Written by Pastor Jack Wellman– Philip Yancey
Seeing the Future
If you are or were a parent, then you’ll understand that young children don’t always make good decisions. Parents know from experience that doing certain things children might do will end up hurting them. How much more so does God, Who sees the future, because He’s already written it, knows what’s best for us? We don’t even know what the next moment brings (Prov 27:1; James 4:13-14) but God sees the end from the beginning. I trust that kind of God. I want my will to be what His will is because the future is in His hands; and that includes your and my future.
Seeing around the Corner
Driving down a dangerous mountain road one time I had to rely on the signs because they told me what kind of curve was ahead and what speed I needed to be going. If I ignored the sign, then I risked my life, so I trusted what someone else had already seen around the corner. God sees not only the future, but around blind corners we don’t see coming our way more immediately. Those things that blind side you like a busted washing machine, a broken down vehicle, or a loss of a job or spouse, so praying for God’s will can help us be in His will so that we won’t be on the wrong side of the curve.
Seeing God’s Will
We know that the will of God is revealed in the Bible but we can know more precisely what that will is by reading passages such as 1st Thessalonians 4:3-5 where the Apostle Paul writes “For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality; that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor, not in the passion of lust like the Gentiles who do not know God.” Pretty simply, isn’t it? The Apostle Peter would add that “this is the will of God, that by doing good you should put to silence the ignorance of foolish people” (1st Pet 2:15), meaning if we claim to be a Christian, we’d better show it. We know it, but do others?
Conclusion
Some parts of God’s will for our life are obvious; obedience, loving others, and abstaining from sexual immorality, but we also know it’s God’s will that none should perish (1st Pet 3:9), so that should be our will too. We are also told, “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect” (Rom 12:2) or, in order that we can discern what God’s will is by the renewing of our mind, and in this way, we can agree with Philip Yancey who said, “If God doesn’t want something for me, I shouldn’t want it either.”
