Knowing God's will begins with a personal commitment to Jesus Christ, as no other steps are possible without this foundational faith. For Christians, understanding God's will requires presenting oneself as a living sacrifice, yielding one's mind, affections, and body to Christ's service. This transformation, moving away from conformity to the world, allows one to discern God's good, acceptable, and perfect will through the Word of God and the Holy Spirit. Ultimately, knowing God's will involves loving and obeying God, becoming like Christ, and actively witnessing to others, all lived out by faith day by day.
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A number have been asking how we may have some knowledge of the will of God, and for that reason we shall try to think through this matter for a little while this morning. But before we turn to God's word, there are one or two preliminary remarks that one must make. The first is this. It's quite hopeless, quite useless for a man or a woman, a boy or a girl, who has never committed himself to the Lord Jesus to seek God's will for his life. There are some people who think of God as the ancient people used to think of an oracle.
They could go to God to get an answer to some of their problems and then go and do whatever they wanted to. There are other people today who think of God as someone to whom they can turn when they get into a tough spot. when they get into a foxhole, when they're in great danger, and then they ask God's deliverance, they ask for light, the knowledge of the way to go, and then they go happily on their own way. God does not deal with people on that basis. If you and I are not Christians, God's will for us is to put our trust in the Lord Jesus Christ.
Because apart from that, we are in a state of enmity against God. We are out of fellowship with Him. We are not living for Him. We do not belong to Him. And if there are any of us here who sort of sentimentally and say, oh, I'd like to know God's will for my life, but you are not prepared to commit yourself to the Lord Jesus, God is not going to reveal His will to you. Because you don't belong to Him. The first step in knowing God's will is to put our trust in the Lord Jesus Christ who died for us. So if you're not a Christian and you want to know God's will for you, it's quite simple.
Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. That's God's will. And until you've taken that step, no other steps possible. But then, as Christians, Is that all there is to it? We're saved? Our sins are forgiven? No, we can live as we please? No, that isn't so. For if we're really going to know God's will, something else has got to be true of us. We've got to be yielded to the Lord Jesus Himself. Will you turn to that very familiar passage in Romans chapter twelve, verses one and two?
For I'd like us to think about this for a few minutes. I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service or acceptable worship, and be not conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind that ye may prove or that ye may know what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. In order that you and I may know God's will which is good which is perfect as God is good and God is perfect and will be acceptable if we're yielded to the Lord Jesus, what must be true of you and me?
First of all, we must present ourselves to the Lord as a living sacrifice. Not a dead sacrifice. Christ died for you and me. But as it were a perpetual burnt offering, you and I have got to present ourselves to the Lord Jesus as an act of worship as an act of devotion and this is something I believe that can be a definite step a definite commitment but then it goes on to be a day by day matter just as we believe and keep right on believing we trust and keep right on trusting we yield and keep right on yielding and frankly for myself if I'm going to know God's will in my life and enjoy the blessing of His presence and the joy of all that He is, I find it necessary each day afresh and anew to commit myself, body, soul and spirit, to the Lord Jesus.
We belong to Him. We've been bought with a price. We're not our own. We acknowledge that fact. And men and women and girls and fellows, if you and I have not yielded ourselves to the Lord Jesus, we're not going to know His will. Because basically we're living willful lives. We're going our own way, and we're asking God to help us go our own way. We're doing what we want to do, and we're asking God to help us to do what we want to do, and that's not God's way. We belong to Him. We're to Heal to Him. Our life is to be a continuous burnt offering, a continuous sacrifice offered up to God for His perfect will.
and we are told that we are to present our bodies to the Lord Jesus. Isn't that a strange thing? And yet we read of the Lord Jesus himself he could say, A body hast thou prepared me? Lo, I come to do thy will, O my God. And in the body that was prepared for the Lord Jesus he offered himself up to God. And in the bodies that God has given us We offer ourselves up as a living sacrifice to the Lord Jesus. But why our bodies? Because you and I have no existence, no life outside our physical bodies in this world. It is not merely that we have a body, but we are physical as we are spiritual.
