Archive for the ‘God's Will’ Category

God’s will hunting, part 5: Clarifying ‘two wills’

Sunday, January 31st, 2010

(Find the whole “God’s will hunting” series thus far, including last week’s Part 4: Asking for wisdom, here. The series will continue soon.)

Hey back, Isaac,

Last time, your closing paragraph, about claiming God “gave us a word” and thus risking taking His name in vain, is one of those salient points that should make any reader go … “ooooohh.”

Greg Koukl pointed out that Christians often get offended when people exclaim “Oh God!”. We say “How dare you take his name in vain!” And then we get a “Word from the Lord” and tell someone whom they should or should not marry. Who’s committing the most serious sin in taking the Lord’s name in vain? Ours does much more damage.

Further on that truth: from what I understand, the Fourth Commandment wasn’t just a ban on saying God’s Name aloud when one isn’t actually addressing Him. That is included, but I’m very sure the wider meaning was that the Hebrews, by their actions, should not profane the Name of God to others by what they do.

Two recent (at the time of this writing, Jan. 14) news stories add even more to this point.

The first is the life-shattering earthquake in Haiti. Christians need to clarify that God is not weak; the earthquake didn’t stun Him. But should we say “the earthquake was God’s will” as some might? It is like we should, in one sense, only among ourselves as Christians. But even then we must be careful, because many Christians (likely because they haven’t been taught) are not careful to distinguish God’s on-the-surface will from His deeper will.

Revealed will: God hates sin and suffering. Deeper will: He allows it anyway, for reasons only He knows but that even now we can begin to see, for greater good and His glory.

The second related issue is Pat Robertson’s statement that God’s will is judging Haiti for some sin in the past (such as a “pact with the Devil”). As you said, this seems to take the Lord’s Name in vain as much as anyone who utters His Name aloud as part of a vile cussphrase.

Disclaimer: I think an equal problem to Pat Robertson’s self-righteous announcements is making equally self-righteous pronouncements against him — playing the “I’m the good cop” Christian game, trying to elevate ourselves in the world’s eyes. But instead of falling into the same sin of spiritual arrogance, we ought to plead: Mr. Robertson, you ought to first, get off the TV and come back and renounce false “prophecies”; second, understand that in the deepest sense, anything that happens is according to God’s will! Make it clear God does hate sin and suffering, but that He allows it — like the tower disaster in Luke 13: 1-4 — to remind people to repent!

What I find most often, is people do not use the principles in the Bible to make sound decisions themselves. Often, we wish to get a clear answer about God instead of making a decision for ourselves, taking the responsibility.

Like many Christians do when they claim “God told me” something, I can illustrate this truth with a Personal Anecdote. Recently I visited extended relatives over the holiday break. Someone, in a personal story of her own, told me “God told her” to give a Bible to someone.

Did she take God’s Name in vain? I’m not sure what to say about that. Isn’t it always good to share the Word with someone? Wouldn’t that obviously be in God’s revealed will? So why not just say you followed those clear written words from Him, rather than claiming some special Spirit whisper inside? In this instance, I just smiled and nodded. That action was likely more honoring to God, and to her, than picking a fight with her wording would have been.

But what if she said God wanted her to donate her entire life savings to Joyce Meyer Ministries or something? — and I, knowing her better years later, had already let her “get away” with claiming God’s direct word about her more-minor actions, and not said anything?

Really I think it comes back to being careful about our language. Someone may say God told me directly to do this and mean it very sincerely. As you said, that can still happen! But in so many cases it’s hard not to say that, or use that, as a way of setting ourselves up as so very Spiritual: God speaks to me directly. Thus the implication: Hmm, does He speak to you directly?

This seems much too close to a Gnosticism-type Christianity, in which the Holy Spirit constantly speaks mainly and “loudest” to people on a very deep Spiritual level that only very Spiritual people can hear.1 But rather than forcing us to cringe and listen closely to whatever God might be saying in between the lines of life, the Bible gives us all the same Word. And yes, it takes physical work with actual language, to understand it. I don’t mean to imply it is easy. But it’s less difficult than how some say it is!

