Divine Dialogue: Learning to Hear God’s Voice in Troubling Times

Summary

In this powerful episode of Arise, Women of God, Tamara K. Anderson and Bonnie Randall explore one of the most urgent needs of our day: discerning God’s voice in perilous times. Using the tragic assassination of Charlie Kirk as a backdrop, the hosts reflect on how Christian women can respond to tragedy with resilience, hope, and the power of prayer.

 They share personal experiences of spiritual promptings, showing how prayer becomes more than words—it transforms into a channel for divine strength and peace. This conversation dives into the importance of recognizing how God speaks, learning to identify when the adversary tries to counter His direction, and writing down divine impressions so we can remember and act on them.

With raw honesty and biblical insight, Tamara and Bonnie remind us that in these latter days before the Second Coming of Jesus Christ, believers are called to stand firm, intercede for others, and live as prayer warriors. Whether you’re seeking guidance in uncertainty, struggling to know if God hears you, or desiring a deeper relationship with Him, this episode offers practical wisdom and spiritual encouragement.

Tune in and be inspired to hear God’s voice clearly, pray powerfully, and walk boldly in faith—no matter how dark the world becomes.

Takeaways

• In perilous times, it is imperative to cultivate the ability to discern God's voice amidst the chaos and turmoil surrounding us.
• Powerful prayer, particularly on behalf of others, enables us to channel divine strength and peace during moments of collective grief and uncertainty.
• Recognizing the opposition we face when attempting to follow divine promptings serves as a testament to our growth and alignment with God's will.
• The narrative surrounding Charlie Kirk's assassination underscores the urgent need for communal prayer and the profound impact of individual faith in dark times.

Companies and Products mentioned in this episode:

• Charlie Kirk
• Women Warriors of Light and the free Defeat the Adversary Booklet
• Releasing Prophetic Solutions by Christy Johnston

Co-Hosts

Tamara K. Anderson @tamarakanderson

Tamara, founder of Women Warriors of Light, is a dynamic speaker, award winning author, and a podcaster. She is driven by her Christian faith to inspire faith in Jesus Christ. Alongside her husband, Justin, she navigates the joys and challenges of parenting four children with autism, ADHD, and mental health hurdles. You can find out more about Tamara on her website: https://www.tamarakanderson.com/

Bonnie Randall @bonnie.randall

Bonnie Randall is a wife, mother, trainer, speaker, actress, copywriter, heart centered life coach and has also been a business and marketing consultant for over 20 years. Her real passion is to help people grow as individuals and teach them how to resolve limiting beliefs. Bonnie enjoys teaching about mental health, abuse prevention and recovery classes. She runs a trauma recovery support group and YouTube channel called, Come Off Conqueror, which helps survivors of abuse find Christ centered healing. Find out more at: https://www.youtube.com/@comeoffconqueror

Transcript

Tamara K. Anderson

00:00:01.040 - 00:00:23.920

What do you do when a tragedy like the assassination of Charlie Kirk rocks not only your world, but the world of everyone around you? How do you respond to that? How are we as Christian women supposed to respond to that? What does God want us to do? Stay tuned.

That's what we're going to talk about today.

Intro/Outro

00:00:26.560 - 00:01:19.160

Are you a woman who knows God is calling you to something more, but you're unsure where to start or how to grow it into something impactful? You are not alone and you're in the right place.

Welcome to the Arise Women of God podcast, a show for Christian women who feel called to shine his light and step into their divine purpose.

Each week you'll hear stories of faithful women, both from the Bible and today, who heard God's voice and chose to say yes even when it felt uncomfortable or uncertain. To step with faith into the unknown, away with encouragement, spiritual insight and practical steps to follow those holy promptings in your own life.

So let's arise together as women warriors of light. Let's do it God's way, God's strong.

Tamara K. Anderson

00:01:23.160 - 00:01:34.150

Hello and welcome to another episode of the Arise Women of God podcast. I'm your host, Tamara K Anderson, and joining me today is my co host, Bonnie Randall. Bonnie, thanks for being here today.

Bonnie Randall

00:01:34.870 - 00:01:36.310

Thanks for inviting me.

Tamara K. Anderson

00:01:36.630 - 00:04:01.410

I had the thought earlier today that I needed to talk to Bonnie about all of the stuff going on with the assassination of Charlie Kirk.

