Hearing the Audible Voice of God

Last night I had a very interesting conversation with my three-year-old son. We talked about all sorts of spiritual things. He asked basic but penetrating questions like, "Will God click on youtube videos for me?", or "How does Jesus get to heaven?" The one question that really made me stop and think was this: "How can we see God and hear God?" Maybe this is a question we should all ask ourselves with some seriousness. Who says that God must be "hidden" most of the time? Who says that it should be normal for those who love God to not be able to hear His voice with utmost clarity? Who says that only a small percentage of human beings will ever have the opportunity to see God during their Earthly lifetimes? Maybe we should stop and consider what exactly we've deemed to be "normal" and see if it lines up with the precedent that God has established in history. I want to propose to you something very bold -- something that could change your perspective on life forever. Maybe it should be "normal" for people to hear God's audible voice. Maybe it should be "normal" for people to have encounters with God face-to-face on a regular basis. Consider the number of examples we have in the Bible of people who saw or heard God clearly. Adam and Eve heard God's audible voice, and God walked among them in the garden (see Genesis 3:8 and surrounding text). God regularly talked with Moses face to face, as one speaks to a friend (Exodus 33:11). God spoke audibly to announce that Jesus was His son (Matthew 3:17), and Saul of Tarsus and his company heard the audible voice of Jesus coming from heaven on the road to Damascus (Acts 9:3-7). Perhaps some of these examples reveal remarkable situations requiring a remarkable sign, but certainly having face to face conversations with God as a friend is certainly of a different nature. So my question is this: if Moses had regular face to face conversations with God, why can't we? Any student of the Scriptures can answer my question by saying, "Certainly, we can, through our fellowship with the Holy Spirit." And that is absolutely correct. In fact, perhaps our intimacy with God can exceed that of Moses's because we have constant, immediate, complete access to God at any moment because of the Holy Spirit that dwells within us. But having the better thing only makes it more strange that we might assume we cannot have the lesser thing. I wonder what would happen if we all started expecting to hear the audible voice of God on a regular basis.