Making Right Decision According to God's Will (part 1)

Speaker: Rev. Kenneth Lee
Date: 12 Oct 2008

All of us have to make important decisions in life. It is something that everyone will have the go through. Minor decisions such as what to eat, drink, when to sleep, or Major decisions such as who to marry, what to study, what car to buy are examples of decisions that we need to make.

It is very important for us to make a right decision, because wrong decisions can cost us dearly. AND we believe that God is our shepherd, the leader and guide, in our decision making process. Good decisions comes when we do what God wants us to do. However, we will still have dilemma in our decision making process. So..


HOW DO WE KNOW GOD'S WILL IN OUR LIFE? How do we make right/hard/good decisions?

Let's look at these few verses:

Jeremiah 29:11
"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "Plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."

2 Corinthians 5:9
So we make it our goal to please Him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it.

Colossians 1:9-10
For this reason, since we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you and asking God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding. And we pray this in order that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and may please Him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God,

To live a life worthy of the Lord, to live a life that please God, to live a life all according to God's will is one of the greatest thing one can do in their life. This is because we're doing the will of the Creator, and not the created. Because we're doing the will of an awesome King and God that is capable of making us fully and deeply satisfied in Him.

So does God have a specific individual will?

Ways of looking at God's will:

a) Through inward experience

• Prompting of Holy Spirit, Personal Desires, reasoning, and praying

b) Through outward experience

• Bible reading, advices from friends/elders/pastors/parents, signs or circumstances, personal spiritual revelation
  

Aspects of God's will:
God speaking through:

a)revelation

18give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus.

1 Thes 5:18

15For it is God's will that by doing good you should silence the ignorant talk of foolish men.

1 Peter 2:15

b)through written words/commandments/law

8 Do not let this Book of the Law depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful

Josh 1:8

c) through His Son

2but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom he made the universe.

Hebrews 1:2

d) through His Spirit

12"I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. 13But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come.

John 16:12-13

e) Through the Bible

36Did the word of God originate with you? Or are you the only people it has reached? 37If anybody thinks he is a prophet or spiritually gifted, let him acknowledge that what I am writing to you is the Lord's command.

1 Cor 14:36-37

16All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, 17so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.

2 Tim 3:16-17

f) God's providential will

10in my prayers at all times; and I pray that now at last by God's will the way may be opened for me to come to you.

Romans 1:10

32so that by God's will I may come to you with joy and together with you be refreshed.

Romans 15:32

13Now listen, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money." 14Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. 15Instead, you ought to say, "If it is the Lord's will, we will live and do this or that." 16As it is, you boast and brag. All such boasting is evil. 17Anyone, then, who knows the good he ought to do and doesn't do it, sins.

James 4:13-25

g) God's permisive will

God also allows things to happen sometimes, things that may seem bad temporary but for the better in the future.

There are a few things that we need to take note of when we look at God's will.

1. God gave us a free will yet He is still sovereign and has control over it. He gave us the freedom to choose what we want to do. Just like how Adam and Eve had a choice to obey God or to disobey God. When we want to do God's will, we have His moral will and Sovereign Will. We know of some truths like we cannot kill, steal, commit sexual immorality and so on but sometimes when we do the opposit, God sovereignly allow that to happen(though He did not will it to happen) yet making something good comes out from it in the end.
2. We often set what we want before we even ask God what He wants. Instead of setting what we want first, we should always seek His will first. Even if we have our own personal desires, we should always pray like how Jesus prayed in the garden of Gethsemane, saying let Your will be done.
3. God does give clear and specific will sometimes though it is very rare. Like the wedding of Issac and Rebakah.
4. Open doors might not be God's will. in 2 Corinthians 2:12-13, the door was open for Paul to preach in Troas but he found no peace, so he went on to Macedonia.
5. God gives us wisdom to choose. We can make choices base on our priorities. Sometimes we need to make sacrifices for greater things

Serving the Lord requires sacrifices too. However, these sacrifices are small compare to what we will gain. Paul finds his successes and all he had ever lived rubbish compare to the surparssing worth of knowing Christ. When we know Christ and do His will, it is far better than doing what we want.
Let us make doing God's will our mission in our life.