Hearing Jesus: Daily Bible Study and Christian Affirmations

Learning His Voice

Jen shares a deeply personal story of meeting Jesus as a young girl, walking through fear, grief, anger, and surrender, and eventually discovering what it means to live in an ongoing relationship with the Holy Spirit.In this conversation, Jen and Silvia explore the difference between simply knowing about Jesus and wholeheartedly yielding a life to Him. Jen talks about learning to recognize God’s voice through Scripture, prayer, relationship, and time—and why anything we believe we are hearing from God must align with His Word and His character. Her story is an invitation to come as you are, keep pursuing Jesus, and discover the Helper He promised.

Check out more from the Echoes of Eden Podcast

IN THIS EPISODE

• Jen’s salvation at age twelve and the later moment she surrendered her whole life to Jesus

• How Christian families and mentors showed her what a life filled with Jesus could look like

• Moving from anger and hurt toward a new way of living

• Why sharing our testimonies can help others recognize Christ

• What it means to be Spirit-filled and continually yielded to Jesus

• Learning to recognize God’s voice through Scripture, prayer, and relationship

• Experiencing God’s presence through grief, suffering, healing, and seasons of darkness

SCRIPTURE & BIBLICAL THEMES

John 10 — Jesus’ sheep know Him, hear His voice, and follow Him.

Colossians 3 — Putting on compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, patience, and love as part of a transformed life in Christ.The conversation also explores the Holy Spirit as the Helper Jesus promised—the One who teaches, leads, convicts, directs, and empowers believers.

CHAPTERS

00:00 — Meet Jen

03:50 — Meeting Jesus at Twelve

09:45 — The Night Jen Surrendered Everything

17:00 — A New Heart & a New Way of Living

24:05 — What Does It Mean to Be Spirit-Filled?

30:35 — Learning God’s Voice Through His Word

42:50 — The Holy Spirit, Pain & God’s PresenceWhether you have followed Jesus for years, are learning to recognize His voice, or are simply wondering whether there is a place for you in His story, Jen’s testimony offers a simple invitation: come as you are. Spend time in His Word. Talk with Him. Ask questions. Keep pursuing Him.

Pull up a chair. There’s a place for you here.
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Holy Audacity: Stepping Into the Water Before It Parts | Joshua 3 and 4

Sometimes God clears the path before you take a step. And sometimes He asks you to walk into the water while it's still standing there. If you're in a season where obedience feels reckless, where you keep asking who you think you are to be doing this, this conversation is for you. Rachael sits down with her friend Silvia, who she met on the Bible Study Live trip to Italy, to talk about what God did on their recent trip to Maui. Silvia opens up about the insecurity that hit right as she was preparing to launch something God had clearly called her to, the moment another woman spoke truth over her, and how God fought that battle in the space of a few hours.

Then Rachael teaches through Joshua 3 and 4, the crossing of the Jordan, and the twelve stones that were meant to mark what God had done.

Join me on an immersive Bible Study Experience. We're returning to Maui in 2027. Learn more at⁠ BibleStudyLive.org⁠

Listen to Sylvia's new podcast, Echoes of Eden, available now wherever you get your podcasts.

Have a question about the series? Leave me a voicemail: SpeakPipe

What is holy audacity?

It's the phrase that came out of a moment on the Maui trip when Rachael found herself asking how she had the audacity to think she should be doing this at all, and the Lord answered that He was the one who told her to do it. Holy audacity is the nerve to obey something bigger than you, not because you feel qualified, but because God said so. It's a prayer worth praying: Lord, give me some holy audacity moments. Challenge me with big obedience so I can see You show up in a big way.

Why does the enemy attack right before you step out?

Because the initial obedience usually isn't where we get stuck. Most of us say yes. It's the middle of the road where self-doubt, comparison, and insecurity start talking. As Rachael puts it, the enemy attacks in infancy what he fears in maturity. Silvia was being called Lady Wisdom by the other women on the trip at the very moment she was internally convinced she had no business doing what God had asked of her. Both things were happening in the same room on the same day.

What's the difference between the Red Sea and the Jordan River?

This is the heart of the teaching. In Exodus 14, God parted the sea first and the people of Israel walked across on dry ground. A generation later in Joshua 3, they face another body of water, and this time the instruction is different. The priests carrying the ark are told to step into the Jordan while the water is still flowing. The waters don't part until their feet are already wet.It's one thing to trust that God will hold back the water while you're standing on dry ground. It's another thing entirely to step in while the water is still there. The miracle still came and the result was the same, but the method changed, and that change required a different kind of obedience.

