Steps to maturity – learn God’s willPart 2 – mundane to action
Probably the most asked question I have gotten over the years..what is God’s will for my life
It seems like a difficult one until you realize
- God designed you for a purpose
- He placed in your heart a joy that comes when you are fulfilling your purpose
- He is constantly providing opportunities for you to fulfill your purpose
It would seem that God’s will is always right in front of us….but what is it?
It is the way God created you, so you can live a fulfilled life, show the love of God to others and change the world!
Last week we talked about how being faithful even in the smallest of things is part of God beginning to reveal his will to you….
Abraham was faithful simply following Terah being faithful at the task even though God had placed great leadership ability, an adventurous heart and the soul of a warrior within him
David, the great king, the heart of a powerful leader, worshiper, warrior yet tested him and was faithful with the task of caring for the sheep
It was in their faithfulness that God called them
Abraham simply following Terah being faithful at the task even though God had placed great leadership ability, an adventurous heart and the soul of a warrior within him
As God did with David, the great king, the heart of a powerful leader, worshiper, warrior yet tested him with the task of caring for the sheep
Genesis 12:1-5
The Lord had said to Abram, “Leave your native country, your relatives, and your father’s family, and go to the land that I will show you. 2 I will make you into a great nation. I will bless you and make you famous, and you will be a blessing to others. 3 I will bless those who bless you and curse those who treat you with contempt. All the families on earth will be blessed through you.” 4 So Abram departed as the Lord had instructed, and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he left Haran. 5 He took his wife, Sarai, his nephew Lot, and all his wealth—his livestock and all the people he had taken into his household at Haran—and headed for the land of Canaan.
David
1 Samuel 16:11,12
Then Samuel asked, “Are these all the sons you have? There is still the youngest,” Jesse replied. “But he’s out in the fields watching the sheep and goats. Send for him at once,” Samuel said. “We will not sit down to eat until he arrives.” 12 So Jesse sent for him. He was dark and handsome, with beautiful eyes. And the Lord said, “This is the one; anoint him.”
What were these men doing when they received the call of God?
– being obedient to the serving of others
– being faithful with the mundane
– caring for what was in their hands today – seeing it as important and not worrying about tomorrow
– they both had complete faith and trust that they were doing exactly what they needed to be doing
– they were learning to be faithful, God saw it and then called them to change their world
In the midst of their faithfulness is when God revealed His will for them
Are you being faithful then expect God’s will to begin being revealed to you
Whatever it is that you are being faithful in, God is using it to train you for your future
Abraham was learning to travel and learn the vision for his future from Terah (Terah had initiated heading toward Canaan)
David in learning to protect the sheep was learning both how to be a leader and to slay Goliath
We might not always understand what lessons we are learning from the mundane, being faithful in the daily and little
How many of you remember the movie the Karate kid…there is a scene where Daniel has been doing all kinds of chores for Mr. Miyagi sanding the floor, waxing his cars, painting his fence, painting his house
Daniel hadn’t realized that he was actually learning and preparing for his future in the mundaneness of his task
When we are following the Lord and our lives are in His hands he is always preparing us for what’s next
To truly learn God’s will we have to accept the time of training…as I mentioned earlier Abraham and David both embraced the time as simply trusting God
The next step to understanding God’s will…once again realizing that he has designed you for it, has been preparing your for it, and you enjoy doing it so you will naturally gravitate to it is to begin doing it?
So how do you know what the “it” is?…God will present situations for you and all you need to do is do them
Abraham and his nephew Lot had divided their people Lot went to the fertile valley of Sodom and Abraham stayed in the plain…a war took place and here is what happened
Genesis 14:10-16
As it happened, the valley of the Dead Sea was filled with tar pits. And as the army of the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah fled, some fell into the tar pits, while the rest escaped into the mountains. 11 The victorious invaders then plundered Sodom and Gomorrah and headed for home, taking with them all the spoils of war and the food supplies. 12 They also captured Lot—Abram’s nephew who lived in Sodom—and carried off everything he owned.13 But one of Lot’s men escaped and reported everything to Abram the Hebrew, who was living near the oak grove belonging to Mamre the Amorite. Mamre and his relatives, Eshcol and Aner, were Abram’s allies. 14 When Abram heard that his nephew Lot had been captured, he mobilized the 318 trained men who had been born into his household. Then he pursued Kedorlaomer’s army until he caught up with them at Dan. 15 There he divided his men and attacked during the night. Kedorlaomer’s army fled, but Abram chased them as far as Hobah, north of Damascus. 16 Abram recovered all the goods that had been taken, and he brought back his nephew Lot with his possessions and all the women and other captives.
Likewise David was at home watching the sheep while his brothers were off at war. Jesse, David’s father sent him with bread and cheese to take to the troops as he dropped them off…
1 Samuel 17: 22-26
David left his things with the keeper of supplies and hurried out to the ranks to greet his brothers. 23 As he was talking with them, Goliath, the Philistine champion from Gath, came out from the Philistine ranks. Then David heard him shout his usual taunt to the army of Israel. 24 As soon as the Israelite army saw him, they began to run away in fright. 25 “Have you seen the giant?” the men asked. “He comes out each day to defy Israel. The king has offered a huge reward to anyone who kills him. He will give that man one of his daughters for a wife, and the man’s entire family will be exempted from paying taxes!” 26 David asked the soldiers standing nearby, “What will a man get for killing this Philistine and ending his defiance of Israel? Who is this pagan Philistine anyway, that he is allowed to defy the armies of the living God?”
In both cases because they had been faithful in the little things God taught them all they needed to know to prepare them for their future, their call, His will and then as we have just read…he presented them with an opportunity to use all they had been taught.
Are you in the mundaneness being faithful with the small right now? If so, just keep being faithful, learn everything you need to learn, accept the correction, growth, wisdom, insight, humility, changes that the Lord is doing in you! At the right time, when you are prepared…
God will present an opportunity for you to use what you have learned and start to understand His will….are you in the midst of a battle, a struggle, some war going on? Chances are that means God wants you to apply all that you have learned in your time of small beginnings
Don’t be frustrated in the battle be confident, apply what you have learned so you can prove to yourself and the Lord that you have learned it well
You have heard me share in times past we need three types of people in our live Paul, Barnabas, and a Timothy – the timothy teaches us that we have learned the lesson and are now able to teach it to someone else
The time of small beginnings has prepared us to accomplish the will of God then God gives us an opportunity to “test” our understanding of what He has taughtand then there are two more steps to totally grasping the will of God which we will wrap up next week