We've kind of been talking about how when something like this happens, you want to act, you want to do something, because there's been so much negativity and there's been some positivity coming from it, but there's a lot of grief and a lot of sorrow. Bonnie and I have been very mindful of all of the things going on in the world today and these perilous times that we live in.

As talked about in 2 Timothy chapter three. It is such an interesting thing to read these prophecies of our last days.

For it says this know also that in the last days perilous times shall come for men (And I'll say women also) shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud blasphemers, disobedient, parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection. Gosh, don't you see that in the everything going on right now?

Truce breakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, high minded, lovers of pleasure, more than lovers of God. Today we see it all around us.

We can see that we're heading into this second coming of Jesus Christ, that it's coming quickly and that things are moving more quickly towards that as we see wickedness increase. But we also see a lot of good people pushing back the darkness and bringing in light.

We're going to talk a little bit about prayer and how Bonnie, when she heard about this assassination, she felt moved to pray and how you can learn to feel God's spirit and pray in that spirit powerfully. But not only learn to pray, but learn to hear so that you know how to act, how you know, you know how to treat those around you.

You know how to be a voice of kindness and in a sea of discord. Will you share with us kind of the circumstance behind the prayer and how you've learned to pray in the spirit?

Bonnie Randall

00:04:03.090 - 00:09:00.620

So I don't really even know much about Charlie Kirk, to be totally 100% honest. I think there's a lot of people who are in my same boat. I had first been introduced to him by a video someone sent me a few weeks ago.

He was talking about homeschooling. And so fast forward to yesterday.

I'm in a business meeting and we're talking about some programs we're about to roll out, and one of our partners goes on mute for a few minutes. And a couple minutes later, my husband comes running into the room, tears in his eyes. And he says, charlie Kirk was just shot.

And I can see he's really upset. And I'm like, who is Charlie Kirk? And then I remembered the conversation I had had the week before.

And just in that moment, Andrea, our partner, comes on, she unmutes, and she's like, it is mass mayhem out here. And we're like, where are you? And she starts telling us about how she is driving through.

She's on the freeway, just passing the UVU campus, and there was a rollover right in front of her. She watched it happen, bumper to bumper traffic. And all of a sudden, everywhere around her erupts into mass mayhem.

There's police cars, there's a million sirens. People are going a million miles a minute. She can see people running all around, like on over by the campus.

And she's like, I. I just heard Charlie Kirk was shot. I'm like, yeah, my husband just came in and told us that.

And in that moment, listening to her describing this scene, I stop and I pause and I'm like, heavenly Father, what do you want? And I hear very distinct voice, stop and pray. Which I'm in the middle of a business meeting, not exactly the Most appropriate place.

But I don't question. I just stop. And I'm like, ladies, we need to stop, and we need to say a prayer. I assumed this was going to be a.

A prayer for him, for the people on campus, for my friend who was in an accident. I did not realize that the prayer was going to turn into this very long and very beautiful prayer. But what unfolded was a very heartfelt plea.

Ladies, this podcast episode, I think, is going to be more about prayer and what we do in these situations. As I was praying, as I began my prayer, the Spirit whispered, speak what I tell you to speak. And I said, okay, I'm. I'm open.

What do you want me to say?

And I have found that when I allow myself to be open to whatever God's will is and whatever he wants, the words that come out of my mouth are not my own. I don't know how to explain this, but I'm sort of transported into a different frame of mind and heart.

And I honestly don't remember most of my prayer. The people who were with me had to tell me what I said. It was that kind of a prayer. And I don't say that in, like, a boastful way.

I say that in an instructive way to explain that when we allow God to speak through us, you can be confident.

Confident that when you are aligned with him and you are truly just trying to proclaim his word and trying to be in alignment with him, that the things that you say and the things that you are feeling, no matter how weird and no matter how strange, are his will. And I encourage all of you to practice that. To practice being in alignment with him while you are praying and practice saying whatever comes to you.

And initially, it's going to feel foreign. It's going to feel different. But as you practice this and you work on it and you ask God as you're praying, is this right?

Am I understanding you correctly? You will get confirmation and it will just flow. I don't know how else to explain it. Does that make sense? Tamara, do you.

Before I keep going, I want to pause and give you a chance to say something.

Tamara K. Anderson

00:09:00.860 - 00:09:28.440

No, I 100% agree. And I've had prayers that I have said that are exactly like that, that it's.

