Decisions and Destiny I, How to Know God's Will

Romans 12. You read in your Bible. I'm going to read from the Phillips version. Romans 12 1 and 2. With eyes wide open to the mercies of God, I beg you, my brothers, as an act of intelligent worship to give him your bodies as a living sacrifice, consecrated to him and acceptable by him. Don't let the world around you squeeze you into its own mold, but let God remake you so that your whole attitude of mind is changed, and thus you will prove in practice what the will of God is. It is good and acceptable and perfect. In the fall of 1895, a young college student by the name of Albert Schweitzer was searching about his future and wondering what his vocation would be. He incidentally picked up a used magazine that was in the foyer of his college dormitory, flipped through its pages, and read rather casually an article by Alfred Bogner, who was the president of the Paris Missionary Society, in which he talked about the mission work to the natives that lived along the Congo in French Equatorial Africa. The force of the article grips Schweitzer with such intensity that at the end of it he remembers thinking to himself as he closed up the magazine, my search is over. And as many of us know, most of us I'm sure, Albert Schweitzer served as a missionary, a medical doctor, an accomplished organist, and a prolific writer, right there from French Equatorial Africa where he served and won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1953, all because he accidentally picked up an article and read it. Beware the next time you go to the doctor's office. How many of you think God's will often comes to us that way? You know, it's almost accidental that we fall into the right thing, or so it seems. God's will often seems like a good investment broker will tell us it's perfect when you look on it with 20-20 hindsight, but to know it before the fact isn't all that easy. It's so important to know God's leadings and yet many, many people are confused and like Schweitzer, uncertain about what they're to be doing with their lives. And many people find that they're just going through the motions, not even taking the time to see if they're really on course for God's plan in their lives. Sometimes our pace and our presumptions can literally result in critical errors in our lives that end up leading us in the wrong direction. I was talking with one of our flight attendants yesterday who flies for one of the major airlines. She told me that it's not uncommon at all for people to get on the wrong airplane. In fact, she said, not long ago there was a man who got on the plane to go to Cleveland and the plane was going to Los Angeles. Could you imagine what he thought when he got off the plane? Wow, they really cleaned up this place. And she told me that it's also not uncommon for people not even to know until they get off the plane that they've made a mistake. I'm sure he thought, there's a lot of headwind here to Cleveland, you know, a four-hour trip or whatever. She said that it was the busiest people that made the mistake the most often. Businessmen, businesswomen who had lots of traveling experience but they were in such a hurry to catch the next flight that it didn't even click that they were on the wrong plane. Even though, how many of you know, they even tell you this is flight 391 going to St. Louis or whatever it is. Well, some of us are in that same mode, church. We're on a plane but we don't know where it's going. When's the last time you stopped and said, God, am I really in your will? Or do you just wake up every day and figure, well, this is the job I have, this has got to be it and, you know, why bother asking? For the next few weeks I want to speak to you on the subject of knowing God's will, how to know that you're being led of the Spirit versus just kind of wandering off and following any voices that come along. And I want to begin by telling you that God does have a plan for your life. And it's very important that the first thing that gets into your mind, not yet please, is what Jeremiah 29 11 says, that I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord. Plans for your welfare and not for evil to give you a future and hope. Turn to someone and tell them, God has good plans for your life. Would you tell them that? Speak it to them. He's got good plans for you. Romans 8 28 tells us that we know that those who love God and are called according to His plan, everything works to their good. But dear ones, I have discovered that the key ingredient, and I want to start with this in this service, to knowing God's will involves not the plan first of all, but the person, the person of the Holy Spirit. Now, if I were to ask you, who are you most familiar with when it comes to your understanding of the triune God? How many would say God the Father? Okay, nobody is, that's interesting. All right, how many would say Jesus Christ? You're most familiar with Jesus. Well, that's probably the most predictable answer because the Bible says we know Him because we have seen Jesus. So how many of you would say, well I'm closest to the Holy Spirit, I understand Him the best? All right, several, maybe a few dozen. I would likely say that that represents most Christians. The Holy Spirit is this mystery person of the Godhead. Who really is the Holy Spirit? I thought He was some, you know, when He's here, don't you see little waves of glory and don't you see this mystical? Now, the Bible says the Holy