E21 - Hope’s Harbor Gritty Bible Devotions - Knowing the Will of GOD - How to Discover it
Hope’s Harbor
Gritty Bible Devotions
Episode #21
Title: Knowing the Will of GOD – How to Discover
Date: September 27th, 2021
Contact: info@hopesharbor.net
The way you make decisions in your life is through the permissive will of God. He gives us choices, but only those which are good for our soul and not harmful or damaging to others.
This episode goes over simple questions and answers about how we can take part in this adventure and take some of the mystery out. And by the way, GOD wants us to enjoy this process called the Christian life!
For full show notes go to hopesharbor.net
Key verse(s): Colossians 1:9 – ‘For this reason we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding;’
Intro: When we obey and apply GOD’s expressed sovereign will to our lives consistently, then, and I think it safe to say, only then does GOD more readily reveal His permissive will to us.
But then, when we determine a course of action within the freedom to choose options and become convinced it is what GOD intends for us a good direction to act on and we don’t follow through, what do you think is the logical outcome for such indecision? When we freeze up with fear and just drift along.
Listen, to do nothing with a choice we know is right is still a decision.
Here’s a quote from an anonymous writer, I have on my wall: “On the plains of hesitation bleach the bones of countless millions who, on the threshold to victory sat down to wait, and waiting they died.”
Devotion focus: Finding GOD’s permissive will for our lives.
The first thing that should come to mind is just what does it mean – GOD’s permissive will?
First off I’m not going into all the theological arguments about every aspect and perception of what is meant by GOD’s permissive will or whether it exists.
For the sake of this devotion, I define GOD’s permissive will as GOD allowing us the freedom to choose options within the Christian life, the condition being we are obeying GOD to the best of our knowledge. This means not living in known, willful sin.
The options are choices we make when deciding where to work, live, marry, or not. Some people even apply seeking GOD’s will as to what kind of car to buy.
Concerning our life's work I’ve read GOD isn’t so much concerned with our occupation and much as He is with what we’re occupied with.
So here is a blessedly easy way I’ve used throughout my Christian life, even though I forget the pastor who wrote the book in which this method of making choices is taken.
When trying to decide between choices available to me I ask the following:
1. Is your choice prohibited in the Bible? If so, then don’t do it, period. You would think this goes without saying, but I’ve heard people dismiss the Bible prohibiting something, like divorce for nothing more than convenience sake. They’ll say something like, “I know what the Bible says, but…” and give their excuse for disobeying GOD’s Word. I’ve witnessed this several times and without fail, their choice turned out badly for them eventually.
2. Will your choice hurt you or anyone else? If so, then don’t do it. This is especially important when children are involved. Moving to another part of the country, or to another country may not hurt you, but may be devastating to a spouse or children. If GOD is in your choice and your family resists it, give it to GOD in prayer and wait for GOD to move in the hearts and minds of your loved ones. I will ask my wife for her thoughts and feelings when considering a change. Sometimes even though the choice involves something outside of her range of experiences she will voice a concern I had not considered. This is called discernment and is given her by GOD in order to keep me from making a bad choice.
3. Do I want the option before me, or am I giving in to pressure to obtain status, i.e.: moving across the country isn’t something I want to do, but the status or promotion, the lure of monetary compensation, may tempt me to do something that if I’m honest with myself, I don’t really want. Beware of making a decision based on fleeting rewards (the status will wear off with time; an increase of income will become normal and eventually won’t be enough to satisfy our ever-increasing desire for more).
4. Am I capable? I may want to be president, but I’m not capable. Now use wisdom here. I’ve felt incapable of being a supervisor before and almost turned down the opportunity for promotion, but went through the promotional process and took the position. For weeks I stressed with the new duties and responsibilities, but eventually, after reading a couple of good books on leadership, came to the point I not only enjoyed the position but thrived in it. (The enjoyment came when I realized my job as a supervisor was to make my subordinates’ jobs easier. This is servant-leadership at its best.)
5. When I can answer in the positive the above conditions I go after the choice, all the while praying for GOD’s leading, wisdom, and enablement.
6. Now this one can be tricky: having GOD’s peace about a choice we intend to make. I’ve had times when GOD’s peace was evident and times when my spirit was so disturbed I knew not to follow through on an option available to me. Sometimes GOD is silent and these are the scary times. I believe when GOD is silent and the above conditions are met, GOD is allowing us to trust Him in faith. And I’m not talking about presumption upon GOD masquerading as faith. You know, as in ‘Name it and claim it.”
Let me finish by sharing my experience when trying to decide whether to remarry or not. I asked GOD for several weeks if I should marry again. You see, I had vowed a few years before to never marry again and take a chance on the kind of pain that came with divorce.
And now, considering marriage there was a lot of fear. While praying yet again for GOD’s will in the matter, He spoke to my spirit with these words, “If you choose to marry I will bless you. If you stay single I will bless you.”
I said, “Lord, I would rather you tell me what to do concerning this. It’s too important to get it wrong.”
The Lord came back with, “Love is a choice.”
That was it. I had to choose. And now, nearly 14 years later, I’ve learned, of course, GOD was right, but I needed that knowledge that I choose marriage because marriage can be tough. And let me say right here: the majority of problems Kris and I have encountered were my fault. I was still jacked up from the mistakes I made in my first marriage that had yet to be addressed.
Summary: Finding GOD’s permissive will involves obeying His declared will in the Bible. GOD gives us great freedom of choice in life when we live in consistent obedience to His Word.
We can rest knowing GOD, as a loving Father, wants us to make the right choices in life. He’s there listening to our prayers for guidance. His Spirit is within us guiding us, but we must be quiet before Him in order to hear His still small voice.
Action to consider: To practice this, the next time you have a relatively small decision to make and you’re not sure about what is best, try running the option through the 6 steps mentioned earlier. Then when the bigger options come before you the practice will help some.
Next episode’s devotion: E22 An account of surviving Delta covid.
If you want to skip the covid episode, the episode after that, E23 is Seeking GOD – Making time for GOD’s wisdom and guidance –
This is obviously a great follow-up to E20 & E21, and one that just came about when I was considering what topic to study next and this lesson was on top of my stack of lessons from the last 10 years.