didn't need or want pictures, Bible verses, or parables that required a master's degree to interpret. They didn't help me, and it took much too long to figure them out. I wanted specific answers to my direct questions. There had to be a way to talk to Him directly. If God was really there, I reasoned, and if He really did create everything around us, then it would be a simple thing for him to talk to me and answer a few of my questions-in plain English! Just like a real mother/father who answers their children's questions. I know that God must be a busy guy, but surely He is the one being in the universe capable of doing more than one thing at a time. So, if God is really there, then why can't He s peak to me in a way that I can understand?

Many people over the ages have told us that God is real, but how do we really know it? The Bible teaches us that He is real, but since that was written thousands of years ago, how can we really know it? I can see, hear, smell, and touch so I'm sure that I am real. Oprah is real. John Travolta is real. My mother was real. Is God real?

For more than thirty years, I have listened to ministers preach about hearing God.

"He'll answer you; you just have to learn how to recognize His answers. You can hear Him in pictures, dreams, music, and nature," they told me. "The next music you hear, the next person you meet, or the next words you read will contain His answer."

They would laugh at that and pat me on the head and send me on my way, but inside my heart, it was a real question and no one would give me a direct answer. In fact, I had nothing but questions! What did His voice sound like? Would He speak to me? Could He speak to me?

It has taken me many years, but I finally learned how to do it. I have learned how to talk with God Himself. The Almighty. The Great I am. I can now have two-way conversations with Him and receive answers in plain English that I can both hear and under-stand. Now, when I ask a question such as "Should I write this book?" I can clearly hear, "Yes, of course, you should. Why wouldn't you?" Real words and real answers.

The voice that I "hear" comes from within. In fact, many people hear "voices" inside of their minds every day; they simply do not believe that it could be God talking to them. That "voice" you have been hearing for years is not your subconscious talking to you, nor is it your intuition.

I was discussing this concept with my friend Jeanne last summer at a party, and as she listened, her expression changed. She then told me that she completely agreed that God can talk to you, because she had heard Him herself once. It was the Friday before Thanksgiving, and her son Bryan was rushing out the door to go to school. Throwing his backpack across his shoulders, he raced outside only to hear a boy across the street shouting to hurry up because the school bus was coming. So without looking, Bryan dashed across the street-and immediately into the path of a car speeding down the road at 55 mph. Upon impact, the car threw Bryan through the air where he landed on the side of the road and was knocked unconscious.

A few moments later, Jeanne heard a knock at the door. Bryan must have forgotten something, she thought. But it wasn't Bryan. When she opened the door, she found a hysterical man screaming that a car had hit a child. As she listened to him, the color drained from her face, because she instinctively knew that it was Bryan. Her heart firmly lodged in her throat, she ran past the man to the street, sprinting as fast as a racehorse just out of the gate. This wonderful woman then looked me right in the eye and told me that that was the exact moment when she heard God's voice clearly tell her,

As she reached Bryan's side, she noticed that a stranger was already there, kneeling beside him, and comforting him. Tears started to roll down her face unheeded as she watched her son lying so lifeless, but inside she knew that he was all right. God Himself had spoken to her and had told her that Bryan would be fine. She watched helplessly as the paramedics loaded Bryan into the ambulance. Then she climbed in and held his hand as they broke all speed limits getting to the hospital. Sitting beside her injured child, barreling through the streets, her thoughts turned to the loving words she had heard only moments before, words that promised that her loving little boy would pull through, and she smiled inwardly knowing that Bryan would somehow get through this.

God's loving words provided her with the inner strength and comfort that she needed to get through the long dark hours that lay ahead. Jeanne never did find out who the man by Bryan's side was, but she is convinced that it was Bryan's guardian angel, sent by God to watch over him until she could get there. And what happened to Bryan? He pulled through completely-just as God said he would. To this day, Jeanne calls her son on the Friday before Thanksgiving just to tell him how much she loves him.

"But I never thought I would ever be able to hear His voice again!" she revealed to me. She can. So can you. There are many people who hear God's loving voice during times of serious stress, but most of them believe that it is a onetime conversation that they can never recapture. Not true. If you believe that God can speak to you, and you have no doubts, then you will be able to hear Him.

My brother had a similar experience many years ago when he was planning his wedding. He decided that it would be nice to invite our father's second wife Anne and her children to his wedding, because they had become good friends over the years. Of course, that irritated our father to no end and a fight ensued. I doubt my mother was pleased either. As the days passed, my poor brother soon became more stressed than I have ever seen him. He handled each ugly telephone call with as much grace and dignity as he could muster while juggling wedding preparations and a stressful job in New York City.