Spirit is a person. He's a person. And I'm willing to go on record today to say that we have two groups of people when it comes to the Holy Spirit, even here this morning, and a whole bunch in between. One group I'm going to call the quenchers. Now see if this describes you. The Holy Spirit quenchers. You're the people who, when you think about how God works and what's going on, you like to have things decently in an order. I mean, that's the way you grew up with it. And hey, for me the word's pragmatism. It's got to be done this way. If you veer one inch off, it really bugs you. You like to see things done the way it's supposed to be. A lot of engineers and accountants and people like that. Maybe. Someone, don't stereotype me. I know there's a lot of really wild accountants and engineers out there too. We're going to get to you in a minute. But you see, the quencher is one, when something unpredictable begins to happen, you get nervous. And you know, if we pause for a moment and you heard someone next to you just get a little bit different, well that makes you real uncomfortable. The quencher is somebody that when you hear of someone being led by God or an answer to prayer that was real specific, you get uptight. You say, that's just a coincidence. And you have an explanation for everything. Now I'm talking about people who love God here. I'm not saying that you don't know the Lord. I'm just saying that when it comes to your faith, it's up here for the most part. And when it gets down here, it gets real uncomfortable. I mean, after all, you've been running your life for 20 or 30 years and you've done a fairly good job. Why get all mystical about it now? And maybe you're just, the moment it just gets a little different, that's when you withdraw, resist and recoil. Now on the other side of the coin, we've got what I'm going to call the quacks. I told you I was going to get some of you mad at me. Here we go. The quenchers and the quacks. Now the quacks are people who see the Christian life as one mysterious encounter, you know. I mean, your favorite praise song is dee-dee-dee-dee-dee-dee-dee. And when you get the opportunity to do something unpredictable, you love it. I mean, decently in order is the worst thing you want to hear. It's the last thing in your vocabulary. I just like it to be free. You pray and fast about what shoes to wear with the dress you have on today. Those kinds of, everything is this mystical. And by the way, these people are the most difficult to be around because you feel so inferior. I mean, they come up and you're trying to have this conversation and they're speaking in tongues in your face. Getting a leading of some kind. I know I'm not talking about anybody here, but you understand what I'm saying. You're uncomfortable when it's just spelled out. I mean, that's just the way you don't like it. Now the quenchers, the first group, you're in danger of missing God's will because you have shut the Holy Spirit out. And the Bible says, quench not the Holy Spirit. And you're in danger. If you quench the Spirit of God, the Bible says that He'll leave you. And these people who reduce Christianity to doctrinal studies and, you know, how much of the Bible you know, dear ones, can I say to you, those people's lives get into this long, boring rut. And as I said Wednesday night, the only difference between a rut and a grave is the depth of the hole. And I have to say that, unfortunately, many people who just won't listen to the Spirit of God, won't respond to the promptings, their experience in God becomes less and less meaningful, less and less exciting, and more and more likely to be history. And I hope over these next couple of weeks you'll discover something that you can trust of the power of God in your life. On the other hand, the quacks, well, you miss God's will because you're so busy following every leading that you never get anywhere. You know, every day God's led you someplace different. There's no consistency or dependability in your life. The Lord told me to stop going to Homegroup. The Lord told me to stop doing that. The Lord said, you know, no one knows what you're doing. The Lord told me to pray for someone to help in the parking lot. Well, brother, you think maybe He's telling you to help in the parking lot? No, He told me to pray for someone to help in the parking lot, yeah. And see, these two extremes, you know, these two extremes are out there, but most of you would say, Pastor, I'm not a quack and I'm not a quencher. Now, if I ask you to put up your hand, which do you think you're closest to? You know. You can look at your spouse and say, I know what you are too, alright? You think, well, I'm in the middle and everything, you know, I'm doing okay here. I'm being led by the Spirit. How do you know you are? You say, well, because I don't have any problems in my life. I want to go on record today to say to you that sometimes you will be Spirit led into all kinds of trouble. Someone say, how do I know that? Because the Bible tells us that Jesus Christ was led by the Spirit into the wilderness where He was tempted by the devil. You may be in a wilderness right now and you think, I must have missed God's will. That's not necessarily true. You may be in that wilderness struggling this morning because God has led you there to mature you and to fashion you and refine you in your faith. I'm sure Paul and Silas felt that way when they thought they heard God and were led by the Spirit to Macedonia. Remember