The decision to make decisions that will please God is in itself a monumental step. It means you have come to the place where it matters. It’s coming to the place where I say “Yes” to all that God says yes to and “No” to everything He has forbidden. The willingness to be guided is itself a powerful thing.
A fundamental principle to begin with:Every heart has a throne, the question is– who sits on it?
Step 1: Putting God First.
In part you have already done this just by your eagerness to do His will. You have made a deliberate decision to honor and esteem Him by letting God be completely God. It is likely that God will withhold His direction if you have no real intention of doing it. You will just sputter around in the dark. Your life will be painfully empty.
Step 2: Worship Him willingly.
For me, to commence praise & worship is like firing up the nuclear power plant that I have in my backyard. It is a source of unlimited energy that I have at my disposal, but it’s not about me at all. When I start to worship, it must be all about Him. It’s His character, attributes, love and grace I lift up to be examined by all.
“But the time is coming—indeed it’s here now—when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth. The Father is looking for those who will worship him that way.”
John 4:23
Step 3: Read the Word faithfully.
Guidance often comes when we turn to the Bible for light. Each part or style of my “leather bound Book” is a purposeful and deliberate unveiling of truth. After 25 years since I became a Christian, the Bible has shown itself over and over to be important. The Life of David has been rich, and Daniel as well. I needed to discern the difference between:
A moral decision that concerns things that are right & wrong, evil & good.
A non-moral decision that directs me in the areas of preference and direction.
Reading the Bible provides us with all that we need.
“Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path.”
Psalm 119:105
Step 4: Seek out the counsel of elders and veteran saints.
The Church has this big ‘brain-trust’ at her disposal whenever she needs it. There is accumulated wisdom and insight that often is ignored or not even considered. My life has changed because of my contact with these older saints. Most of them never really recognized the imprint they were having on me, my marriage, or my ministry. I realize that I stand on the shoulders of giants, that I only see further because they were willing to raise me higher. We will fail in decision making if we will not involve our elders.
“Plans fail for lack of counsel, but with many advisers they succeed.”
Prov. 15:22
Step 5: Prepare yourself to walk by faith.
The scripture is jam-packed with people who had to have faith. They are everywhere and they are doing everything! But, all through faith. I got to thinking about Noah, and his faith. Directed to construct an ark, which took him years and years.
“It was by faith that Noah built a large boat to save his family from the flood. He obeyed God, who warned him about things that had never happened before.”
Heb. 11:7
Faith is defined as trusting God to carry out His unseen promises.
“Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen; it gives us assurance about things we cannot see.”
Heb. 11:1
Step 6: Concentrate on eternal purposes.
I have heard it said, that this life is very short, and only what is done for Christ will last. I believe this. Matthew also tells us to seek first the kingdom of God, and everything else will be given to you.
It is the kingdom that must be paramount. The kingdom is carried around in our hearts; it is the place where the King dwells and rules.
These are not just noble and lofty thoughts to be smiled at, humored and regarded as quite quaint. This is for real, these are concrete realities that we choose. God’s will is not some abstract, it is as specific as the believer wants or needs it to be.
Summary
I honestly believe that you and I can know deep inside us what constitutes a Godly decision. It very often is on the path of greatest humility. And when you meet up with humility, you will find faith– and then follows goodness. And as you accrue these qualities it becomes much easier to make Godly decisions.
Recommended Book
“Decision Making and the Will of God,” by Garry Friesen, J. Robin Maxson
Before I entered college I hardly gave a thought to cancer and terminal illness. But ever since those college days death by disease has walked beside me all the way. Two of my college acquaintances died of leukemia and cancer of the lymph glands before they were 22. At seminary I watched Jim Morgan, my teacher of systematic theology, shrivel up and die in less than a year of intestinal cancer. He was 36. In my graduate program in Germany my own “doctor-father,” Professor Goppelt, died suddenly just before I was finished. He was 62—a massive coronary. Then I came to Bethel, the house of God! And I taught for six years and watched students, teachers, and administrators die of cancer: Sue Port, Paul Greely, Bob Bergerud, Ruth Ludeman, Graydon Held, Chet Lindsay, Mary Ellen Carlson—all Christians, all dead before their three score and ten were up. And now I’ve come to Bethlehem and Harvey Ring is gone. And you could multiply the list ten-fold.
