Understanding God's Will, Part 2

Today on Fellowship in the Word, Pastor Bill Gebhardt challenges you to become a fully functioning follower of Jesus Christ. We are shocked when we turn to the Bible and discover that asking the question, how do we know the will of God for life's tough decisions, is not a biblical question. God does not encourage us to ask the question, and even more significantly, God gives us no answer. The Bible's silence almost shouts at us.

Please understand what I'm not saying. God is sovereign over everything. So when I make a decision on my own, does God sometimes close doors, open doors, close windows, open windows? Yes!

I mean, that's what He does because He's sovereign. Thank you for joining us today on this edition of Fellowship in the Word with Pastor Bill Gebhardt. Fellowship in the Word is the radio ministry of Fellowship Bible Church located in Metairie, Louisiana. Let's join Pastor Bill Gebhardt now as once again he shows us how God's Word meets our world. Acts 2, 22. This is Peter speaking right in the birth of the church, but he blends these two together perfectly.

Watch what he says. Men of Israel, listen to these words. Jesus the Nazarene, a man attested to you by God with miracles and wonders and signs which God performed through him in your midst, just as you yourselves know. OK, he's talking about Jesus and how great Jesus was when he was on Earth. Then he says this man, now watch, delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God.

So. According to this verse, why was Jesus turned over? Delivered over to be crucified.

Why? God decreed it. You see, I say often when Jesus was born in Bethlehem, Mary had a little lamb. In other words, he was only born to die and he did. You see, that's why John the Baptist said, behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. How he's going to go to the cross. You see, is that part of God's decreed of will? Yes, that was it right from the beginning on. This is the he said, that's my decreed of will.

But watch. He then says the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men and put them to death. Who killed Jesus? Godless men. Evil men. Did they in their own will decide to kill him?

Yes. But notice there's a decreed of will and there's an individual will here. He goes on verse 24 and says, But God raised him up again, putting an end to the agony of death, since it was impossible for him to be held in his power. The death and burial and resurrection of Christ is our hope because Christ was raised to the newness of life. So can you and I be raised to the newness of life? All of our hope is on this. It all works out in a very, very real way. I want you to see how this works.

It works in such an easy way. There are things that God decrees, but it doesn't mean you and I are less responsible. What we often do when we talk about the will of God is terrible, horrible things happen.

And then we say that God did that God did that. Now, if you read in the book of James. James says that God says, I cannot even tempt someone to sin. Can I not sin? But I can't even tempt someone to sin. That's not God.

She has the enemy, Satan and the temptations like he did with Christ in Matthew four. There's there's temptation that comes. But that's not from God.

You see, and we end up getting kind of mixed up in this small child as a cost that and kidnapped and then murdered and left in a ditch somewhere. And you said, well, that was God did that. That's the will of God. God didn't do that. God sovereign over that.

And I'll talk about sovereignty next week. But God didn't do that. See, evil did that.

Man did that. Sin did that. God does not usurp. You see, he does not usurp our will. So secondly, God has a permissive will. Under his decreed of will, he also has a permissive will. So the best way I can illustrate like this is that God's will for you not to sin. Or how many of you think God wants you to sin all constantly? It's God's will, right? That how many times he told us don't do that. OK, so it's God's will that we don't sin.

Do you? Wait a minute. It's God's will. You can't stop God's will. See how this works. He has a permissive will. He allows that now he sovereign over it. And we'll talk about that again next time. But the idea behind it is that's the way this works.

Let me illustrate. Go with me to Second Peter, Chapter three. Second Peter, Chapter three. Now, the first seven verses is Peter is dealing with trying to encourage believers.

And he says, look, I know you guys are getting mocked. And the reason they're getting mocked is the early church, just like the church today, believes the Lord's coming back. They believe the Lord's coming back.

And I believe that's part of God's decreed of will. The Lord's coming back. But the people in which they were witnessing laughed at him and mocked him. They said, if the Lord's coming back, where is he? You said he's coming back, but I don't see him. By the way, it's the same thing can happen today.

You could have a friend that tells you the same thing. You say he's coming back, but he he hasn't been back for a long, long time. Well, this verse will help you notice what he says in verse eight.