that? They said they wanted to go here and they wanted to go there and no, no, no. And they ended up saying, ah, a vision of a man in the night. And so they went to Macedonia and they were there for a couple of weeks and guess what happened? Boom. Arrested, feet put in stocks, thrown into the prison that I've described as being right over top the sewer lines of Philippi. Now, how many of you know when you're in there and everything's going bad, you think, I must have missed God's will. Ever been there? I've had that experience more times than I'd like to think. And I want you to know, that isn't a guarantee. If everything's going well, that's no guarantee. In fact, I have to say, as I've prayed about this message for this particular congregation, I think most of you are so comfortable in where you are that you haven't even considered if it is God's will to be there. And we don't want to leave our comfort zones. Have you asked God, am I doing your will, Father? Am I in your will? Why should I know it? Let me go back now and talk a little bit about why you should know the will of God. Why you should be Spirit-led. Why it's worth it to you. This is the plan. And I have five points under this plan I'd like you to follow with me. Now, listen, folks, some of you won't relate to these, all of them. But every one of you will relate to some of them. First of all, it's important that you know God's will. Because God has a plan for you, and it has to do, number one, with your personal destiny. As I look around the room today, I'm sure that there are people with us, that you do not know where you are going in life or where ultimately you will end up. The first thing you have to understand is God's will in your life will lead you to the place of your personal destiny. Your response to what the Spirit is saying. You know, in the Bible, we read of people who are nudged along. Every one of us here today, when we became believers in Christ, we'd have some story like this. Some fashion of this. Well, there was somebody who began to talk to me about God and my relationship. And then they took me somewhere. It might have been a meeting in a restaurant. It might have been a church. It might have been an outreach, whatever. And then you would say something like this. And somewhere along the line, I felt this urge to respond. I felt this prompting to make a decision. Now, dear ones, that leading, that nudge is the Holy Spirit. Listen to me, please, in the back. Today, if you're here and you're not clear about your eternal destiny, and there are things that are happening here that you don't understand, but something inside of you is saying, I want this. I need some of this. I want you to follow that leading. Don't be afraid. Don't push it off. Don't deny it because it's the Holy Spirit. Nicodemus, the ruler of the Pharisees, was intrigued about Christ, but embarrassed that he was intrigued. And so at night, he got up out of bed, the Bible says, and he went and asked Jesus, What must I do to have eternal life? I want to ask you a question. What got Nicodemus out of bed? Was it his neighbor? No. Was it his co-worker? No. Was it his wife? We don't know. He didn't have one. It was the Holy Spirit nudging him to be there. And I want to say again to you, your personal destiny largely rests on whether or not you'll follow that prompting and take a step. Number two, another reason why you should obey these leadings and hear the will of God, listen to the Spirit, is because your personal assurance will depend upon it. Let's go back to the airport a minute. Have you ever been up by one of the check-in areas, the gates, and noticed the difference between the people who have confirmed reservations and the ones who are on standby? Now, the people with confirmed reservations are sitting there just kind of waiting for it to happen, reading USA Today, talking to their loved ones, their associates, maybe just kind of waiting, and that's all they can do. The people with standby tickets, they're up there asking, how's it looking, what's going on? They pace around, and oh well, I think we're going to make it. If there's smokers, watch out, it's back and forth, it's intense. And I want you to know something. If I were to announce today that your plane was leaving at four o'clock, your eternal destiny plane, would you have a confirmed reservation or a standby ticket? Would you know that when that plane lifted off, you'd be on it? Or is there some hint in your mind today that you wouldn't be? Now, I don't want to make that announcement. I don't know that the Lord's going to be here at four o'clock to call you home. But it's very important that you come to terms with that in your own life, is it not? Because you see, the Bible says that we can know that we have eternal life. And once again, I want to say to a number of you that are here with us, if you're not there, listen to that prompting. It's God today who's saying to you, draw near to me. Jesus said, no man can draw near to me unless the Spirit draws him. And I believe even as we meet here today, the Spirit of God is drawing people to be together. What would you be? Would you be a pacer? Or would you be part of the group that if you knew your plane was leaving at four, you'd drop down to your knees and begin to exalt the Lord? It'd be the greatest news you've ever had. How many of you would be glad to go today at four? Well, I think I might. I mean, you know, I kind of like it here actually, Lord, you