Would you say that Noah had 'personal' convictions regarding to God's will?
How about the disciples/apostles - were they personally convicted to follow Jesus? How did they know - by revelation? By someone talking?
How did Moses come to see that he was to reject his Egyptian training? And how personal was that - to start with?
Was it Cornelius' personal conviction to call for Peter? And was it Peter's personal conviction (as a Hebrew) to go and see what that Gentile desired?

EVERYTHING is based on personal & individual revelation between a soul and God. And people following someone else's convictions & visions are merely 'spiritual couch potatoes' - unwilling, unable, frightened, ignorant or simply too lazy to SEEK their God and start their personal walk.

No preacher's sermons can be used to excuse one's failure in finding out what God's plan for him/her is. It wont work saying: " Hey God, I never bothered asking you directly what YOU want me to do - and anyway, the preacher said I'm safe as long as I attend regularly, support the church and quote the current magic formulas, oops - prayers.

Personal convictions are everything - everythings else are lukewarm excuses.