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Have you ever told someone something only to find out later they didn't understand what you meant? Alan Greenspan once said, "I know you think you understand what you thought I said, but I'm not sure that what you heard is not what I meant." You may need to read that a couple of times! How many times have there been misunderstandings between people because they didn't truly understand what the other person was saying?
It is vital in our relationships that we communicate clearly. If it is important between people, how much more is it important for us to understand God when He speaks?
God speaks primarily through His written word. If something we hear does not line up with the word of God, it is not from Him. But our God is not limited to His word. He also speaks through the inner witness (or inner voice) where you hear something in your spirit.
God may communicate with us through people and prophetic words. Not so common, but possible, is God speaking to someone audibly. I have never heard God's audible voice, but I have heard Him many times in my spirit. That is when you just KNOW God is speaking to you. I have also had God use people and prophetic words to speak to me, but it is usually in the context of confirming what I was already sensing. We should not be led by people, but they may confirm that "knowing" in your spirit.
It would be nice if we always understood what God was saying, but there may be times we think He is saying something He is not. We hear Him say something and think it means one thing, only to later find out that was not what He meant at all.
There is a particular time this happened to me that I have never forgotten even though it was over thirty years ago. Our oldest son was born six years after we were married and we wanted more children, so we were excited a couple of years later when we found out I was pregnant, but at about six to eight weeks I started having difficulties with my pregnancy. We spent a lot of time praying and believing we would not lose the baby.
I know the word of God well and trust it completely, so when God gave me a specific verse, I felt like He was going to save our baby. II Chronicles 20:5 says, "I have heard your prayers, I have seen your tears; behold, I will heal you." I was filled with hope as I just knew God was saying everything was going to be fine. So you can imagine our disappointment when the doctor said I had lost the baby.
As time went by though, I felt like God showed me He HAD heard me and He HAD seen my tears, but my healing was not going to come in the way I expected. My healing came in that about eight months later I became pregnant again and gave birth to a healthy baby boy. God truly had healed me. Not only was I healed physically by conceiving another child, but also emotionally from the pain and distress of our loss.
So if you have heard God speak something to you and it hasn't happened, continue to stand in faith and believe for it to come to pass in God's timing. But if something you sensed was going to happen does not, and it is now impossible, it may be that you need to take some time to see if what you heard and thought it meant was correct. There may be another meaning for the word you have hard.
Expect God to speak as He wants to have a close relationship with us. Don't be disappointed or discouraged if you feel He didn't keep His word. His word, whether written or spoken, will not fail to come to pass. God cannot lie. Learn to trust Him again. He is a good, good Father.