Here’s another point I heard somewhere If God only gave us nudges and whispers, rather than primarily speaking with His direct Word (as He has!), He would be cruel and unloving.

Last time, you mentioned looking for precedents in Scripture about finding God’s will. I think many people actually do look there for precedents, but only selectively. For example, some homeschooling-oriented Christians look to Middle-eastern culture of Old Testament days and their courtship practices2 as precedent for matching up in modern times. But they never have their daughters sneak into the handsome field worker’s property when he’s in high spirits from too much drinking, and lay at the foot of his bed until he wakes up and then you say he’s your choice of a mate — a la the book of Ruth!

You also mentioned the many examples of people in Scripture asking for God’s wisdom, but making choices on extra-Biblical matters without waiting for a supposed “direct word from the Lord.” Do you think Christians blithely see past those? For example, the many times Paul in his missionary travels just went to Antioch or Crete or Attalia in Asia Minor and did not wait for a direct leading from the Lord. Instead, readers subconsciously pay more attention to the Spirit not allowing Paul and his fellow missionaries to enter one place and sending them elsewhere, or the way Moses heard from God in the burning bush, and perceive those as the way God normally works. Again, it’s selective. I wonder how much of that ties into the “life verse” fallacy, where someone bases his lifestyle or ministry on favorite parts of the Bible, ignoring the rest.

That probably means that if we were to question someone’s “word from the Lord” about even where to buy a new car, he/she would be upset and assume we believe God never speaks or acts miraculously. Of course we believe He does! Yet like you said, that’s not the Biblical rule for living. We should not expect Him to give us extra revelation when He’s already closed the canon of written Scripture, and gives us wisdom and the abilities to grow in it, with His Spirit’s help.

So here are my closing questions for next time: how do we react when someone says “God told me” such-and-such? Do we nitpick? Lovingly ask deep questions? Ignore it? And especially if someone is using that as a reason/excuse not to make a decision and take the consequences if it turns out to be “wrong” — that is, if God uses it to help us the hard way — what can we do?

Again, Godspeed! And in Him,

Stephen

  1. You know what’s strange? We can’t just dismiss this as the beliefs of some “fringe” Christians who believe in “name it, claim it” or the prosperity “gospel” or sinless perfection in this life. My relative was a firmly Baptist woman. I can’t help but wonder if this teaching gets about such circles because they are kind of craving Holy Spirit-type beliefs somewhere. Baptists tend to frown upon exuberant worship in church, etc. ↩
  2. They are barely described in Scripture anyway! ↩

Tags: , , ,
Posted in God's Will | No Comments »

Ransomed notes: Worship in daily decisions

Monday, January 25th, 2010

Yesterday, Adam preached the sermon at my church. He is a great guy, normally with shaggy brown hair, but recently he had a haircut and it took a moment before I recognized him. It was a great message, thematically tied to the previous two (also posted on this site). And somehow, even more truths in this Biblical message related to this site’s current God’s will hunting series.

Another truth I haven’t included below: I can do quite a decent Adam voice impersonation. Yet I’m not sure whether continuing this is God’s will, because the Spirit hasn’t “nudged” me one way or the other (like He does every time we have a decision to make, right?).

So, discussion question: can I imitate Adam’s voice to the glory of God? It’s not forbidden in the Bible, and I believe my intention is not mockery. So in this instance, that might be permissible. (more…)

Tags: , , ,
Posted in God's Will, Ransomed notes | 1 Comment »

God’s will hunting, part 4: Asking for wisdom

Saturday, January 23rd, 2010

(On Jan. 2 we began a series on “God’s will hunting,” consisting of emails traded back and forth between E. Stephen Burnett and Isaac M. That included last week’s column Part 3: The subjects of Scripture, and this shows the entire series so far. We continue with part 4 …)

Stephen,

Good point with the Dan-Brown glasses. Someone once asked my brother if it was God’s will for him to be in the military. Now, think about it for a second. What will does he mean? Is this God’s moral will for him he’s speaking of? Probably not. He clearly knows its not in scripture for him to receive a command to clearly join the military. Sexual purity, yes, but not questions on whether to join the military. While he could use the Bible to gain wisdom on that decision, it won’t give him a clear answer.