What shall we say to these things? Something must be said because sickness and death are threats to faith in the love and power of God. And I regard it as my primary responsibility as a pastor to nourish and strengthen faith in the love and power of God. There is no weapon like the Word of God for warding off threats to faith. And so I want us to listen carefully today to the teaching of Scripture regarding Christ and cancer, the power and love of God over against the sickness of our bodies.
I regard this message today as a crucial pastoral message.
You need to know where your pastor stands on the issues of sickness, healing, and death. If you thought it was my conception that every sickness is a divine judgment on some particular sin, or that the failure to be healed after a few days of prayer was a clear sign of inauthentic faith, or that Satan is really the ruler in this world and God can only stand helplessly by while his enemy wreaks havoc with his children—if you thought any of those were my notions, you would relate to me very differently in sickness than you would if you knew what I really think. Therefore, I want to tell you what I really think and try to show you from Scripture that these thoughts are not just mine but also, I trust, God’s thoughts.
Six Affirmations Toward a Theology of Suffering
So I would like everyone who has a Bible to turn with me to Romans 8:18–28. There are six affirmations which sum up my theology of sickness, and at least the seed for each of these affirmations is here. Let’s read the text:
I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God; for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of him who subjected it in hope; because the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and obtain the glorious liberty of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning in travail together until now; and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.
Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with sighs too deep for words. And he who searches the hearts of men knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.
We know that in everything God works for good with those who love him, who are called according to his purpose. (RSV)
1. All Creation Has Been Subjected to Futility
My first affirmation is this: the age in which we live, which extends from the fall of man into sin until the second coming of Christ, is an age in which the creation, including our bodies, has been “subjected to futility” and “enslaved to corruption.” Verse 20: “The creation was subjected to futility.” Verse 21: “The creation will be freed from slavery to corruption.” And the reason we know this includes our bodies is given in verse 23: not only the wider creation but “we ourselves (i.e., Christians) groan in ourselves awaiting sonship, the redemption of our bodies.” Our bodies are part of creation and participate in all the futility and corruption to which creation has been subjected.
Who is this in verse 20 that subjected creation to futility and enslaved it to corruption? It is God. The only other possible candidates to consider would be Satan or man himself. Perhaps Paul meant that Satan, in bringing man into sin, or man, in choosing to disobey God—perhaps one of them is referred to as the one who subjected creation to futility. But neither Satan nor man can be meant because of the words “in hope” at the end of verse 20. This little phrase, subjected “in hope,” gives the design or purpose of the one who subjected creation to futility. But it was neither man’s nor Satan’s intention to bring corruption upon the world in order that the hope of redemption might be kindled in men’s hearts and that someday the “freedom of the glory of the children of God” might shine more brightly. Only one person could subject the creation to futility with that design and purpose, namely, the just and loving creator.
Therefore, I conclude that this world stands under the judicial sentence of God upon a rebellious and sinful mankind—a sentence of universal futility and corruption. And no one is excluded, not even the precious children of God.
Probably the futility and corruption Paul speaks of refers to both spiritual and physical ruination. On the one hand man in his fallen state is enslaved to flawed perception, misconceived goals, foolish blunders, and spiritual numbness. On the other hand, there are floods, famines, volcanoes, earthquakes, tidal waves, plagues, snake bites, car accidents, plane crashes, asthma, allergies, and the common cold, and cancer, all rending and wracking the human body with pain and bringing men—all men—to the dust.
As long as we are in the body we are slaves to corruption.
Paul said this same thing in another place. In 2 Corinthians 4:16 he said, “We do not lose heart, but though our outer man (i.e., the body) is decaying (i.e., being corrupted) yet our inner man is being renewed day by day.” The word Paul uses for decay or corrupt here is the same one used in Luke 12:33 where Jesus said, Make sure your treasure is in heaven “where thief does not come near and moth does not corrupt.” Just like a coat in a warm, dark closet will get moth eaten and ruined, so our bodies in this fallen world are going to be ruined one way or the other. For all creation has been subjected to futility and enslaved to corruption while this age lasts. That is my first affirmation.
2. An Age of Deliverance and Redemption Is Coming
My second affirmation is this: there is an age coming when all the children of God, who have endured to the end in faith, will be delivered from all futility and corruption, spiritually and physically. According to verse 21, the hope in which God subjected creation was that some day “The creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God.” And verse 23 says that “We ourselves groan within ourselves waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.” It has not happened yet. We wait. But it will happen. “Our citizenship is in heaven from which we await a Savior, the Lord, Jesus Christ, who will transform the body of our lowliness to be like the body of his glory” (Philippians 3:20, 21). “In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet, for the trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised incorruptible and we shall be changed” (1 Corinthians 15:52). “He will wipe away every tear from our eyes, and there shall be no longer any death; and there shall be no longer any mourning or crying or pain; the first things have passed away” (Revelation 21:4).
