Posts Tagged ‘Knowing God’s will’

Piper: Three Stages of Knowing and Doing the Revealed Will of God

Posted: March 19, 2013 by Pam Larson in Devotionals/Commentaries, March, Romans
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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. —Romans 12:2 ESV

John Piper’s conclusion to a sermon on Romans 12:1-2, What is the Will of God and How Do We Know It?:

Three Stages of Knowing and Doing the Revealed Will of God

There are three stages of knowing and doing the revealed will of God, that is, his will of command; and all of them require the renewed mind with its Holy-Spirit-given discernment that we talked about last time.

Stage One

First, God’s will of command is revealed with final, decisive authority only in the Bible. And we need the renewed mind to understand and embrace what God commands in the Scripture. Without the renewed mind, we will distort the Scriptures to avoid their radical commands for self-denial, and love, and purity, and supreme satisfaction in Christ alone. God’s authoritative will of command is found only in the Bible. Paul says that the Scriptures are inspired and make the Christian “competent, equipped for every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16). Not just some good works. “Every good work.” Oh, what energy and time and devotion Christians should spend meditating on the written Word of God.

Stage Two

The second stage of God’s will of command is our application of the biblical truth to new situations that may or may not be explicitly addressed in the Bible. The Bible does not tell you which person to marry, or which car to drive, or whether to own a home, where you take your vacation, what cell-phone plan to buy, or which brand of orange juice to drink. Or a thousand other choices you must make.

What is necessary is that we have a renewed mind, that is so shaped and so governed by the revealed will of God in the Bible, that we see and assess all relevant factors with the mind of Christ, and discern what God is calling us to do. This is very different from constantly trying to hear God’s voice saying do this and do that. People who try to lead their lives by hearing voices are not in sync with Romans 12:2.

There is a world of difference between praying and laboring for a renewed mind that discerns how to apply God’s Word, on the one hand, and the habit of asking God to give you new revelation of what to do, on the other hand. Divination does not require transformation. God’s aim is a new mind, a new way of thinking and judging, not just new information. His aim is that we be transformed, sanctified, freed by the truth of his revealed Word (John 8:32; 17:17). So the second stage of God’s will of command is the discerning application of the Scriptures to new situations in life by means of a renewed mind.

Stage Three

Finally, the third stage of God’s will of command is the vast majority of living where there is no conscious reflection before we act. I venture to say that a good 95% of your behavior you do not premeditate. That is, most of your thoughts, attitudes, and actions are spontaneous. They are just spillover from what’s inside. Jesus said, “Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. The good person out of his good treasure brings forth good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure brings forth evil. I tell you, on the day of judgment people will give account for every careless word they speak” (Matthew 12:34-36).

Why do I call this part of God’s will of command? For one reason. Because God commands things like: Don’t be angry. Don’t be prideful. Don’t covet. Don’t be anxious. Don’t be jealous. Don’t envy. And none of those actions are premeditated. Anger, pride, covetousness, anxiety, jealousy, envy—they all just rise up out of the heart with no conscious reflection or intention. And we are guilty because of them. They break the commandment of God.

Is it not plain therefore that there is one great task of the Christian life: Be transformed by the renewing of your mind. We need new hearts and new minds. Make the tree good and the fruit will be good (Matthew 12:33). That’s the great challenge. That is what God calls you to. You can’t do it on your own. You need Christ, who died for your sins. And you need the Holy Spirit to lead you into Christ-exalting truth and work in you truth-embracing humility.

Give yourself to this. Immerse yourself in the written Word of God; saturate your mind with it. And pray that the Spirit of Christ would make you so new that the spillover would be good, acceptable, and perfect—the will of God.

How do we discern God’s will?

Posted: February 12, 2013 by Pam Larson in Acts, Devotionals/Commentaries, February
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    When we heard this, we and the people there urged him not to go up to Jerusalem. Then Paul answered, “What are you doing, weeping and breaking my heart? For I am ready not only to be imprisoned but even to die in Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus.”    And since he would not be persuaded, we ceased and said, “Let the will of the Lord be done.” —Acts 21:12-14 ESV

Pastor Steven Cole discusses discerning God’s will, based on Acts 21:1-12, our passage for today’s Bible reading plan.  Here is an excerpt from “Discerning the Will of God”

But, then, how do we discern God’s will? The bad news (or good news, depending on how you look at it) is that there is no simple, mechanical formula in Scripture for discerning God’s will in specific situations. If there were, we would probably just apply the formula without seeking God Himself. So the good news side of it is that God primarily guides us through our relationship with Him, as we grow to understand His Word and learn to walk daily by His Holy Spirit. But since even the best of us (including Paul) are fallen sinners, it is an imperfect and somewhat uncertain process at best. But even when we miss God’s will due to our dim sight or sin, He is sovereign and gracious to overcome our mistakes.