Is the man then asking about God’s sovereign will? If so, then one would have to say that he’ll only know if he joins or not. But then, it was also God’s sovereign will for Joseph’s brothers to sell him into slavery, but we wouldn’t want them to answer “Yes” if we asked them whether it was God’s will for them to betray their brother.

You asked as to whether people make judgments on God’s word based on their perception of the audience of the Bible. Well, I’m not sure. In many ways, I do view it as an instruction manual (though that is an insufficient definition that excludes the most important aspects). Yet, people perhaps don’t want that. What I find most often, is people do not use the principles in the Bible to make sound decisions themselves. Often, we wish to get a clear answer about God instead of making a decision for ourselves, taking the responsibility.

Again, look at Solomon. He asked for wisdom so that he could make good decisions. When the two women came before him with the baby, he didn’t pray about a decision. James 1 tells us to ask for wisdom, and we are told God “gives generously”.

This leads me to my next point after talking about Solomon, and that’s examples. We rarely look to the scriptures for precedents in how we ask for God’s will.

Look at Paul. We often speak of open and closed doors. In 1 Corinthians he speaks of a door being opened with many adversaries, and he went through. But in 2 Corinthians he mentions a door “opened for me in the Lord,” but what does he do? He leaves it and goes somewhere else. But that throws a wrench in the paradigm of open/closed doors. Clearly God opens doors in our lives, but just because he opens them, it does not mean we have to take them.

Now before I go further, I want to say something. I believe God can definitely speak to us today in 21st century America. He can do it. I actually hold that he does. Now, God could deliver emails or send letters down in a space ship if he wanted to. Logically, there’s no reason why he couldn’t. But if you’re skeptical, it should probably be because you’re looking for scriptural precedent.

Here’s what I find in scripture: God’s speaking is always miraculous. It is most often unlooked for. It often goes against common sense. And finally, and this is big: It is always clear. No one in scripture misunderstood God’s direct word to them. They may have disobeyed, but they always heard it. And yet we can get seminars on how to listen clearly to God’s will. Nowhere in scripture does God speak through inward nudges. Nowhere does he speak through “checks on my spirit”.

And finally, I’ll end with this. You know, when I was younger, people asked me why I didn’t date. I said I didn’t want to. Nothing spiritual about it. No command from God. I just didn’t want to. Now, I wasn’t thinking as clearly about this as am now. I was still at the point where I was trying to divine God’s will. But we must be very cautious about attaching God’s sacred name to a decision of ours.

Greg Koukl pointed out that Christians often get offended when people exclaim “Oh God!”. We say “How dare you take his name in vain!” And then we get a “Word from the Lord” and tell someone whom they should or should not marry. Who’s committing the most serious sin in taking the Lord’s name in vain? Ours does much more damage.

In Christ,

Isaac

Coming next week: God’s will hunting, part 5: Clarifying “two wills.”

Tags: , , , , ,
Posted in God's Will | 2 Comments »

Ransomed notes: Delighting in the Word

Monday, January 18th, 2010

Changes are coming to my church, which is only three years old and thus far has about 50 members. In that light, Sunday morning sermons this month have focused on the church’s core beliefs, such as the preeminence of Christ. (That was last week’s sermon; my notes are here.)

So yesterday’s message was about God’s Word, as in His written Word. But unlike some usual admonitions about making God’s Word supreme in our lives, my pastor talked about the need to base all this on delighting in the Word of God. We avoid error, receive life direction, grow to be like Christ and all that stuff mainly because we love the very words God has inspired.

Also — this has application for the current “God’s will hunting” series. After all, as noted below, one can’t find in the Bible specific instructions for many life choices. If we could, that would make the Word about us and mere behavior modification, not seeking delight in God Himself!

But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work.

