How to Know God’s Will - Part 1
"What is God's will for my life?" is one of the most often asked questions that comes up when a person considers whether to be a GOER to the nations for the sake of the Gospel. This blog series will help you identify how God wants you to invest in the nations - whether that be as a GOER, SENDER, or a MOBILIZER.
Is God calling me to be an international missionary? Where does God want me to go to college? Is God calling our family to move to another location? Does God want me to take this job offer? What school does God want our child to go to? These are the kinds of practical questions that plague our daily lives.
Sometimes, though, it is difficult to discern what God is saying. As maturing sheep within the Shepherd’s Kingdom, we are continually learning how to recognize God’s voice. Therefore, when we faced with weighty decisions in our lives, we are often prone to confusion, worry, discouragement, and inertia.
Photo by Andrew Mason
The good news is that God wants you to come to Him with these questions. He wants you to follow His leadership in the weighty matters of life as well as the countless mundane decisions that you make every day.
There are four main elements to consider in order to faithfully discern God’s will. First, and most important, is the Bible. The only way to be absolutely sure that you are hearing God speak accurately is through faithful interpretation of the Bible. Second, God’s Spirit speaks through the internal feelings, or the “gut feeling”, of believers. Third, God speaks through the church community around a believer. In fact, God most typically speaks to us in the context of community with others who are following Christ. Fourth, because God is sovereign over all things, God speaks through the circumstances upon us.
These four elements are not weighted equally. In fact, the teaching of God in the Bible is the absolute and primary element to consider. God will never lead us to do or not do anything that is in contradiction to the teaching of the Bible. When you want to discern God’s will, the first and last place to look and pray about is the Bible. The other three elements (your internal feeling, the perspective of others, and circumstances) are not mutually exclusive but they often work together.
The following series of blog posts will cover in detail each of these elements. If we understand how God speaks through each of these elements and practice discerning them faithfully, then we will grow in our ability to follow our Master as He guides us.