You're like, I don't even know how what I said or how I said that, or it just flows, and, you know, it's God speaking through you. You know what I mean? So I totally. I totally hear you on that. But not every prayer that. Right.

Let's just be honest, like 99.9% of my prayers are not like that.

Bonnie Randall

00:09:28.840 - 00:12:05.970

Yes, but when he is calling you to pray and he's calling you to pray over something, right? To pray for someone, to bless something, to bless someone, you feel this urge to pray.

Those are the times, I think, when we are invited to have this kind of prayer. There's a book called Releasing Prophetic Solutions by Christy Johnson. It is such an amazing book. She's a, I want to say, an ordained minister.

I believe she's from Australia. I don't know exactly her church affiliation, but this book from her has changed my life.

This book in in particular is all about this kind of prayer, about releasing your will and aligning your will with God's will. And when we do that, the things that we say can produce miracles.

You guys, you can literally move mountains with your faith when your faith is in alignment with his will. The book goes on to cite so many different scripture stories and scriptures.

Her book gave me the confidence to start really leaning in to prayer more and, and leaning into this idea of I first need to learn how to hear him. The first step, right, is to learning how God speaks to you, right? Learning how you, you receive revelation or receiving His Spirit.

And that's different for everybody. But I can tell you from experience and being a life coach, and I've had many opportunities to help clients discover how God speaks to them.

In fact, he recently gave me a sort of a formula on how to do it. But the first thing is knowing that the. Usually I would say nine times out of 10. And Tamara, I'm curious to hear if you agree with this.

Nine times out of ten, it feels like the very first voice that you hear is God and the second is the opposition. Because if you think about it, in the scriptures, it's always like truth and error, God and Satan, like God always comes first in every scripture.

And then Satan's mentioned. That's a pattern. Would you agree with that, Tamara?

Tamara K. Anderson

00:12:06.210 - 00:12:46.530

Yes, I 100% agree. And that's why I always encourage people to write down what God tells them to do.

Because almost immediately after you're out of that kind of space of God speaking to you, the adversary comes in and is like, no, you can't do that. That's so dumb. Why would you do that? Just act. It's one of the. You learn, you learn to hear the Spirit and recognize and act.

So if you're wondering if it is the Spirit, ask God to teach you to recognize when he's speaking to you. Because Sometimes I often think we're getting downloads all the time.

But it's just learning to recognize, okay, this is God telling me to do something, right?

Bonnie Randall

00:12:46.930 - 00:14:08.880

Yes. And, and the. That's like step two, right? Is recognizing knowing that he speaks to you.

There's a belief there, right, that he can speak to you and he does. And then recognizing how he does it and knowing that the opposition is going to come. And let me explain why this is a good thing. Okay.

Oh my gosh, so many cool things to share. So we need that opposition. It is a law. It is a universal law. When Adam and Eve fell, right, God said in the garden, now you will have opposition.

Now there will be hard things in your life. And what's cool is those hard things. The opposition is proof that God is speaking to you. And here's how you can know that that is true.

Not just because of the scriptures, but also because the opposition is going to come in with doubts.

And those doubts are going to be targeted towards your weakness, towards the things that you are insecure about, which is a sign that you have something to work on and also a sign that you are headed in the right direction. Because if you weren't heading in the right direction, why would Satan try to stop you?

Tamara K. Anderson

00:14:10.640 - 00:14:14.880

So true, right? Exactly right.

Bonnie Randall

00:14:15.360 - 00:14:56.030

And we know that the opposition is there to prey on our weakest things, our insecurities. To keep us in doubt, to keep us in shame, to keep us stagnant, to keep us paralyzed, to keep us in fear.

So if the second voice has anything to do with fear, anger, a weakness, an insecurity, if it makes you feel as if you can't move forward, something that is. Give me some more words that kind of describe the opposite of God. We'll go to what God is in a second here.

Tamara K. Anderson

00:14:57.230 - 00:15:31.520

For me, often I feel blocked, like paralyzing. Right? Satan wants to keep us paralyzed and stuck. It's interesting to me that the word in the scriptures often is damned.

You know that our progress has been halted like a dam going across the river. Satan does not want us to progress. So God's goal for us is the exact opposite. It is that he wants us to progress. He wants us to move forward.

And sometimes moving forward is. Requires us to do things that are not what we're comfortable with. Right?