Why would God change His method?

Because we have a tendency to chase the miracle instead of the miracle worker. When we've seen God move a certain way before, we start expecting the pattern instead of the Person. Changing the method reorients our hearts back toward Him. Notice too what went first into the Jordan: the ark, the presence of God. His presence goes ahead and makes the way, and then the rest of the people cross.What do the twelve stones in Joshua 4 mean?After the crossing, God tells Joshua to have twelve men take twelve stones from the very place where the priests' feet had stood, and set them down where they camped that night. They were markers, so that when future generations asked what these stones meant, the story would get told again.That's what a marker moment is. A place you can look back to and say, if He did it then, He can do it now. When you're standing at the edge of water that hasn't parted yet, your stones are what you have. It made no sense then either, and He was still faithful. So the question worth sitting with: where are your river stones?

Featured quote:

"It's one thing to trust that He's going to hold back the water when I'm standing on dry ground. It is another thing to step in when there's still water."

Scripture referenced:

Exodus 14:21-22

Joshua 3:8-13

Joshua 4:1-9

Joshua 4:20-24

Psalm 66:16

Chapters:

00:00 Welcome, and how Rachael and Silvia met on the Italy trip

01:28 Deciding to go to Maui, and the tension that came after the yes

03:17 Taking the decision to prayer

05:06 Why these trips grow out of seasons of healing

08:03 What was happening in Silvia's heart on the trip

09:32 Self-sabotage, and the lie that she wasn't qualified

10:01 Bring it to the Lord before you bring it to me

10:31 The woman who grabbed her hand and spoke truth

12:20 Why obedience gets attacked in the middle, not at the start

13:49 Lady Wisdom, and what everyone else was seeing

15:32 The shame the enemy kept returning to

17:33 The dependence that only comes with a heavy lift

19:23 Holy audacity

21:10 Announcing the Echoes of Eden podcast

23:00 Psalm 66:16, and the simplicity of the assignment

26:45 The word marker, and the stones

28:00 Exodus 14 and the dry ground

29:30 Joshua 3, and the call to step into the water

32:15 Why wet feet require a different obedience

32:45 Joshua 4 and the twelve stones

34:10 Chasing the miracle worker, not the miracle

34:30 Why Rachael laid down podcast coaching

35:25 The ark goes first

40:20 Where are your river stones?

41:30 What Echoes of Eden is and who it's for

45:30 Closing prayer

Frequently asked questions

Why did God part the Red Sea before they crossed, but not the Jordan?

The outcome was the same, but the method changed. At the Jordan, the priests carrying the ark had to step into the water before it was cut off. That shift required trust in God Himself rather than in a repeated pattern.

What did the twelve stones represent?

They were a memorial. Each tribe carried one stone from the riverbed so future generations would ask what they meant and hear the story of what God had done.

Who is Silvia and what is Echoes of Eden?

Silvia is a friend Rachael met on the Bible Study Live trip to Italy. Her new interview podcast, Echoes of Eden, gives women space to tell their stories and share where God met them. It's anchored in Psalm 66:16.

When is the next Maui trip?

We're going back in 2027. Details are at BibleStudyLive.org.
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Before we open the Gospel of Luke, there's a question worth answering: what exactly is a gospel? Most of us have read these four books without ever stopping to ask what kind of writing they are, and that one gap changes everything about how we read them. Gospel is a genre. These are ancient biographies of Jesus, written by four different men to four different audiences, and they were never meant to be read the way we read a modern news report. This episode covers why there are four, why they don't always line up, why we can trust them, and how to actually read them well.

Join me on an immersive Bible Study Experience. Learn more at BibleStudyLive.org

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What does the word gospel actually mean?

Gospel is a genre, and genre simply means the kind of writing a work is. The Bible contains poetry, letters, prophecy, law, and historical narrative, and each one asks to be read differently. The four gospels sit together at the front of the New Testament, and they are essentially biographies of the life of Jesus. Knowing that changes your expectations before you read a single verse.

Why are there four gospels instead of one?