He said, do not let this one fact escape your notice. Beloved, that with the Lord, one day is like a thousand years and a thousand years is like one day. OK, so how long has the Lord waited so far? Two days. It's two days.

So don't be in such a hurry. You see, he's the Lord, he's eternal. We said, no, it's two thousand years and he's not back yet.

No, two days of the Lord. Then he says this. The Lord is not slow about his promise. He's not slow to fulfill his decreed of will. He's not slow about it. He said, as some count slowness, but he's patient toward you. Why is he patient with man?

Next verse. Not wishing for any to perish, but for all to come to repentance. Why is he waiting? He wants mankind to come to repentance, to be saved.

That's why he's waiting. In First Timothy two, Paul writes to Timothy, God desires that all men be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth. Now, question, is everybody saved then? Well, God, wait, God desires that's God's will. God wants everyone to get saved. Why aren't they getting saved? You can't stop God's will.

Yeah, you can. You see, God created in you and me free will. You see, there's a free will that you and I have. So we know not everyone's going to be saved, but it's not because it's not God's will. It's because it's not their will. They don't want to believe it, then they have free will. God doesn't coerce your free will or mine. Now, there are consequences to willful decisions we make on our own. I don't deny that.

Those are terrible. But the idea is God allows us to have our own make our own choices in this life. Now, one of the verses that got us in so much trouble understanding the will of God and choices is found in Proverbs three.

And I'm going to explain this in just a minute. It's all because of a bad translation. But let's go to Proverbs chapter three. Solomon writing. He starts out and he says, My son, do not forget my teaching, but let your heart keep my commandments. Solomon is trying to teach his son and us one thing. Wisdom. He's trying to say, you need to live life wisely. In fact, he says, if you live life wisely, you will be infinitely better off than if you live life like a fool.

Now, we kind of know that, don't we? But most of the problems, by the way, that people have in their lives and the despair they have is always because of the choices they made. They made choices. They reap what they sow. And now their life's a mess. And it's always interesting that when people find their lives like that, they always victimize themselves. Like there was nothing I could do about it and nothing to do with any choices I made.

It just happened to me. That's not true. So he goes on and he says this. Now, remember, this is wisdom literature. I'll explain in a minute for length of days and years of life and peace.

They will add to you. You live wisely. You're going to live longer. And you're going to have peace. Now, remember what I've said about Jewish wisdom literature. It's a principle. It's not a promise. Let me ask you, did Jesus live wisely?

OK, did he have a long life? No. See, that's this, isn't it? This is just like train up a child in a way she's go when he's old, he'll not depart from it. I run into that all the time with Christian parents and say we did that so they they can't they can't walk away from it. I said, why can't they? Well, the Bible says that. No, the Bible says that's the principle. You see, that's not a promise. Why is it not a promise? Because your kids have free will. They can decide to live whatever way they want. You can train them up in the right way.

And by the way, isn't that the process of parenting? How many times you've ever had a teenager and you say this to them? How many times have I told you?

Apparently not enough. You see? No, no. If I told you, you're going to do that.

No, I'm not. I have free will. I can act the way I want. So he says they will have long days, peace. He said, do not let kindness and truth.

He said, leave you bind them around your neck. Live based on truth and kindness. Live that way. You see, that'll be a much better way for you to live.

He says, you know, write them on the tablet of your heart. He said, so you will find favor and good repute in the sight of God and man. If you live a really good life, you'll have first of all, you will have a good relationship with God.

And secondly, normally you'll have a good relationship with man. Question. Can you live rightly before God and men won't like you?

Yes. This is a principle. You see, this isn't the promise of God. This is the principle of God.

And then he says this. We all know this verse is one of our favorite in the book of Proverbs. Trust in the Lord with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding in all your ways. Acknowledge him and that numeric and standard and he will make your pass smooth.

And he will make your pass smooth. King James Version. Says and he shall direct thy pass. There's where the problem comes from.

Doesn't say that it's a mistake. See, there's a difference between him making your path smooth and him directing you. You see, I'm here, Lord, left to right left. OK, I'm here, Lord, right, right now.