I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.

2 Timothy 3:14 – 4:5

01.17.2010 — 2 Timothy 3:14 – 4:5 (Paul)

  • Though typically we interact about other things, we must talk more about the Word of God, our growth and our spiritual struggles. Let’s encourage this, including on the church blog, ProvPress.org — living out our theology.
  • During the Reformation, the defining battle cry was SOLA SCRIPTURA and four other solas: sola Christos, sola gratia, sola fide, and SOLI DEO GLORIA. Reformers, such as John Huss and Martin Luther, began recovering these: the defining issues, contrasted with the Roman Catholic Church’s emphases on traditions and human teachings above the truth of God’s Word — though they believed it was inerrant.
  • Church authorities tried to prevent these truths from spreading by burning the Reformers’ books, and sometimes the Reformers themselves.
  • If the Bible is not central and valued in our hearts, it will become to us just another book wit good advice on how we should live. Do the predictions of Paul to Timothy resonate today? Absolutely they do!
  • “Everything in our faith rises and falls” on what we learn about God, Christ and the Gospel from the prophets’ and apostles’ words in Scripture.
  • Thus, to disobey or disbelieve any word in Scripture is to disobey or disbelieve God too. Example: Romans 13, which says to obey human governmental authorities unless they contradict the clear word of God. Failing to treat others in a Godly manner, also, is to disobey Him.
  • Paul does not say reading the Bible brings salvation — it is not itself the saving agent. But the Word of God reveals the Gospel, which a person hears, and which the Spirit uses to bring saving faith. Through the preaching of the Word, the Spirit opens people’s eyes to receive it.
  • This is why we keep the Word central: because we want to spread the Gospel of Christ — justification — and this is how; and to grow to be like Him — sanctification.
  • The Bible equips us for every good work by equipping us for God’s unique callings on our lives. Too often we want specific answers for what we should do in life, and what decisions to make in specific circumstances, but this is not how God’s Word works. Rather, as we read the Scripture, the Spirit reveals to us how to have wisdom.
  • As we learn His Word, we have our hearts changed to find more and more satisfaction in Him, not in our sin, and not just reading lists of rules.
  • Example: the Bible doesn’t tell husbands how to address every specific situation with their wives. But it does say to build our marriages on the relationship between Christ and His Church — the way He loves her.
  • We all face choices like this. As we become more familiar with the Word’s teaching, we are more familiar with how the Spirit would have us act.
  • Psalm 1: the writer delights in and meditates on God’s Word constantly. The man who does this, who loves God’s Law and studies it, will be blessed. Never reduce God’s will to rules of behavior! Rather, we should be Christians because we love and delight in God and His Word. We should taste such sweetness and crave more, and grow to be like Jesus!
  • We bring forth fruit this way, in all seasons of life, good or bad. That is why we must hold to God’s Word. “That is our sustenance, and that’s our joy.”

Tags: , , ,
Posted in God's Will, Ransomed notes | No Comments »

God’s will hunting, part 3: The subjects of Scripture

Saturday, January 16th, 2010

How do Christians determine God’s will? Should we listen for Him to speak to us, even directly, before making choices about where to move, whom to marry, what Kingdom work to do?

My friend Isaac and I are having an email discussion about these topics, to adapt into this series called “God’s will hunting.” We began Jan. 1 with part 1: Christian assumptions, and last week’s column was part 2: Watch your language. All of the series will be available here.

Hey back, Isaac,

From the start in your last message, you zoomed right in on how our views of the Bible affects our views of God’s will. Is the Bible a book whose meanings can be plain to any reader? Or do we go to it with our Dan-Brown-style magnifying glasses, trying to find the Special Personal Meaning, a “Bible code” that is all so much more spiritual and high-falutin’ than the plain meaning of a text? 1

Do you think a lot of this is rooted in how people view the audience of the Bible? Along with the evangelical “life decision” jargon you mentioned, there’s an idea about (I often fight it in myself) that Scripture is “life’s little instruction manual.” Or people say it’s “God’s love letter.” While surely both instructions for right living and truths of God’s love are in the Bible, saying these things without a bigger picture can lead to unhelpful misunderstandings. Scripture is primarily the story of God and what He has done. It is not mainly about us.