Bonnie Randall

00:15:32.960 - 00:17:23.090

And Satan is limiting, Right? He's going to show you in what ways you're limited, in what ways you can't do something. Right.

Notice that all of these words are negative and they're fear based. They're grounded in falsehoods. Because God's way is always forward moving, it's always progressive. It's always showing you your potential.

It's always giving you hope. It's giving you faith to propel you. You may receive a warning, but you will not receive fear from God.

Notice those are two very subtle feeling differences, but in the magnitude of them, they're very different. So when Tamara invited you to have God teach how you hear him and how you receive him, notice to the feeling that you are feeling.

And notice the difference between the subtle difference in that feeling. Right. Excitement is not necessarily God. Peace, calm, harmony, joy is God. Excitement, Twitter Patentedness.

I'm trying to think of how to explain excitement that. That fascination. Fascination is Satan.

I'm sorry to say that, but it's something that he has been teaching me over the last year, that if I become fascinated with something, it's often a distraction to what I should be focusing on. Do you. Have you had that experience?

Tamara K. Anderson

00:17:23.890 - 00:18:29.750

Oh, yeah. Yeah. Well, because I have a little bit of add, so I get distracted easily. You know what I mean?

And so my prayers, especially where my focus should be, it's almost like I have to keep praying. Okay, what should my goal be this week? What should my goal be this month? Because there are always things to pull me off that aren't as important.

They're still good.

Lots and lots and lots of great ideas and good ideas and things that just sound so amazing and fantastic and, you know, kind of like in the movie, I'm like, squirrel, I'm totally distracted now. So it. It takes constant realignment, especially in this world that we're in.

I mean, I wish we all lived on this constant spiritual high, but the truth is we don't.

You know, we'll have those spiritual highs, but we come down from it, and then we get distracted, and God's like, no, no, come on, Cameron, stay focused here. Stay focused. Remember, this is what I need you to do. I'm like, oh, yeah.

Bonnie Randall

00:18:31.750 - 00:22:00.540

So it's tiny object over here looks so much fun. It's so interesting. I want to go down this rabbit hole, whatever it is. So we, we talked about that.

The other thing that he showed me is that some people, not everybody is this way, but some feel it in their body. They feel God in their body, and they can feel like a difference between the spirit and the enemy.

And so I have had really cool experiences with clients where when they feel the spirit, I'm like, okay, that's it. That. That first voice that you heard that let's take, let's Focus on that first voice. Now, where is it in your body? How does that feel? It feels warm.

It feels like a glow. It feels. I have chills up and down my body. My hair is standing up on, like, I hear different things. Right.

And then as we focus on that, Kate, we maybe focus on it for a couple of minutes, inevitably, the opposition comes in, which is exactly what it needs to do. It's. It's so cool how this happens. So the opposition comes in. I'm like, oh, good. What is it saying? Well, it said the opposite of what I just heard.

Or it said this or it said that. Okay, now where do you feel that in your body? I have a pit in my stomach. My heart hurts. I have a headache. I feel sick to my stomach.

I feel anxious, noxious, anxious. I feel fearful. I now want to crawl into a hole. I feel darkness. I feel. Oh, my gosh, so many different descriptive words.

For those of you who are listening, I would love to please, please, please, please, please put in the comments the feelings that you get when you're feeling the spirit versus when you're feeling the enemy. Okay.

Because this is going to really help people who are listening, who are maybe not really sure, get different descriptions to help them put into words what's going on inside of them. Okay. And then after you feel the enemy, we go back to the spirit. Okay. We don't want to stay there, right?

We don't want to give them the time of day to, like, you know, have place in our hearts or in our minds. But we. You do need to recognize what the juxtaposition between the two.

This is really important because then if we go back to praying, a prophetic prayer and praying over people and learning how to pray, it's important to know that while you are praying, you might be going through this back and forth. Okay. And as you practice, I truly believe that receiving the spirit is a skill, that this is something that we practice.

It has taken me several years of concerted effort to get to a point where when I am in my grounded space, okay. When I'm not in a really heightened emotional state, it's easier when I'm in, like, anger or really hard grief.

Like, anything that's really heightened, it's a lot harder for me. I have to kind of calm myself down first. That's why I love meditation so much. Deep breathing helps me get into a more calm state.

And when I'm in that calm state, I can feel the spirit easier. Are you the same way, Tamara?