Go down, go up. I'm going to tell you, make every step in your life that's wrong. It's not scriptural at all.

He will make your pass smooth. Bruce Walkie, who is one of the great Old Testament Hebrew scholars in the last hundred years, he writes this. He said, all of us had the shock of discovering that a favorite verse in the King James Version was inaccurate. I recall the astonishment as one of the committee members assigned to translate the book of Proverbs for the new international version. When he discovered that Proverbs three, five and six had nothing to say about guidance.

When confronted with the linguistic data, he had to admit reluctantly that the verse more properly should read. And he will make your pass smooth. In other words, he'll make your life better. Walkie goes on and says the true intent of Proverbs three, five and six is set. I set forth a pattern that the believer should follow to experience true success in life, a pattern where he demonstrates his trust and obedience to God by following the directions of God's moral will. It's always what God wants from you. If you want to know what's God's will, it's relational with him.

We always want to make it vocational, locational. It's relational. Listen to these verses. First Peter to 15. For this is the will of God, that by doing good, you should put the silence, ignorance of foolish people. This is the will of God for you to do good.

First Thessalonians five. Rejoice, always pray continually. Give thanks in all circumstances. For this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus. There's God's will.

God's will was clear. You should rejoice and pray and give thanks in all circumstances. First Thessalonians four. It's God's will that you should be sanctified, set apart from the world. They said earlier, Ephesians five. Be very careful in how you live, not as unwise, but wise.

Do not be foolish. You need to understand what the will of God is. See, what is the will of God?

Well, that Ephesians passage, the next thing he tells us right after that verse in five says, be filled with the spirit of God. It's God's will for you. Be controlled by the spirit of God. That's God's will for all of us.

You want to know his will for you personally. It's be controlled by the spirit of God. We are also to love God and people. Jesus made it clear.

Love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength in your neighbors yourself. That's God's will for you. You see, we never think about it that way. We always want to think about it about something else on a choice or decision we're making. All those imperative mood commands in the New Testament are God's will for you and me. And that's what I should be preoccupied about. But so often when we think about the will of God, we think about it in a very different way than that.

Hadyn Robinson wrote a book called Decision Making by the Book. And Dr. Robinson says this. We are shocked when we turn to the Bible and discover that asking the question, how do we know the will of God for life's tough decisions, is not a biblical question. God does not encourage us to ask the question. And even more significantly, God gives us no answer. The Bible's silence almost shouts at us. Now, please understand what I'm not saying. God is sovereign over everything. So when I make a decision on my own, does God sometimes close doors, open doors, close windows, open windows? Yes. I mean, that's what he does, because he's sovereign.

That that is not a problem at all. When I was graduating from a Dallas seminary. Velma, I decided, where would we want to be served to serve the Lord? And so we both decided that we would go serve the Lord anywhere in the north.

Anywhere. We didn't care where we wanted to go north. Now, the reason for it was. Dallas was known and still is, but like the buckle of the Bible Belt, we don't want to be in the Bible Belt. We didn't want to be in the Bible Belt at all. We wanted to be like where we came from, where born again Christians are pretty rare. And the fact that born again, Christianity is countercultural. And we wanted to go somewhere like that.

And that was our. So all the applications we sent out were all to the north. Then one particular was always a Monday that I went down to the seminary. You go down to the seminary.

It's about 20 mile drive. And then I pull in to go student union. And this church is you can sign up for it.

And. All the churches that I had signed up for up till then in the north were all for pulpit ministry. They were all designed for me to go to a pulpit.

I was advised to do that by the professors. Don't go on a staff. Well, there was only one church that was up there. And it said Fellowship Bible Church, Metairie, Louisiana. And I never heard of Metairie. I didn't know Metairie was in Shreveport or where it was. I never heard of the place, you know, and it was for an associate pastor's job. And but I thought I drove 20 miles to get here. You see. And so what I do, I wrote my name down.

Here I am. I mean, but think about this from another point of view, how God's sovereignty worked. We didn't want to go into the Bible Belt. We wanted to go somewhere where the gospel was countercultural. And New Orleans is below the belt. Nobody would call New Orleans Bible Belt. I mean, nobody. So it was exactly what we wanted.