We’ve talked before about The Chronicles of Narnia and how people try to identify Lucy as Mary Magdalene or the Tisroc as King Herod, and things like that. Have you seen, perhaps, that Christians who do that with Narnia do the same thing with the Bible, and themselves?

I’m guessing this is another main source for the assumptions that lead to the “burning bush” notion of how to find God’s will. In addition to the confusion of God’s revealed will (in the Scriptures) and His hidden will (which none knows save Himself), it is the “violent flattening” (as blogger Dan Phillips called it) of Biblical descriptions into behavior prescriptions.

In this kind of view, the stories about King David are not just about how God used him, from a shepherd boy to a warrior to a king, to fulfill a role in the history of Israel, God’s chosen old-covenant people — and especially as a type of the real Christ to come. No, in the wrong way of seeing it, you, gentle reader, are like David, and you need to figure out how exactly God worked with him so you can follow the same guidelines. Do you think God may want you to be a “king” (wink wink) too? What are the “giants” in your life? Etc. …

And instead of seeing, say, Moses’ revelation from God in a burning bush (Exodus 3) as an example of how God was working with him at that point in the Story, people react as though God ought to work the same way with us too and give us a “burning bush.”

Instead of seeing Peter’s visions of a sheet filled with creatures as God’s unique word to the apostle that His Spirit would be bringing Gentiles into the faith (Acts 10), some people see having a vision as normative. It happened to Peter; why shouldn’t it happen to us? 2 Thus something really vital in God’s Story, the blockbuster news that Gentiles and not just Jews would be brought into Christianity, is flattened right alongside whether you should get the more-durable Ford or the cheaper Volvo.

But the people in God’s Story (consisting of stories, poetry, history, records, etc.) are not stand-ins for us. He doesn’t say He will give everyone a burning bush, or a vision, or a “peace about it” as you said before.

I think the alternate view comes from the sense of un-Biblical pride that you also talked about. How often we find this in our own lives! Yet figuring out that the Bible, while written for us to be sure, is not about us personally, helps kill that pride. We see ourselves as players in God’s Story, not the stars of a story God writes about us. The self-centered view is subtle, and part of our sin nature. Yet God can change that.

And more and more, as God is helping us grow, we discover we like it that way! He is glorified. We give Him glory, not vice-versa. Slowly we begin to see that the Word is not merely a mirror to reflect our lives, or a collection of various Book of Proverbs-style slogans we can pick out and make refrigerator magnets out of and apply for better choices in daily living. Instead, we learn further to get under His Word, humbly, and let it teach us about Himself. That includes how He has directed people in the past, and how He directs us now.

… Which may lead us to the Holy Spirit. This past Sunday my church study group did a survey on the doctrine of the Holy Spirit. He gets ignored a lot in some circles, and overly promoted in others — either side of which oddly falls into the quasi-Biblical God’s-will-hunting views. I wonder how that is?

But anyway, the Holy Spirit — we’ll have to tackle that One soon. How has He worked in the past to direct people? How does He work now in the lives of believers to direct them?

Also a huge issue in this is God’s sovereignty. Can we mess up His revealed commands, such as when we disobey His edicts about encouraging each other or staying holy? Yes, absolutely.3 Is that still part of His will? Yes, absolutely, in the sense that He is sovereign and has a “hidden” will, and no one can step outside of it.

I wonder — what would happen if, in some parallel world, God’s people did know about His hidden will in advance? We’d be too much like Him. He would lose glory. We would trust the knowledge, rather than learn to trust Him. And besides that, when we are finally beyond this old Earth and can review our lives from His perspective in Heaven (and later the New Earth), our stories would be much more boring, don’t you think?

His hidden will is a comfort: He is in charge. We can’t fail, because He can’t fail.

His revealed will is a caution: we’re still responsible. We can fail. But still, He never ever will.