One afternoon after a particularly nasty telephone call from our father, my brother reached his breaking point. After hanging up, he stared blindly at the telephone. His mind was filled with the horrible conversation he had just had with our father, and in that moment, his brain just seemed to burst from the stress that had been thrust on his young shoulders. He raced from his office into the city streets where he could blindly walk among strangers for a while-and, he hoped, clear his head. However, as he walked through the crowded streets, his thoughts turned darker instead of lighter. They became blacker and blacker with each passing block. Instead of making him feel better, the walk was actually making my brother feel worse as the dark thoughts swirled in his head. Each step pounded the black thoughts further and further into his mind until they seemed to dominate his very being.

"Why me?" he asked no one in particular. "Why can't my family be normal like other people?" he wondered over and over again.

Soon beet red hives began to appear all over his face, his chest started to hurt, and his breathing became shallow. He actually felt as if he were going to explode! Then it happened. As he was talking himself into a frenzy of stress, God quietly spoke to him.

The loving voice literally stopped my brother in his tracks. Like Jeanne, my brother instinctively knew that it was not his own voice that he had just clearly heard; it was God's, and the relief was immediate. His breathing became normal, and the dark thoughts drifted away amid the warmth and love of God's voice. In fact, he felt so much better that he was able to go back to his office and finish the day. And the wedding? Despite my brother's objections, our stepmother decided not to come after all, and the wedding went off without a hitch. My parents were even civil to each other! All was indeed well.

My brother never heard the voice again, but he never forgot it either. In fact, I'll bet that he would give everything he has to hear it again. God's love comforted him in one of the most stressful moments in his life, and they shared a sacred moment of unconditional love and mutual respect.

Thousands of people have heard God's voice at one time in their life, and they all instinctively knew that it was indeed His words that they heard. Unfortunately, these same people also think that it was a special sacred moment that they will never be able to repeat. Not true. You can hear God's voice again anytime you wish.

I was chatting on the phone with an old friend of mine a while back, and we got onto the subject of this book. As I outlined the book, she casually mentioned to me that she too had heard God's voice once. Now, I've known Pam for years, and although I knew that she is a recovering alcoholic who has been sober for more than a decade, she never told me that she had heard God's voice. As it turns out, the few words that He spoke to her completely changed her life's course.

After graduating from college, Pam moved to New York City. She had a good job downtown, a nice studio apartment, and often went out for drinks with her many friends. For most people, this would be no problem, but unfortunately, Pam was the type of person who never knew when to stop and often drank herself into a stupor. She liked to party hard and frequently found herself in extremely bad neighborhoods with people she didn't know. In fact, she blacked out so many times she lost count, and each time she told herself that she wouldn't do it again. But she did-over and over again.

One morning, like countless others before it, Pam woke up and couldn't remember what had happened the previous night. While the coffee was brewing, she went to the bathroom and splashed water on her face in a desperate attempt to clear the alcoholic haze from her head. After consuming two aspirin, she returned to the kitchen, poured a cup of fresh coffee, and sat down at the table. As the coffee did its work, her brain began to clear, and bits and pieces of the evening before slowly came back to her. She closed her eyes in an attempt to block out the memories of her out-of-control behavior. This time, however, she couldn't get the memories to stop. She sat for what seemed like hours reliving other drunken nights. Memory after memory flashed through her brain, and she cringed inwardly each time another episode surfaced. The people she had hurt, the horrible places she had gone, and the terrible things that she had done all flashed through her tired brain like a Saturday night movie of the week .

She became so horrified at what she had become that her mind seemed to explode into a million pieces on the spot. Something had to change! She just had to get her drinking under control! She couldn't let this happen again! So she decided to set some ground rules so she wouldn't black out again and lose control. It never occurred to Pam to stop drinking; she simply thought she should modify it a bit.

Later that morning, she left her apartment. As she walked down the street to the subway, she wondered how she could avoid the blackouts. Perhaps I can stop drinking on an empty stomach, she thought, or switch to club soda after two drinks. It was at that exact moment that she heard God's voice.

Who said that? She whipped around to see who had spoken to her, but, of course, there was no one near. It was then that she realized that the voice she had just heard was actually God's. It literally froze her in her tracks. She couldn't believe it-God had actually spoken to her. To her! His words made such an impression on Pam that she stopped drinking the same day, and she has never had a drink since. God's simple observation turned Pam's life completely around and forced her to realize that she had a problem. However, like most people, she never thought that she would actually hear His voice again because she simply figured that it was a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

What these three stories all have in common is that although each did hear God's voice, none of them thought that they could ever talk with God again. Each person thought that it was a one-shot deal never to be repeated. I'm here to tell you that this is not true. They can all talk with God again anytime they choose to-and so can you.

