Day 1: Seeing God’s Will as A Way of Life

How can I discover God’s will for my life?

God, what do you want me to do about [fill in the blank]?

Nearly all of us have asked questions like these at critical decision points.

For many of us, questions about God’s will don’t figure into our small, daily decisions. We only think about discerning God’s will when we realize a specific choice could affect the rest of our lives. Because the consequences of a wrong choice at such a point could be disastrous, we suddenly break out of our habits and begin to pursue and sometimes agonize over God’s mind on the matter.

Is there a better approach?

What if we approach the pursuit of God’s will as a way of life instead of as an emergency support system?

We shape and order our existence by the hundreds of decisions we make each day. Most of these are so trivial that we make them almost automatically. But a truly spiritual life—a life like Jesus led—isn’t just for crisis moments. It’s a continuous series of daily responses to the Lord’s promptings in our lives.

In every decision, we can choose to:

• Walk by sight or by faith
• Live by law or by grace
• Obey the flesh or the Holy Spirit
• Submit to God or resist Him
• Depend on God and His provision or depend on ourselves
• Follow worldly wisdom or divine wisdom
• Bet everything on God’s promises and character or try to control life on our terms
• Set our sights on this world or the next world
• Try to find our lives or lose our lives for Christ’s sake

Being Over Doing

I am not saying we should seek God’s counsel on every tiny decision. That would be foolish, if not impossible.

We make thousands of decisions each day, many of them unconsciously: which shoe to put on first or when to look out the window, for example.

But there are still many decisions and moments we can invite God into—deliberately acknowledging His presence in them. Doing so will carry us far in making God’s will a way of life rather than something we seek during a crisis experience.

The fabric of our lives is woven from the threads of minor choices. It is wise to form the habit of being conscious of God while making them. This habit of taking God seriously in small decisions will make major decisions less traumatic.

God’s will is a way to be, not just something we do. He does not unfold His plan before us like a blueprint. His will for us is a dependent walk in which we invite Him to participate in all our activities.

Day 1 Scripture Readings:

John 15:16

2 Corinthians 5:17–20

Ephesians 2:10