Next Saturday: Isaac responds with further thoughts on how Christians, by saying “God told me this” specifically, actually risk taking His Name in vain, and how any of His direct commands to His people are never vague, in Part 4: Asking for wisdom.

  1. Some readers might misunderstand me here. I don’t mean to imply that reading and understanding Scripture is easy, or be some kind of populist type of person who rejects Biblical scholarship. Absolutely, we need in-depth knowledge to get the tougher parts of the Bible. But God meant its plain meanings to be found. ↩
  2. Of course, that could go too far. Someone could say God only punished David because a king shouldn’t commit adultery, but I’m not a king, so what the hey! But we have clear mandates elsewhere in the Bible that adultery and lust are always wrong. ↩
  3. It seems well established that God won’t ask us to do anything He said not to do in the Word. A lot of “God told me to do this” stuff could be debunked in just that. The philandering pastor I mentioned last time, who (supposedly) told a churchgoer she had to sleep with him — that’s out. So are a lot of things. ↩

Tags: , , , ,
Posted in God's Will | 3 Comments »

God’s will hunting, part 2: Watch your language

Saturday, January 9th, 2010

(In this series, in the form of a personal email exchange, E. Stephen Burnett and Isaac M. are discussing the topic of God’s will — what it is, which parts of His will we’re expected to know, how to find out and more. The series began last week with part 1, Christian assumptions.)

Stephen,

Before I begin this series, let me first start by saying two things.

First, I approach this very cautiously. I think approaching the subject of God’s will requires an attitude of humility (also a difficult subject, because as Jerry Bridges puts it, “No one wants to write a book called ‘Humility and How I Achieved It’”). Yet it’s a very important subject, and I think that we need to discuss it, perhaps just to learn for ourselves.

I think the attitude of humility is essential not just because we don’t want to make overly strong claims about God’s will but also because I think our pride blinds and distorts our view of God’s workings in our lives.

Second, throughout this piece, I may knock around some Christian phrases we use. As one of my favorite profs says, “Sloppy language makes sloppy thought possible.” When we use non-Biblical terms to discuss spiritual concepts, we must proceed with caution. Examples could range from phrases like “God has a wonderful plan for your life”, “God called me to go…”, “God gave me a peace”, or they could be terms like “substitutionary atonement” and “trinity.” Just because a phrase isn’t in the scriptures doesn’t mean we can’t say it, but we must be sure that first, it’s an accurate representation of the Biblical concept, and second, that it doesn’t handicap and limit our thinking.

I would start by distinguishing between two “senses” of God’s will.

Like you mentioned, one is his revealed will. Mark Cahill wrote a brilliant piece on this once called “Don’t pray; just obey!” Far from diminishing the power of prayer, his point was that on issues such as sexual immorality, thievery and murder, we don’t have to pray to God for him to tell us what to do when the scriptures are very clear.

Then there is God’s sovereign will. This sort of will comes in with stories like Esther (a book where God is hardly mentioned), yet we can see how his sovereignty had it that he would preserve the Jews from annihilation. Another example is Joseph situation where he tells his brothers that what they meant for evil “God meant it for good” (Gen. 50:20). Paul also writes in 1 Peter 3:17 that for some they may suffer evil “if that should be God’s will,” so clearly this isn’t a command for everyone to deliberately suffer but states that some believers will suffer in God’s plan more than others.

Like you alluded, people often listen for some sort of “burning in the bosom” or pray for a clear answer to a decision. I think praying for an answer on discernment and knowledge is different, but for know I’m concentrating on people praying for a clear mandate on a decision.

We’ve created a sort of Bible code, and we didn’t need Dan Brown after all. We look at God’s sovereign will as something we have to figure out, as something we need to know or else we’re in trouble (or perhaps we worry that God will be in trouble because we didn’t figure out his sovereign plan).

I’m thinking right now of an example in my own life. During senior year in high school, I was wrestling between two very different college choices. One was my state university which was more local, less expensive but could still provide me with a good education if I worked hard. The other was a private Christian college in New York City that I’d heard nothing but great things about to which I’d been accepted.