The uncertainty of this process is revealed in the difference of opinion between godly scholars over whether Paul was right or wrong to go to Jerusalem. The Holy Spirit had repeatedly revealed to Paul that he would encounter “bonds and afflictions” if he went there (20:23). Some commentators, such as Donald Barnhouse, Ray Stedman, and James Boice, argue (in light of 21:4) that Paul was either deliberately sinning or making a foolish mistake to continue his journey in light of these warnings. Others (the majority of those that I read) argue that Paul was right and that those who pled with him not to go were wrong. But our text and the history of Paul in Acts reveal some principles on how to discern God’s will:

We should walk so closely with God that we discern His guidance as we live in obedience to His Word, in dependence on His Holy Spirit.

With that as a brief summary, I want to work through seven principles for discerning God’s will, some of which are in our text, and others which come from Paul’s walk with God.

To continue reading, click here to go to the entire sermon in pdf form:

The main thing in life

Posted: December 5, 2012 by Pam Larson in December, Devotionals/Commentaries, Hosea
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Doug Goins, of Peninsula Bible Church, wraps up our reading of Hosea 14:

Verse 9 is an epilogue that serves as a conclusion to the entire prophecy of Hosea. It also provides the final step of returning to the Lord and remaining in fellowship with him: surrendering our will to him.

Whoever is wise, let him understand these things;
whoever is discerning, let him know them;
for the ways of the Lord are right,
and the upright walk in them,
but transgressors stumble in them.

The wise, spiritually discerning, upright person has discovered the main thing in life. In the movie City Slickers, the character Curly says, “There’s one thing in life, and you have to figure out what it is.”   Thank God we don’t have to see City Slickers II to figure out what it is! The prophet Hosea, guided by the Spirit, tells us what the one main thing in life is: that the ways of the Lord are right. Very simply, there are only two ways in life: Either walk in obedience to God’s revelation in the Scriptures, or stumble over it and fall. That phrase “stumble” at the beginning and end of this chapter doesn’t mean to just stub your toe. It means to fall to destruction or death. There is hell to pay in the life of transgressors who stumble. We can choose to relativize the word of God, trivialize it, try to manage it like we do everything else in life, and make it mean what we want it to mean. Or we can learn to walk obediently in the Lord’s ways, to surrender our will to him.

It struck me forcefully this week that Hosea chose to end this passionate book with an appeal not to our emotions or even to our intellect, but to our wills. There is a very simple choice before us, but just because it’s simple doesn’t mean it’s easy. It’s very difficult. G.K. Chesterton once acknowledged how hard it is to return to the Lord, remarking about Christianity, “It has not been tried and found wanting-but found difficult and not tried.”

God’s will: no simple, mechanical formula

Posted: February 12, 2012 by Pam Larson in Acts, Devotionals/Commentaries, February
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Pastor Steven Cole discusses discerning God’s will, based on Acts 21:1-12, our passage for today’s Bible reading plan.  Here is an excerpt from “Discerning the Will of God”

But, then, how do we discern God’s will? The bad news (or good news, depending on how you look at it) is that there is no simple, mechanical formula in Scripture for discerning God’s will in specific situations. If there were, we would probably just apply the formula without seeking God Himself. So the good news side of it is that God primarily guides us through our relationship with Him, as we grow to understand His Word and learn to walk daily by His Holy Spirit. But since even the best of us (including Paul) are fallen sinners, it is an imperfect and somewhat uncertain process at best. But even when we miss God’s will due to our dim sight or sin, He is sovereign and gracious to overcome our mistakes.

The uncertainty of this process is revealed in the difference of opinion between godly scholars over whether Paul was right or wrong to go to Jerusalem. The Holy Spirit had repeatedly revealed to Paul that he would encounter “bonds and afflictions” if he went there (20:23). Some commentators, such as Donald Barnhouse, Ray Stedman, and James Boice, argue (in light of 21:4) that Paul was either deliberately sinning or making a foolish mistake to continue his journey in light of these warnings. Others (the majority of those that I read) argue that Paul was right and that those who pled with him not to go were wrong. But our text and the history of Paul in Acts reveal some principles on how to discern God’s will:

We should walk so closely with God that we discern His guidance as we live in obedience to His Word, in dependence on His Holy Spirit.

With that as a brief summary, I want to work through seven principles for discerning God’s will, some of which are in our text, and others which come from Paul’s walk with God.

