Love God and Do What You Want
Part of God’s will is unknowable. He does what he wants. He causes and allows all things and somehow weaves them together for the growth of his children. If I think I have the capacity to understand that process than I have made God over in my image. I wrestle to understand his ways, but at the end of my understanding I am grateful for his vastness. And, I’m keeping a list of unanswered questions.
What about the part we can know? There is so much that has been revealed. It makes crystal clear what God would have me do, and at times I keep looking because I don’t like the answer. Oh, I hide it better than my eldest daughter did; but I share the attitude she declared at two and a half.
She was spotted slipping out the back door, heading down the path to Grandma’s on the adjoining farm. Now to her credit, the draw to Grandma was powerful. Her love was tangible and delivered with storybooks and ice cream at 7AM. So when the toddler heard her mother’s pursuit and calls to return she replied with an honest defiance as old as Eden. “It’s too late Mom, I already want to!
I’ve been told that 90% of knowing God’s will is getting neutral. Getting to the point where I’ll ask the question and submit to the answer is the hard part. Getting to the point of trusting his direction when I don’t like it or understand it completely. Trusting him with the implications.
I’m not talking about hearing audible voices, signs, and wonders (or ruling them out because I’d welcome the clarity). Isaiah 30 mentions the voice that will tell us when we stray to the right or to the left. The direction I’m thinking of could be as simple as the certainty that follows prayer.
There was a sermon of John Macarthur’s I heard in college that summed up the will of God in five S’s. He said God wanted us to be saved by accepting the gift of his grace. That he willed us to be Spirit-filled , (don’t be nervous) by living in continual conversation in prayer and study of his word. That he wanted us to be sanctified, to live a life of obedience in response to his grace with the submission. You can read that as trust rather than submission if you like. It’s not the fearful response to an egotistical dictator, but reliance on a benevolent king. The final S is a consequence of leading such a different life, which he called Suffering. In the U.S. this will not likely end in martyrdom, but it will exact a cost. I found the sermon online and you can read it in its entirety if you like: http://www.gty.org/resources/Sermons/1217 . It made quite an impression when I listened to that cassette tape in the summer of 1976, particularly when he said that person who lived in line with those principles could do what he wanted.
It may be more simply stated by Paul’s summation in 1 Th 5:16-18, “Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances. For this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus”.
Getting neutral is resting in the fact that God’s best for me is better than my best for me. Solomon said, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him and he will make your path straight” (PR 3:5-6). Ok, I see the pattern here; learn Gods perspective and character and he will make the way to go clear. I think my problem has been when I also expected him to clear the way; when I assumed he would make the right way the easy way.
Solomon’s father told him to “Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart”. This sounds like he is saying love God and do what you want. The dad trick there is a loving one. He knew that if his son delighted in God that his desires would be brought into line, and then he would get what they both wanted; what was needed.
I remember a fork in the career path where I had the choice between the job I had dreamed of, and an interesting uncertain alternative. Recalling John Macarthur’s advice I checked the 5S alignment, I prayed, I sought counsel, and I knew that my way would be to go for the dream job. But I decided not to choose for a day. I just tried to get neutral. All I can say is that by the end of the day I had complete peace about moving in the uncertain direction; and it has made all the difference.