God wasn’t closing doors on either side (another fallacy I believed in at the time and will address later), and everything looked good both ways.

So I prayed for him to tell me what to do. I prayed for months for an answer (literally into June before the start of the semester). I listened and listened and eventually realized that I wasn’t going to get a voice. I never kidded myself that a little tug one way or another was God’s clear voice for me, as I couldn’t find examples like that in scriptures (more on that later). I realized I wasn’t going to get a clear “Yes” or “No” from God and that I had to make a decision.

So I prayed for wisdom, looked at the pros and cons of each choice, asked for thoughts from my parents and made a decision to stay with my state university.

I think that was the beginning of when I started to explore more examples in scripture and particularly which examples applied to me.

I think a great deal of what we desire when we ask for God’s will is really God’s forecast. We don’t want to trust in him; we’d rather know if this job will work out long term, if this person will say yes to going out with us, and if living in this state or that state will be worse off for us in the long run. But in addition to not trusting in him, we also limit God in this way. We act as if he will punish us for not figuring out his cosmic plan or that not figuring it out will prevent him from accomplishing his purpose. I can find examples of neither in scripture. Yet despite our foulups in trying to discern God’s will, he’s not limited by that either.

In the end, much of it comes down to trusting God and realizing his sovereignty.

(Coming next Saturday: “God’s will hunting, part 3: Living His-story.” And now that Christmas and New Year’s Day breaks are over, new YeHaveHeard blog items will resume this week on the formerly usual Wednesday-and-Saturday schedule.)

Tags: , , , ,
Posted in God's Will | 1 Comment »

God’s will hunting, part 1: Christian assumptions

Saturday, January 2nd, 2010

(Looking for God’s will in the new year? We hope this series of columns, first written for a personal email exchange, may help sort through the many ideas, un-Biblical and otherwise, that get about Christendom about how to seek the Lord’s will in life decisions. Please post your thoughts below!)

How disgusting. Just before I prepared to start this introduction to our email exchange on the topic of God’s will hunting, I read this from an Associated Press story (Nov. 4, 2009):

Rev. Brenda Lamothe says in a complaint filed Wednesday in Los Angeles Superior Court that Rev. John J. Hunter of the First African Methodist Episcopal Church repeatedly demanded sex as part of “God’s will.”1

Haven’t we all heard of similar situations in which someone said “God’s will is that you do this” when obviously His will is nothing of the sort?

In this case, claiming God wants someone to sleep with the pastor is clearly against the Bible’s revealed words on the subject (unless of course you’re the pastor’s wife). But in other cases, it’s not so easy to find a Bible verse to confirm or oppose the notion of God supposedly telling you to do something — such as take this job, go here and do this, shop at that store, buy that car.

As we talked about last night, Isaac, until recently I didn’t know this was such a controversy. Then a few years ago, fortunately at a time of life when I was considering some very big decisions, someone sent me a little book by John MacArthur with the title Found: God’s Will.

This book was an alert for me, yet mostly a relief. At the time, I didn’t try to listen for some super-secret voice of God before making a decision. So I should be okay, right? No, because in the back of my mind the silent assumption was there: if I did seek the Lord’s will like this, it would be a Very Spiritual Thing to do.

What a joy it was to read MacArthur’s reminders that as long as we are in God’s revealed will — what He has given us in the Bible, sufficient for us (2 Timothy 3: 14-17) — we have much more freedom to make life decisions. When we do, we will find faith after the fact in Him and that His sovereignty is being worked out in our “free” decisions!

Also until recently, I thought the listen-for-God’s-voice assumptions were just Out There in evangelicalism, sort of like always having goldfish crackers and fruit juice for Sunday-school children.

Then in April 2009, Pyromaniacs blog contributor Dan Phillips isolated at least one source of the virus: none other than the Blackabys, authors of Experiencing God and its curricula, and a study Bible. Reading Phillips’ direct and desperate critique (part 1 and part 2) shocked me.