Think about walking into a library and looking for a biography of Abraham Lincoln. A search on Amazon turns up more than ten thousand books about him. Some cover his presidency, some his politics, some his character, some only his childhood, some his views on the Bible, some his war years. Every one of those historians chose what to emphasize. Ancient historians worked the same way. They wrote with clear moral, political, and theological purposes, and readers were expected to draw lessons from the work. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John each had a lens, and a different audience in mind.

Can we trust the gospels?

Yes, and the reasons are worth knowing. These books were written while eyewitnesses were still alive and still holding positions of authority in the church, which means the oral tradition could be checked by people who had been there. They were written within the first two generations, while the teachings of Jesus were still fresh. And the culture itself was built for careful preservation. Students learned their teachers' sayings rigorously, taking notes and memorizing, with some repeating the previous day's lecture before getting out of bed. The disciples of Jesus treated His words that way, and many of them became the teachers passing those words on.

Why don't the gospels always match up?

This is where a lot of readers get stuck, and it usually comes from applying modern expectations to ancient writing. Three things help. First, no one in that culture expected teachings to appear in chronological sequence. Teaching was situational, the way a grandmother's saying comes back to you in the moment it fits rather than in the order she said it. Second, word-for-word repetition was not the standard. Most people could not read, so teaching passed down orally, and paraphrasing was a normal and accepted practice. On top of that, Jesus often spoke Aramaic while the gospels were written in Greek, so His words were being translated. Third, ancient biographers had genuine freedom to arrange their material. When critics point to an event appearing earlier in Matthew and later in Luke, they are holding the text to a standard nobody in the first century used. The heart of the message is what carries.

Why only these four, and not the other gospels people mention?

By the time Luke wrote, other accounts of Jesus were already circulating, and Luke tells us so. Mark was already in use, and many scholars believe Matthew, Luke, and possibly Mark drew on a common written source. The four that the church preserved were kept for reliability, access to eyewitnesses, and accuracy. The apocryphal gospels came much later and read more like novels, drawing from oral tradition that had drifted over generations. The Gnostic collections attributed sayings to Jesus, but the earliest of them date to roughly 120 years after His public ministry, far too late to verify. The early church knew what it was doing.

What is the best way to read a gospel?

Read one all the way through before moving to another. There is a method called a harmony of the gospels that weaves all four together story by story, and it has its place, but it is hard to follow and it is not how these books were meant to be read. Each gospel was written separately, to different readers, with its own flow of thought. Reading one at a time lets you catch what makes that writer distinct. Luke was a doctor, so when you stay inside his gospel you start noticing what he noticed: the women, the healings, the people on the margins. Those details are easy to miss when you are jumping between books.

What should I be looking for as I read?

A few things to carry into the series. Ancient biographies had morals to their stories, setting characters up as positive or negative examples, so ask what the story is showing you about the character and nature of God. Learn to tell the difference between what Scripture describes and what it prescribes, because someone's story appearing in the Bible does not mean we are meant to copy them. And remember this one: Scripture was written for us, but it was not originally written to us. It went first to an ancient audience in a particular culture. Most of them heard it read aloud rather than reading it themselves, which is why it helps to think of them as an audience instead of readers. Before we can understand how the teachings of Jesus apply to our lives, we have to understand what they meant to the people who heard them first.

Featured quote

"Scripture was written for us, but it was not originally written to us. It was written to an original audience that lived a long time ago."

Terms explained in this episode

Genre, synoptic gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke overlap significantly, while John is distinct), harmony of the gospels, descriptive versus prescriptive, apocryphal and Gnostic gospels.

Timestamps (approximate)

00:00 What is a gospel, and why start here

01:00 Gospel as a genre, and what that changes

02:00 Why the gospels are not chronological

03:20 The Abraham Lincoln analogy: ten thousand biographies, ten thousand angles

04:50 Who were these writers, and why trust them

06:40 How sayings were preserved in an oral culture

09:00 Why sequence was never the point

11:00 Word for word, Aramaic, and Greek

15:00 The freedom ancient biographers had with their material

17:30 Why only four gospels survived

19:50 How to read a gospel, and why not to jump around

21:20 Descriptive versus prescriptive

22:30 Reading versus hearing, and the original audience

25:00 Synoptic gospels explained

26:20 We learn by teaching

Frequently asked questions

What does the word gospel mean? It refers both to the good news about Jesus and to a genre of ancient writing. In this episode we're focused on the genre, meaning the kind of literature Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John belong to.

