Does God Still Speak Today?

Yes—God still speaks, and constantly. But how he speaks is exactly where many Christians get confused and anxious, so it’s worth being clear. God’s decisive, saving speech to the world has been given: “long ago… God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son” (Hebrews 1:1-2). In Christ and the Scriptures that testify to him, God has said everything necessary for faith and life. He is not withholding some further revelation you must strain to receive.

So when Lutherans say God still speaks today, we mean something reliable and available, not mystical and elusive. God speaks through his living Word—the Scriptures read, and above all the Gospel preached and applied. This is not a dead letter; it is the very voice of the Shepherd, by which his sheep still hear him (John 10:27) and through which faith itself is created (“faith comes from hearing,” Romans 10:17). When you read the Bible or hear a faithful sermon or the words of absolution, God is genuinely addressing you, right now. That is not a lesser way of hearing God; it is the surest way, “a lamp shining in a dark place” (2 Peter 1:19).

This is a great relief, because it frees you from a common and exhausting burden: the sense that real spirituality means receiving private voices, dreams, or inner impressions, and that you are failing if you don’t. Scripture never commands you to chase such experiences, and it warns that our inner impressions are unreliable guides easily confused with our own wants. You are not left to decode mysterious signs. God has spoken plainly, clearly, and enough—and he keeps speaking that same sure Word to you every time it is opened. If you want to hear God today, you know exactly where to listen.