To continue reading, click here to go to the entire sermon in pdf form:

Knowing God is the path to sexual purity

Posted: July 15, 2011 by Pam Larson in 1 Thessalonians, Devotionals/Commentaries, July
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John Piper, in a sermon, “This is the Will of God For You: That You Abstain From Sexual Immorality”

Start reading with me at [1Thessalonians 4] verse 4: “That each of you know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor, 5 not in lustful passion, like the Gentiles who do not know God.” There it is: “like the gentiles who do not know God.” When you give way to lustful passion, you act like people “who do not know God.” Which means: knowing God is the path to sexual purity. If you are struggling with sexual impurity in mind or body, the immediate and long term strategy is know God, know God!

Be careful here! Don’t nullify 1 Thessalonians 4:5 by saying with a cynical tone: “Good grief, there are world-class theologians who are in bondage to lust and who leave their wives. So what good is all this knowledge about God?” Indeed there are. And I say with tremendous confidence: they don’t know God. To know ten thousand facts about God is not to know God.

Knowing God is the path to sexual purity. And if you are in bondage to pornography and fantasies or fornication or adultery the immediate and long-term strategy of this war is: Know God! Know God! Lustful passion is the mark of the Gentiles who do not know God. (See 1 Peter 1:14; Ephesians 4:22; Romans 1:23-28.)

Why would this be? Why would God ordain that the path to sexual purity is knowing God? The answer is given in 1 Corinthians 6:18-20,

“Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body. 19 Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, 20 for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.” Or verse 13: “The body is not for immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord is for the body.”

We have bodies so that God might be gloried in them. That is why God gave you a body – whether it’s tall or short, pretty or plain, brawny or feeble. This is what Paul said in Philippians 1:20, “It is my eager expectation and hope that Christ will . . . be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death.” Our bodies are given to us so that in the way we use them Christ is made to look more valuable to us than anything.

Now we can see why it is that Paul would say that knowing God is so crucial in the war on lust and pornography and fornication and adultery. If, by some means you get rid of lustful thoughts and slavery to pornography and fornication and adultery – without any reference to the knowledge of God, he won’t get any glory for your new behavior. In other words, God is not just interested in what you do with your body, he is interested in – he is passionately concerned with – why you do it. If there is no connection between your knowing God, and your sexual purity, God gets no glory and you are in the grip of another idol.

Knowing God is the path to sexual purity because the purpose of sex and the purpose of the body is to magnify the supreme worth of God and the infinite value of Jesus Christ. And he will not be seen as supremely worthy and infinitely valuable if knowing him is not the key and the path of our liberation. “You will know the truth and the truth will set you free” (John 8:32). And Jesus said, “I am the way the truth and the life” (John 14:6). Knowing God, knowing Christ, is the path to sexual purity.

But we should ask in closing: Knowing what about him? Knowing him in what way? Let me mention three things about God that he may use to set you free and keep you free.

Know the Patience of God

Look at verse 1: “Finally then, brethren, we request and exhort you in the Lord Jesus, that as you received from us instruction as to how you ought to walk and please God (just as you actually do walk), that you excel still more.” Do you see what this says about God? It says, these Christians have room for improvement – “excel still more and more.” And it says that they are pleasing God – “just as your actually do walk.” In Christ, God is not an all or nothing God. He knows our frame. He covers our sin. He is pleased with our successes through faith, and patient with our failures. So know him in his patience, all you struggling saints. Let this knowledge encourage you: You are walking in the way that pleases him – do so still more and more.

Know the Power of God

In the previous chapter, 1 Thessalonians 3:12-13, we read Paul’s prayer for the Thessalonians: “May the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another and for all, as we do for you, 13 so that he may establish your hearts blameless in holiness before our God and Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints.” Notice: he asked Christ to establish them blameless in holiness at his coming. In other words, holiness is the work of Christ. Yes, we must pray for it, and yes, we must fight for it. But in the end, be encouraged! You are not left to yourself to win this war. Know God’s power on your behalf through Jesus Christ.

Know the Preciousness of God and the Pleasure He Is to Us

I say this because that is simply what it means to be God in Christ. God is the most valuable person in the universe. He is the sum and source of all true pleasure (Psalm 16:11; 37:4). And knowing this in our experience is what triumphs over temptation. Knowing the preciousness of God and the pleasures of his fellowship will strip pornography of its power. We defeat the deceitful pleasures of lust with the superior pleasures of knowing God. Paul said it like this: “I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord” (Philippians 3:7).

To read or listen to the rest of the sermon, click here:

Audience of one

Posted: May 17, 2011 by Pam Larson in 2 Corinthians, 2 Samuel, Devotionals/Commentaries, May, May Bible Readings
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For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ.  Galatians 1:10

John Piper, in a sermon, “When Not To Believe an Angel”  

The most thrilling implication of verse 10 for me personally is this: The absoluteness of Christ’s lordship is gloriously liberating. It frees me from having to worry about pleasing one person here and another person there. It brings unity and integrity to my life. When you live to please only one person, everything you do is integrated because it relates to that one person. Shall I go to this movie? Read this book? Make this purchase? Take this job? Go out on this date? Marry this person? What a freeing thing it is to know that there is one person who is to be pleased in every decision of life—Jesus. Sometimes pleasing him will please others. Sometimes it won’t, and that will hurt. But the deep joy of a single-minded life is worth it all.