What are the synoptic gospels? Matthew, Mark, and Luke, which overlap heavily in content and often tell the same events. John stands apart with a different structure and emphasis.

Should I read the gospels in chronological order? Not for this study. We'll read Luke straight through so we can follow his particular flow of thought and notice the details that are uniquely his.

When does the Luke study begin? Right after this episode. We'll start with an introduction to who Luke was and why his account matters, then move through the text at a spirit-led pace, with Luke and Acts studied together as one work.

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Tuesday Daily Affirmations: Strength for Today | Courage When You Feel
Weak

Step into your week with boldness, peace, and purpose. These
Scripture-based Christian affirmations are a short but powerful way to trade
your own strength for God's before the day gets away from you. As the world demands more, God invites you to lean on Him. Today's affirmations are a reminder that you are never alone, never powerless, and never without purpose.

I'll read each phrase, you repeat it, and then I'll tell you the Scripture it comes from.

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Join me on an immersive Bible Study Experience. Learn more at BibleStudyLive.org

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Before we begin

Today's affirmations are for strength and confidence for the week ahead.
Whatever this week holds, you are not facing it alone. God is with you,
strengthening you, guiding you, and fighting for you. No matter what challenges you encounter, you can walk in faith knowing that God has already prepared the way for you.

Tuesday affirmations and Scripture

I am strong and courageous in Christ.
Joshua 1:9

I do not fear because God is with me.
Isaiah 41:10

I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.
Philippians 4:13

I am victorious through Jesus.
1 Corinthians 15:57

I have the power of God working within me.
Ephesians 3:20

I will not be shaken because God is my refuge.
Psalm 62:6

I walk by faith, not by sight.
2 Corinthians 5:7

No weapon formed against me shall prosper.
Isaiah 54:17

God fights my battles and I need only to be still.
Exodus 14:14

I am not afraid because God has overcome the world.
John 16:33

I have authority in Christ over every attack of the enemy.
Luke 10:19

I am rooted and established in God's love.
Ephesians 3:17

I have divine wisdom and strength for today.
James 1:5

I am resilient and I will persevere through trials.
Romans 5:3-4

I am filled with the power of the Holy Spirit.
Acts 1:8

I will not grow weary in doing good.
Galatians 6:9

God's grace is sufficient for me.
2 Corinthians 12:9

I have peace that surpasses understanding.
Philippians 4:7

I am never alone. God is always near.
Deuteronomy 31:8

I am protected under the shadow of the Almighty.
Psalm 91:1

God's Word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.
Psalm 119:105

I stand firm in faith and do not waver.
James 1:6

I am free from fear because God's perfect love casts it out.
1 John 4:18

I have a spirit of power, love, and sound mind.
2 Timothy 1:7

God is working all things for my good today.
Romans 8:28

Closing prayer

Lord, I surrender my fear to You. Fill me with boldness, courage, and
confidence in You. No matter what today holds, I trust in Your strength. In
Jesus' name, amen.

Listen daily and start your morning with God's truth so you can walk in
faith, clarity, and confidence.



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The Silent Years: What God Was Doing in the 400 Years Between the Old and New Testaments

There are about 400 years between the last page of the Old Testament and the first page of the New. Most of us turn that page without ever noticing. Scholars call it the intertestamental period, but most people know it as the silent years, because there was no prophet speaking in Israel and no Scripture being written. And yet when you look at what was actually happening in that stretch of history, you find something that will change how you think about the silent seasons of your own life. God was not absent. He was setting a stage.

Join me on an immersive Bible Study Experience. Learn more at ⁠BibleStudyLive.org⁠

Have a question about the series? Leave me a voicemail: ⁠https://www.speakpipe.com/HearingJesusPodcast⁠

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Why do they call it the silent years?

The name comes from what was missing. There were no prophets in Israel during this period, and no books of the Bible were being written. After Malachi, the prophetic voice that had guided Israel for centuries goes quiet. But silence is not the same thing as absence. Some of the most important groundwork in redemptive history was laid in exactly this window, which is why the episode lands where it does: sometimes when God is silent, He is doing some of His best work.

If no Scripture was written, how do we know what happened?

We know a great deal, because plenty was being written even though none of it entered the canon of the evangelical Bible. The books of the Apocrypha, including Maccabees, Tobit, and 1 Esdras, are read in Catholic and Eastern Orthodox traditions and give us a real window into the period. The historian Josephus records much of it. The Dead Sea Scrolls, discovered rolled in jars in caves along the Dead Sea and first found by a young shepherd boy, were largely written during this time. And the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament, was produced in this era.