It's just happened to be the weather's better here. I mean, but the point of it is God's sovereignty worked in that situation. We still made our own decision, but God's sovereignty does get involved in helping us with those. That's different than having this idea of a bullseye that we have to hit.

So then how do we make a decision? One verse I want to give you that maybe you'll remember and I'll help you make the decision. Go with me to Psalm 37 in the Old Testament. Psalm 37. And I want to look at verses three and four. David's writing this in verse three.

David says this trust in the Lord and do good. Is that God's will for you? Yes. Me.

Yes. We've just seen it in the New Testament. Trust in the Lord and do good. Dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness. I want to be a faithful servant of the Lord.

Everything in New Testament tells us over and over again. Jesus said, I'm the vine. You're the branches.

You need to do what? Abide in me. If you abide in me and I abide in you, you will bear much fruit. But apart from me, you can do nothing. What's he mean?

Stay close to me. Everything about God's will in our life is born again. Christians is our relationship with God.

Every bit of it. That's God's will. Now, that's what David tells us this a thousand years before Christ.

Then he says this in verse four. Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart. If you delight yourself in the Lord. You decide. You see, it's your choice.

Where do you want to go? You see, how does that work? It's such an important thing. See, and you can't use it as a gimmick. You can't say, I'll pretend I delight myself in the Lord. I'll pretend and then I'll make my own choices. You don't delight yourself in the Lord.

You can't fake that. And the choice will probably be poor. But if you delight yourself in the Lord, he'll give you the desire of your heart. Again, I talked earlier about Haddon Robinson, who is one of the great professors of homiletics or preaching that I've ever read or got to listen to. And Dr. Robinson was recruiting a Christian psychiatrist named Paul Meyer. And Paul Meyer was a Trinity seminary up in the Chicago area. And he wanted him to come here and lead a counseling department at Dallas Seminary. So he flew to Chicago and he was having dinner with him. And Paul told the story, not Haddon. Paul said, I said to Dr. Robinson, I said, look, this has been really hard for my wife and I.

We're really struggling with this. And he said, what do you mean? He says, we just don't know whether God wants us here in Chicago or wants us in Dallas. He said, hadn't laughed at me.

He just laughed at me. He said, God doesn't care if you're in Chicago or Dallas. That's up to you.

He said, God only cares how faithful you are to him. How about this? You decide where you want to go. That's your choice. And he said, soon as he told me, I looked at my wife and we both said Dallas.

He said, but see, he was frozen because I don't want to miss the target. Delight yourself in the Lord to give you the desires of your heart. This is your responsibility and mine. So whenever we live in accordance with God's will and whenever we live a godly life and it comes to a choice in your life. Do choose what you want. You see, you choose what you want. If your choice isn't good, God's sovereignty will usually help you.

You know, you may say I thought this was a great decision, but then something will come up and you can't. He'll divert you. But the choice of the responsibility isn't trying to seek out the wisdom or the exact perfect target of God's will. That's a decision that God's given you and given me to make. Delight yourself in the Lord. He'll give you the desires of your heart.

Let's pray. Father, so often we get ourselves into such a difficult place. We're seeking out the perfect will of God for every choice we make in our lives and we're paranoid about it and we become fearful. And how do I know it's the right choice? How do I know this is the right job?

How do I know this is the right person? On and on we go. But, Father, if we cultivate what clearly is your will, our relationship with you, that we trust and obey what you have asked us to do, that we remain controlled by your Spirit and as close to you as we possibly can, your Word tells us simply then you bequeath to us the desires of our heart and we make the choices and we trust your sovereignty that they are right. Father, that's what the will of God should mean to each and every one of us. In Jesus' name.

Amen. You've been listening to Pastor Bill Gebhardt on the Radio Ministry of Fellowship in the Word. If you ever miss one of our broadcasts or maybe you would just like to listen to the message one more time, remember that you can go to a great website called oneplace.com. That's oneplace.com and you can listen to Fellowship in the Word online.

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