This shock was not because of Phillips’ sternness, but because of the fact that anyone would directly propagate this notion: that we, like the Biblical saints and prophets, must be sure that an extra-Biblical choice, especially a big one, is God’s will before we make it. Otherwise, we’re guilty of disobeying direct words from God, we won’t be walking with Him, and there will be consequences (!).
(more…)

  1. Journalistic disclaimer: No one was arrested, no judgment made; so far, this is just an allegation. ↩

Tags: , , ,
Posted in God's Will | 2 Comments »

Christian myths, part 3: Believe the lies, or bust

Saturday, November 21st, 2009

(Continued from Christian myths, part 1: Cautions before busting and Christian myths, part 2: To bust or not to bust.)

What do you do if someone says music with a beat is evil? Or that anything except music with a beat is evil? What if you hear someone quote a verse and interpret it in a way that you know isn’t what the verse means at all? Or maybe a Christian friend keeps telling you (I hope gently) that you’re views are against the Bible. Is it always wrong to bring this up? Divisive? Unloving?1

What I’ve found is that sometimes it can be, if love is not the main motive. Yet love doesn’t automatically mean you look past lies. Scripture presents both sides: love, and uphold truth.

As promised, to end this little series: three reasons, Biblically based, to bust Christian myths.

1. Much of Scripture specifically refutes wrong beliefs with the truth.

This is especially true in the epistles. With few exceptions (Romans, Philippians), most of them were written in direct response to falsities. They didn’t just write the truth and ignore the lies.

Paul penned Galatians because they were dealing with Jewish legalistic leaders, the Judaizers, who sought to add to the Gospel with new rules and regulations.

The Corinthian church got Paul’s scorchers (especially 1 Corinthians) because they were compromising with culture and buying into false beliefs about the body.

Jude’s short book would have been written only about what Christians had in common — salvation (verse 3) — but he switched and wrote about lies.

I could even suggest that God allowed humans to sin so that His perfection would be magnified even more. Though Scripture doesn’t say this exactly, I’m guessing that in the New Earth we’ll find the truth (if we ever do) is close to that, anyway. At the very least I can say this: for me, learning to debunk the lies makes the truth, and the God of truth, seem even more glorious.

2. We must know more about how to pick out Christian lies in our own lives.

Any Christian’s growth to be more like God comes from God. Yet we don’t just sit there like fatalists and wait for this to happen. The Bible still encourages us to try, though we know it is actually God working in us (Philippians 2: 12-13). God works His will through what we do.

Understanding about spiritual truth also comes from the Spirit (1 Corinthians 2: 14-15). Yet we’re still encouraged to fight for it. Paul’s encouragement to Timothy does say not to argue about mere words, and avoid “irreverent babble.” But the apostle also says to him, rightly handle the word of truth (1 Timothy 2: 14-16)! 2 The apostle’s advice to him surely applies not just to young Christian pastors, for we find similar admonitions to all believers. Avoiding “irreverent babble,” including false doctrines, and seeking the truth takes action — action God enables.

Have you seen what I’ve come to see — that many Christians are very capable of knowing, receiving and loving God’s truth, even while carrying on in beliefs that are contradictory? Might it be God’s grace that enables them not to see the contradiction and be mostly okay anyway?

But it might also be God’s grace that brings a caring friend, a firm correction from a pastor, a well-placed book, or a web-article that happens by, to show what Scripture really says.

Sometimes it takes a direct word about a specific belief to show how it doesn’t match the Bible.
(more…)

  1. Again, if you disagree with anything written here: a) Write a comment, ask away, discuss, etc. b) Consider that if critiquing another Christian’s beliefs is wrong or unloving, how could anyone critique anything written here either without also be wrong or unloving? ;-) ↩
  2. Note also Paul’s very out-loud and public criticism of two people, Hymenaeus and Philetus, in this passage. If it is wrong to call out a public Christian teacher equally publicly, the apostle himself was guilty. ↩

Posted in Discernment, Epistles, God's Will, New Testament | No Comments »