How did God prepare the world for Jesus during the silence?

This is where it gets remarkable. Alexander the Great conquered the Persian Empire and spread Greek language and Hellenistic culture across the known world, which meant that by the time Jesus came, a common language existed for the gospel to travel in. Meanwhile, rabbis rose to prominence as teachers alongside the priests, and local synagogues became places of worship, prayer, and hearing the Torah. Scripture that had once been accessible only to the elite was now within reach of ordinary people. Luke tells us Jesus went to the synagogue regularly, an institution that did not exist in the Old Testament. None of that was accidental.

What was the Maccabean revolt, and where does Hanukkah come from?

After Alexander died in 323 BC, his empire was divided among his generals. Under Antiochus, the Jews suffered badly. He banned core Jewish practices, seized the temple, and ordered pigs sacrificed on the altar. An elderly priest and his sons refused to comply, and their zeal sparked the Maccabean revolt beginning in 167 BC. By 164 BC the Maccabees had retaken and cleansed the temple. The eight-day celebration that followed became Hanukkah, and the Gospel of John records Jesus Himself in Jerusalem for that festival.

What happened after the Maccabees won?

Here is the sobering turn. The Maccabean family formed the Hasmonean dynasty, and over time the very Hellenistic influence they had been repulsed by became something they embraced. That drift sparked opposition groups like the Pharisees and the Essenes, all wrestling with the same question of how to be faithful in a Greek world. Rome eventually ended the dynasty when Pompey took Jerusalem in 63 BC. Herod the Great was named king of the Jews, ruled cruelly, and rebuilt the temple complex into the largest temple to a single deity in the world. He died in 4 BC, and scholars believe Jesus was born not far from Herod's own burial grounds. The Zealots later revolted, and the temple was destroyed in AD 70.

What does this mean for my own silent season?

These years were anything but silent. The political, cultural, and spiritual climate all had to be primed before Jesus walked onto the scene, and God was doing that work the entire time no one could hear Him. The question to sit with is this one: where in your own life has God been working in ways you could not see or hear? He may not have been silent at all. He may have been setting the stage.

Featured quote

"Sometimes when God is silent, He's doing some of His best work. Just because God is silent doesn't mean He isn't moving and acting."

Scripture and sources referenced

John 10:22-23 (Jesus at the Feast of Dedication), Luke 4:16 (Jesus in the synagogue), Malachi as the close of the Old Testament. Extra-biblical sources discussed include 1 and 2 Maccabees, Tobit, 1 Esdras, Josephus, the Dead Sea Scrolls, and the Septuagint.

Timestamps (approximate)

00:00 Welcome and what's ahead in the fall Luke series

01:24 Why we're covering the gospel genre before opening the text

01:51 How the study will run, and why Luke and Acts belong together

03:05 The teaching begins: the 400 years between the testaments

04:30 Why they're called the silent years

05:00 Where our information comes from: Maccabees, Josephus, the Dead Sea Scrolls

06:20 The Septuagint and the rise of Greek

07:15 Rabbis, synagogues, and Scripture made accessible

08:30 Alexander the Great and Hellenization

09:45 Antiochus, the desecrated temple, and the Maccabean revolt

11:00 The origin of Hanukkah

12:15 The Hasmonean drift back toward Greek culture

13:30 Rome, Pompey, and Herod the Great

15:00 The Zealots and the destruction of the temple in AD 70

16:00 These years were anything but silent 1

7:20 Where has God been working in your silence?

Frequently asked questions

What is the intertestamental period? It's the roughly 400-year span between the end of the Old Testament and the beginning of the New, commonly dated 400 BC to 1 BC. You may also hear it called the Second Temple period in academic settings.

Are the books of the Apocrypha part of the Bible? They're included in Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Bibles but not in the evangelical Protestant canon. They aren't treated as Scripture here, but they are useful historical sources for understanding the period.

When does the Luke series start? Right after this week's two review episodes. We'll begin with an introduction to who Luke was, then work through the text at a spirit-led pace, with Luke and Acts studied together as one work. Expect the series to run through the end of the year.

How do I ask a question about the series? There's a SpeakPipe link in the show notes where you can leave a voicemail, or you can always reach out by email.

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