know. I don't think we really know what heaven's... If we really knew, I'm pretty sure that we'd have an awful lot more excitement about it. You see, God wants you to know that you know that you know that you're His today. And if you have a fear of death, it's likely because you don't have assurance of eternal life. And you can know today, before you leave this service, you can have assurance if you follow that prompting of the Holy Spirit and respond to what God is nudging you to do. Now, the next group that needs to respond are those who are seeking personal fruitfulness. As I look around this congregation, there are so many of you with so much talent and so many gifts. Have you ever wondered, what am I supposed to do with my life? I mean, I've got so many things I could do. I could sing in this praise team, but actually, I'd rather be working with the children. I'd rather be back here with helping hands. You know, I'd rather do this, I'd rather do that. And here in North Way Christian Community and Church of Jesus Christ in our country, there are a million alternatives out there. It's kind of like walking into Giant Eagle. And you have so many things you can buy. I feel sorry when I send my kids in to buy a box of cereal. They must go through incredible calculations. There's a wall full of cereals. It used to be like six or eight kinds. And it's an overload, and that's the way it is with us. I've talked about this before. The tapes, the radio, the seminars, all the ministries. What are you called to do? How many believe God has a fruitful path for you? Something that you are meant to do. I believe that. And I believe that an important part of discovering that is hearing the prompting of God, the Holy Spirit, in your life. And listening carefully to that. I have to say that that can change for some of you. Here today, even in our staff, people who are working full time in our church, we are reevaluating, is this person doing the best thing for them? Is that person doing the best? Are they most suited at this time in their life to do that? You may be doing something right now, and God's about to say to you, hey, it's time to change. Maybe you've been working back there with the children, and the Lord is saying, hey, it's time for you to leave that ministry soon, because I want you to go out there and be in the parking lot. And you're probably saying, that cannot be God. I know it's not God. I don't know. But I believe it. I believe the Lord wants to direct you. I believe He doesn't want you just to be 30-fold Christians, or even 60, but what? 100. He wants you to be fulfilled. You say, you know, that's easy for you to say, because you're a pastor, and this is your full-time job, and I've got all these other things I've got to do. Dear ones, all I can tell you is I read the Scripture that I believe with all my heart. I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord. And God doesn't favor me or pastors or evangelists or anybody more than He favors you. You are favored in God's eyes. And so whatever you're doing, find God in it and listen to Him. And if it's not where you're going to be maximally fulfilled, He'll lift you out and put your feet on the path He wants you to go. Number four, you need to hear God's leadings because your personal future will be greatly affected. Because you matter to God, He knows what will fulfill you. He knows who you should be married to, single people, if that be God's will. He knows what vocation you should be pursuing, what job you should be in, and He knows what would be best. And I believe that the Lord wants to direct your steps in a way that is most glorifying to Him. We started saying something about a year ago, Lord, lead me into maximum glory. How many still say, that's my desire? I want maximum glory in my life. I want to be all that I can be. And I pray that God will root out of us that one little thing that I think is so latent in the church and in America, it's the spirit of complaining. The murmuring spirit. Let me ask you a question. Have you complained once yet today? Have you already let murmuring overcome you? Did you murmur when you drove in and wished you were doing something else? You know, this happened to me just the day before yesterday when I went into that Giant Eagle. And I've often shared with you, I have a little bit of a problem with patience. I mean, just a little bit. And God is on his second generation of trying to get through on this one. And I'm going out to the express checkout line. Fifteen people in this line. It's just enormous. And I look at them and I say, oh, what is it? You know, you always see the checkout people that are having this little talk time next to you. Where are they going? And I start to complain. I say, oh, this is going to set me back at least another 45 seconds. I just, this is terrible. And out of the corner of my eye, at the next aisle over, I spot this man being wheeled into the aisle in a wheelchair with no arms. Dear God, I'll tell you right then, the Holy Spirit just said, stop your complaining. Stop it. You know, we need those kinds of things, don't we? No matter how bad it is for you, dear one, God could show you someone far worse off. And when you think you don't have enough money to make it or you don't have enough friends to feel loved, root out that spirit of complaining. Turn to the one who has a plan for you and say, God, forgive me for my murmuring. Let me begin to praise you for what I know your plan is. I