Myth: Only Special People Can Talk to God
"Well," you might say, "since you seem to be able to talk with Him, you must be special or something because normal people can't do this."

Hmmm, actually I'm not. I'm a normal everyday person with a husband, two kids, a dog, and a mortgage. I had a normal childhood (okay, so it was almost normal). I have some good friends, eat three meals a day, and put my pants on one leg at a time-just like you. I am a normal everyday person who simply wanted to get her questions answered, and who wouldn't take the word "no" for an answer.

God didn't stop speaking to us thousands of years ago, and He doesn't just talk to people such as the pope and Mother Teresa. He talks to every single one of us every day of our lives in thousands of ways. Some of us listen and some of us don't, but we are all born with the ability to hear Him. Many people do not hear His voice because they are scared of what they might hear-what they think He might say to them about the way they've handled their lives. Others don't want to listen because they are afraid He might make them think about that one thing that they have completely buried. Still others feel that they are not worthy enough to talk to God and think that He must have better things to do. Heck, they think, He probably doesn't even know I exist.

A few years ago, I was in an herb shop and somehow the sales-woman and I got on the topic of God. Happens to me a lot actually. After a while, I mentioned that I could teach her how to hear God's voice so that she could get some answers to her questions. The saleswoman's face turned pale, and she looked at me with eyes wide with horror. "Oh no," she said, shaking her head, "I don't think so." She then practically ran to the back of the store. What on earth did she think God would say to her?

Hmmm. I've done some things that I'm not proud of, and if God really was a punishing type of God, wouldn't he have squashed me like a bug by now? Wouldn't He have put me on some sort of celestial time-out when I did it? Why would He wait? As parents, we punish our children the moment they do something wrong. Since God has never punished me in any way whatsoever, I submit to you that He never will. He loves me. I love Him. He loves me no matter what I do, no matter what I choose. Do we not love our own children in the same way? No matter what?

There is absolutely nothing to be afraid of. God can and will speak to you. He will not yell, scream, berate, or scold for that is simply not His way. His way is truth and love. Always. No matter what you have done.

God has asked me to give you a message. Although His words come through my own human filter, they are directly from God.

Open your mind to Me, and I will hear. Remove all doubt. Remove all feelings of inability. Ask if I am there, and I will speak to you. It is time you learned to hear. I am there for you and have always been. You just need to choose it. Choose to feel it and choose to hear. It is as simple as that and always has been. If you choose to hear Me, then you will. If you doubt that you will hear Me, then you won't. Make the choice to hear and listen. Don't make it difficult on yourself because the harder you make it, the harder it will be. Keep it simple. If you need help, just ask, and I will help you. I love you.

In the following chapters, I am going to teach you how to talk to God and actually get an answer back in your own language. I will also tell you about some normal everyday people who hear God's voice just like I do.

My purpose is to simply share some of the answers that I have found over the years. I am just like a teacher who teaches a fifty-year-old man how to read. Once he begins to understand and recognize the words, it opens up a brand-new world for him. Books provide him with a new road to walk down and unlimited opportunities that he never had before. All his questions can now be answered. All is desires can now be filled. This is exactly the same thing.

My goal is to teach you how to "read" (so to speak). Each and every one of you reading this book can do it. How do I know? You wouldn't be reading this book if you weren't ready. God has brought you here to this exact place at this exact time because you are now ready to talk to Him. All the questions you have wondered about all your life can now be answered in full detail. I am not going to tell you what God will say to you, nor am I going to tell you what answers I have personally found, for that is not my goal here. I actually don't want you to take other people's word for it, because we've been doing just that for centuries. Since everyone has a different opinion on what God has said (or not said), it makes it extremely difficult to find the truth. I am not here to tell you what I think the "truth" is, because it is time for you to find your own answers, ask your own questions, and finally have your own personal conversation with God. I am similar to a telephone technician. I am simply go ing to come into your "house" (so to speak) and connect your telephone. Then I'm going to hand you the receiver.

There is a whole world out there that has been waiting for you. Now all you have to do is sit back, relax, and choose to move forward. Choose to hear God. It doesn't matter what your beliefs are, what religion you practice, or even what name you choose to call God-everyone on the planet has the capability to do this.

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