In summary: The underlying truth of this passage is that there is one, and only one, gospel. It is therefore astonishing to turn away from it—away from God who calls, and away from grace in Christ. It is not only astonishing, it is tragic, because the person who rejects the gospel is anathema, accursed and cut off from God. But on the other hand, if you embrace the one true gospel, not only are all your sins forgiven by God, but a thrilling unity and integrity and liberty come into your life because there is only one person to please, Jesus Christ, and he only wills what is best for you.

To read the rest f the sermon, click here:

Cole: no simple, mechanical formula in Scripture for discerning God’s will in specific situations.

Posted: February 12, 2011 by Pam Larson in Acts, Devotionals/Commentaries, February
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Pastor Steven Cole discusses discerning God’s will, based on Acts 21:1-12, our passage for today’s Bible reading plan.  Here is an excerpt from “Discerning the Will of God”

But, then, how do we discern God’s will? The bad news (or good news, depending on how you look at it) is that there is no simple, mechanical formula in Scripture for discerning God’s will in specific situations. If there were, we would probably just apply the formula without seeking God Himself. So the good news side of it is that God primarily guides us through our relationship with Him, as we grow to understand His Word and learn to walk daily by His Holy Spirit. But since even the best of us (including Paul) are fallen sinners, it is an imperfect and somewhat uncertain process at best. But even when we miss God’s will due to our dim sight or sin, He is sovereign and gracious to overcome our mistakes.

The uncertainty of this process is revealed in the difference of opinion between godly scholars over whether Paul was right or wrong to go to Jerusalem. The Holy Spirit had repeatedly revealed to Paul that he would encounter “bonds and afflictions” if he went there (20:23). Some commentators, such as Donald Barnhouse, Ray Stedman, and James Boice, argue (in light of 21:4) that Paul was either deliberately sinning or making a foolish mistake to continue his journey in light of these warnings. Others (the majority of those that I read) argue that Paul was right and that those who pled with him not to go were wrong. But our text and the history of Paul in Acts reveal some principles on how to discern God’s will:

We should walk so closely with God that we discern His guidance as we live in obedience to His Word, in dependence on His Holy Spirit.

With that as a brief summary, I want to work through seven principles for discerning God’s will, some of which are in our text, and others which come from Paul’s walk with God.

To continue reading, click here to go to the entire sermon in pdf form:

 

God’s Will and Dice

Posted: April 8, 2009 by Pam Larson in April Bible Readings, Bible Passages, Joshua
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In Joshua 18-19, we read of the people of Israel casting lots for the way the land was to be alloted between the tribes.  Should we follow that practice?  This is what John Piper had to say in a recent “Ask Pastor John”

Q:  What do you think of casting lots to determine God’s will?

I think it’s a bad idea, almost always.

It’s a bad idea because, when you read the whole New Testament, the normal way over and over and over again for discerning the will of God is not casting lots but “being transformed in the renewal of your mind that you may be able to prove what is the will of God, what is good, acceptable and perfect” (Romans 12:1-2). And you have Ephesians 5:17: “Strive to know what the will of the Lord is.”

diceIf it’s as easy as just rolling a dice every time you’ve got a decision, then you’ve just got to get it down to two and roll the dice, or get it down to three and say, “Top three numbers!” But if it was that simple Paul just wouldn’t have talked like that.

So the New Testament portrays discovering the will of God in other ways than lot casting.

Should you ever take your Bible and just flip it open and take the first text you see as your answer?

Example: “…who acquit the guilty for a bribe and deprive the innocent of his right” (Isaiah 5:23). So, don’t give bribes? Yes, you shouldn’t. But you shouldn’t read it out of context. That’s obviously an indictment of bribery, and you might not know that if you didn’t read the rest.

I do not think it is wrong to just flop your Bible open anywhere and plead for something special for you. But it better mean what it says! I mean, you better get the meaning right, rather than the old joke, “Judas went out and hanged himself,” and “Go thou, and do likewise” is the next text you look at. It’s ridiculous.

But as far as rolling dice, that would be incredibly rare.

I’ll give you an instance when we do it. We come to elder meetings and you have to have a certain quorum of lay elders to staff elders at Bethlehem. There are usually too many staff elders there. Which of them should not be allowed to vote?

We do it by lot. The chairman writes down three numbers, if three can vote. And we go around and chose numbers. And the numbers that get them, they’re included. So, that’s a little illustration.