haven't found it yet, but I know I'm going to. And the Bible tells us that that murmuring and complaining killed the children of Israel in the desert. And I have to say, sad as it is, many good Christians are lying near death in the desert because they've not given up their complaining and murmuring. And I say it's time to rise up and give God praise for what we have. Thank Him for what He's given us and bless Him for the plans that He has for us. And last reason why you should know God's will is, even if it's not enough for you, listen, your life, your decisions will greatly affect others. If all those personal reasons don't get you motivated, you should know God's will because what you do will affect lots of other people. Two years ago, or almost three now, a very well-known pastor revealed that he'd been involved in an adulterous affair for several years. And he wrote a book about his experience that just came out. And in it he says, the worst part of the whole thing was not the guilt that I felt. It wasn't the questions that I had. He said, the worst part of it was what it did to my family. You see, when you step out of the will of God, the ripple effects are very profound. When you step into the will of God, the positive effects are very profound and very good. We need to know the will of the Lord. We need to be comfortable in walking on the path that God has spelled out for us. And I believe that's something that every single one of us would want to do. Well, how do you do it? Well, you get in touch with the Holy Spirit. Well, how do you do that? Well, next week I'm going to talk to you about knowing the difference between hearing the Spirit of God versus all these other voices that are out there. Have you ever wondered why people go... We read about a year ago, a year and a half ago, a man jumped on a ferry boat in New York Harbor with a sword and started killing people and said Jesus told him to do it. Now, you hear those strange things. And that makes you quenchers just freak out. That's why I hate this stuff. Because all the weirdos... And then you get some things... People say, well, God told me if we didn't get this much money... All these things... Well, that's not for me. But how many of you, just because there's counterfeit money out there, you don't stop spending the real thing? God wants to say to us, let's get in touch with the real Spirit of God, the real voice of God to us. Paul said, those who are led by the Spirit, they are the sons of God. Romans 8, 14. And I have news for you folks. The third thing you need to have is a posture. A plan, a person, and a posture. The posture is simply one sentence. We walk by faith and not by sight. We walk by faith. We don't always understand it, but we walk by faith and not by sight. When all the money's not there, we walk by faith. When the healing hasn't come, we walk by faith. When we don't know whether to go this way or that way, when we don't know whether it's this job or that opportunity, whether I'm supposed to go to this doctor or that hospital to marry this person or not, I want you to know we walk by faith. And I'm going to talk very specifically about how to do that in the next two weeks, so that we don't miss the will of God. Because you see, in the end, God wants to direct us. This life was not meant to be a solo run. Quite a while back, let me conclude with this illustration. Quite a while back, I was invited to spend a night with a friend in a city that I'd never been to. And when I called him, he said, well... I had arrived at the exit. He said, well, all you have to do is go down this road and then go three blocks this way. You'll come to a light, turn right, and go another few miles road-wise. And after about five minutes of running, he heard the silence on my end of the phone. And he said to me, he said these words, he said, hang on, I'll be right over. He and his wife came over, and he hopped in the car with me, and he led me to his home. My wife followed along in the other car. And I want you to know something. That's what God wants to do. He wants you to find that destination. And sometimes this book is just like a big road map in a city you've never been in. It's very tough to see around. And the Holy Spirit wants to get right there in the passenger seat and direct our steps and guide us into the path of God. He wants to be the one. It's not the plan, it's the planner. It's not the leading, it's the leader. It's not the will, it's the one who wills. God wants to direct us, and I want to be there. Don't you? I want to know it. Amen. Let's stand together. Heavenly Father, I believe that many people here have just begun to discern the focus of Your perfect will for them. And Holy Spirit, we ask You to forgive us for all the times we've quenched. Would You do that right now? Would You ask the Lord to forgive you for whenever you have quenched His leading, please? Lord, I'm sorry for all the times that I've ignored, I've pushed back, I've said, that can't be You. I've turned away. I'm sorry, Lord. And Lord, I'm sorry for all the times that I've been so mystical that I didn't do anything. I waited and waited and waited, trying to hear something that wasn't there, and I didn't take a step of faith. Forgive me for those times, too. And Holy Spirit, meet us today. I thank You that You're purposing to change our whole attitude about Your leading, to learn how to hear Your voice and follow Your steps, as we learn to trust in who You are, in Jesus. Amen.