There is coming a day when every crutch will be carved up, and every wheelchair melted down into medallions of redemption. And Merlin and Reuben and Jim and Hazel and Ruth and all the others among us will do cartwheels through the Kingdom of Heaven. But not yet. Not yet. We groan, waiting for the redemption of our bodies. But the day is coming and that is my second affirmation.
3. Christ Purchased, Demonstrated, and Gave a Foretaste of It
Third, Jesus Christ came and died to purchase our redemption, to demonstrate the character of that redemption as both spiritual and physical, and to give us a foretaste of it. He purchased our redemption, demonstrated its character, and gave us a foretaste of it. Please listen carefully, for this is a truth badly distorted by many healers of our day.
The prophet Isaiah foretold the work of Christ like this in 53:5–6 (a text which Peter applied to Christians in 1 Peter 2:24):
But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that made us whole, and with his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. (RSV)
The blessing of forgiveness and the blessing of physical healing were purchased by Christ when he died for us on the cross. And all those who give their lives to him shall have both of these benefits. But when? That is the question of today. When will we be healed? When will our bodies no longer be enslaved to corruption?
11 “For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people. 12 It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age.”
Titus 2:11-12
My life runs better when I learn to say “no.”
I can’t make it any simpler. We have become part of a culture that almost always says yes. To deny ourselves the fulfillment of our particular desires seems impossible– considering our track record. We pretty much seek out our particular pleasure, and then take our lumps and absorb all the consequences.
Things then, digress and “solidify” from this point. Deeply ingrained habits become almost impossible to break. We are now being held in a very certain bondage. And all because we can’t say “no”.
Perhaps this will become a learning point, when we start to say “no” to our desires. We can’t let temptation have its way, we must stand and say “no!” It is no sin to be tempted, Jesus was tempted, and yet did not sin against His Father.
When we consistently say no and to deny ourselves, we’re actually starting to obey and it’s then we begin to follow Him. Your discipleship depends on this.
“If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.”
Mark 8:34
The deep and earnest passion of our Father is that we learn to do this. To joyfully discover each morning we are “will-doers.” But in order to do this we must also be “no-sayers.”
There is an unholy trinity that is working against us: the world, our flesh, and Satan. When our enemy tempts us, we must object. We must take a stand against his schemes.
Will you just say “no” to the enemy? Can you say “no?” These are questions that only you can answer.
“My deepest awareness of myself is that I am deeply loved by Jesus Christ and I have done nothing to earn it or deserve it.”
― Brennan Manning, The Ragamuffin Gospel
This quote rings deep within this heart of mine. It echoes and sings with a confidence that is not logical or reasonable by any stretch of the imagination. But I’m learning that I need to consciously aware of his solid and steadfast love that he has for me. I sometimes forget, and when I finally remember I shake my head, and look around in kind of a stunned silence.
He loves me!
But I’m not the only one who is deeply loved. There are millions of others who are walking in this outrageous love. None are worthy; all have sinned. Those who are following are those who have renounced their feeble efforts at self-righteousness. It simply doesn’t work. (But sometimes it takes a while to work this out.)
I ask myself, “What if I got what I deserve?”
And when I follow this ‘line-of-thought’ I get a gnawing sense of doom– sort of a panicky fear. To get what I really deserve would be the most terrible thing I could ever know. For “I am the chief of sinners.” I believe my past sin would destroy most people.
“But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners.”
Romans 5:8
My mental health can be fairly disruptive to my spiritual health. My depression poisons everything. I suppose that at times I can be quite ‘trying’ to those closest to me. It can be frustrating but I have discovered that His grace is more than enough to hold me tight, and protect others as well.
And Jesus accepts me, receives me, loves me even if others can’t or won’t. I may be ‘defective’ to some, outcast by others, but I am never, ever alone. Jesus loves me– not for what I can do or how I function. He loves me unconditionally.
“See how very much our Father loves us, for he calls us his children, and that is what we are! But the people who belong to this world don’t recognize that we are God’s children because they don’t know him”
Broken Believers 