Tamara K. Anderson

00:22:01.640 - 00:22:37.660

Oh, definitely. But I don't use meditation, I actually have learned to cast out the negative emotions.

And so I'll say something like, in the name of Jesus Christ, I cast out the spirit of anxiety and fear. And I. Anytime you cast something out, you have a void. And so you need to fill that with what you desire.

And I invite in the spirit of peace, of love, of tranquility, all those things that I'd rather have. Meditation works, and sometimes you need to do several things to get rid of, you know, that negativity.

Bonnie Randall

00:22:38.060 - 00:22:57.900

If I've been angry, I often have to repent before I can feel the spirit. Let's be honest.

If I've just been yelling at my kids or been in, like, a really stressful situation where I'm kind of, like, bugged or frustrated, I often have to repent first before. And that's kind of like casting out, right?

Tamara K. Anderson

00:22:57.900 - 00:23:03.320

Yeah. Yeah. Well, it's getting rid of the negative that's holding you captive at the moment so you can move forward.

Bonnie Randall

00:23:03.800 - 00:26:51.660

Yes. And it's just practicing that daily repentance and coming back into alignment. And I don't mean to say I have to repent in, like, this judgmental way.

It's just life. Right. Like, I make mistakes. So, long story short, let's go back to the prophetic prayer.

So yesterday with Charlie, feeling so much pain for him and for the community, I prayed for calm and for order to be restored on the campus, for order to be restored in the community. I remember feeling this strong sense that his passing would be a catalyst for both good and evil.

And if we're not careful, it's going to set off a chain of events.

And what I have realized since then is that situations like this, where there is so much emotional energy and so much polarization, has the opportunity to either bring us to our knees in prayer and supplication, or it has the opportunity to bring us to our knees in despair, or it has the opportunity to bring in hatred and disorder and chaos.

And what I feel God is asking and calling all of us here at Women warriors of Light to do is to decide to take the opportunity to choose how you want to react, to choose if you want to be on the side of love and peace and unity, or if we want to continue in division and hate and discord and disharmony. Speaking for myself, I choose to be a beacon of light. I choose to not focus on the negative, to focus on what unifies me with my sisters.

We may not all be of the same denomination, the same faith, the same religion even, but we have something in common. We have this desire to love, this desire to serve and to serve God and the best of our capability.

And we best do that when we have love in our hearts. Without love, it is really hard to find the truth.

And in these days we need truth more than anything and we need our ability to discern truth with the world of AI and misinformation. I mean, think about all of the reports that were going on yesterday that were just false, right? And that happens all the time in today's world.

We need the ability to hear God. There will come a day, sisters, when we will be cut off from each other and the only thing we will have to rely on is our relationship with God.

He will tell us how to find safety. He will tell us where to go, what to do, who to talk to, what to eat, what not to eat, what medication to take, all of those things.

Now is the time to practice our ability to hear him and to move forward with confidence. And I say that in his name.

Tamara K. Anderson

00:26:53.100 - 00:27:25.780

Thank you so much, Bonnie. That was beautiful. And I 100% agree. I have found that God most quickly answers prayers.

I pray for someone else, not for myself, and that I will most often feel guided in the spirit when I'm praying for someone else very, very specifically. So if you're wondering what the spirit feels like, try praying for someone else in front of them, with them. It. It's a powerful experience.

Bonnie Randall

00:27:26.580 - 00:27:27.620

A good idea.

Tamara K. Anderson

00:27:28.180 - 00:27:54.160

We'll just close this off saying, ladies, learn how God speaks to you. It's important. And once you learn how God speaks to you, begin acting on those little promptings and then teach someone else that same lesson.

Thanks for joining us today, and may you be able to hear the voice of the Lord more clearly in the days ahead.

Intro/Outro

00:27:55.920 - 00:28:51.540

Thanks for tuning in to the Arise Women of God podcast, brought to you by Women with Warriors of Light.

If you're feeling unsure how to move forward in your calling or just tired of doing it alone, visit womenwarriorsoflight.com you'll find resources, accountability, and a community of women who get it. Sometimes the calling feels bigger than you. That's when you need steady reminders of the powerful God who called you.

Subscribe now for weekly inspiration and the courage to keep going. Because with him, nothing is impossible. And you're not the only one. God is calling that friend on your heart right now. Share this episode with her.

Your small act of obedience could be the breakthrough she's been praying for. Until next time. May you arise, walk God's way and stand God strong.