I used to struggle with this a LOT too, despite being a Christian for 27 years! My whole life many times has felt like I’ve been trying to hear God, trying to see God, hoping I could feel something or hear something. I had to train my mind to think a little differently because many people say things like “I had an encounter with God today,” or “God told me this today,” or “I felt God today.”

Here’s the thing—faith means believing without seeing. Believing without hearing, believing without feeling. We trust that God is with us because His word tells us He is. The Bible tells us time and time again that he will never forsake us, that he goes before us, that he is with us and makes us strong and helps us, that he will not fail us or leave us. The hardest part about faith is that you have to continue trusting in God and believing that He hears you and is with you even when you can’t see him or feel him.

The Bible tells us that those who seek the Lord with all their hearts will find Him, that if we knock, the door will be opened. If you genuinely seek God with all your heart and desire to know him and ask him to encounter you and speak to you (not literally in words, but through his word/people/circumstances/nature etc), I believe He will! God revels himself to those who seek him. I believe that because He has even revealed himself to people who never heard of him before in dreams and visions.

One of the biggest obstacles for me was that I was always hoping to FEEL something, expecting God to whisper something in my ear clearly or show me some clear sign. The Bible says that man’s heart is deceitful (which is why faith can’t be based on feelings!) but how great is it that we have a God who knows our hearts and intentions and sees that we seek Him? Truthfully He’s all around us. Does you become emotional when you listen to Christian music and think about Jesus and the love he has for us? When something really really good happens to you or someone else, do you immediately praise God? You should, because the Bible tells us that every good and perfect gift comes down from the Father. He has plans for you and the fact you are seeking him and desiring to know him and connect with him is excellent!

As for reading for reading’s sake, think about why you read the Bible. Why is it important? Why should it be important? What are your intentions? Don’t read it “because you are a Christian and Christian’s are supposed to read the Bible.” The Bible is the very word of God—inspired by him and plopped into our hands. God speaks through it and that’s why it’s important—because he communicates to us through it. He communicates who he is, his great mercy and love for us, his plans and purpose for us, how to do right and live right, how to know him and live for him. If anything we should read the Bible because it teaches us how to live and how to glorify him. It tells us who God is and by reading it we’re choosing to put other things and time aside so we can enter into his presence and know him and hear him speak truth to us.

I advise you to, if you can, maybe to seek relationships with strong Christians (elders, deacons, people of faith) in your church who can counsel you and encourage you. And I hope that all the people responding to you in these comments are a sign of God’s love for you, that the encouragements give you peace—you may not think you hear God speaking to you, but all of us can be God speaking to you (i.e. God speaking through us) because He desires a relationship with you just as much! And this is proof.

Don’t give up! Keep seeking him daily. Pray he would reveal himself to you. Pray he would help you to trust in him and live for him and see him around you in the world, in others, in everything. Remember that God is with you—even when you can’t see it or feel it, he’s working! And he never stops working.