We are body and spirit or body, soul and spirit. And it's in this body we live and move and have our being in this physical dimension or world, and so we have to offer these bodies of ours to the Lord Jesus Christ. What do our bodies consist of? We'll start with the most difficult area, I believe, and that is our mind. I find so many people who are unwilling to surrender their minds to the Lord Jesus Christ. They're unwilling to think God's thoughts after Him, particularly university students. That's the most difficult area of surrender.
They want the right to think the way they want to think. But that's not possible. We've got to even bring our mind into subjection and obedience, every thought to the obedience of the Lord Jesus. And this isn't easy. As a matter of fact, surrender involves the surrender of the right of independent thought as well as independent action. Frankly, I am very troubled at what I see in the United States and elsewhere today among evangelical Christians, because as more and more young people are getting higher education, less and less are they willing to surrender their minds to the Lord Jesus. They are not willing to accept the Bible as inerrant.
They are not willing to accept the Bible as authoritative. They say, I believe this and this, but that I won't believe. And this is in high evangelical circles to an increasing degree today. And this is going to reap a whirlwind of awful destruction. If you and I are going to know God's will, there must be a surrendered mind. There must be a yielded will that we will to do God's will. As a matter of fact, God wants to bring us to that position where we find our greatest joy... and our greatest satisfaction in knowing and doing God's will, which is perfect and good. It has to do with our affections. It has to do with our desires, the desires of our hearts.
And some of us are troubled at times with impure and unworthy desires, and again these must be brought by faith to the Lord Jesus, asking Him to deal with them. Excuse me speaking frankly, but we're living in a strange day. I'm convinced that in the surrender of our body it involves the yieldedness of every part of our body even our sex organs to the Lord Jesus for they belong to him not just for our personal pleasure and indulgence but to him we must speak frankly about these things my appetites my time is not mine if I belong to the Lord Jesus My talents are not mine if I belong to the Lord Jesus.
My intelligent quotient is not mine if I belong to the Lord Jesus. All is to be yielded to him. After all, he bought us with his precious blood. We belong to him. Why not recognize that he's bought us? And why not say, yes, Lord Jesus, I belong to thee, body, soul, and spirit. And the result will be, that if we are thus healed of the Lord Jesus, we will not be conformed to this world. Our life will not be shaped after the pattern and standard of this world, but rather after the Lord Jesus Himself. And because all this is true, there will come a glorious and wonderful transformation.
transformed from one degree of glory unto another degree of glory, even as by the Lord the Spirit. The Lord wants to transform us. He wants to make us different. Oh, I wish I could help us all to understand this. It is God's will for you and for me, every one of us, that because we belong to the Lord Jesus, we should be different. Are you prepared to be different? We are subject to tremendous social pressures to conform to our peer group, to those to whom we belong. In school we want to dress like everybody else, do what everybody else does, go where everybody else goes.
And for those of us who are in our teens, it's a terrible battle to be prepared to stand and be different for Christ's sake. Or are we ready to do that? Are we prepared to be like our peer group, the Lord Jesus and those who belong to Him. We are supposed to be different because we're Christians. We are to be transformed by the renewing of our mind. We're not to be patterned and shaped and conformed by this world or to this world. And then we shall know what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.
So I would suggest before we can get into particulars and details, two things must be true of you and me if we're really going to know God's will. We've got to be born again. We've got to have taken that first step of obeying the command of the Gospel and believing on the Lord Jesus. And then we've got to surrender our bodies to Him, ourselves to Him, a living sacrifice. Oh, what a thrilling thing to be able to do this for the Lord's sake. Not to be conformed to this world, transformed by the Spirit, a renewed mind, a new point of view, a different outlook, a totally different orientation.
And then we know what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. Now if by God's grace that's true of you and me, then we are in the way of knowing God's will. Now then, practically and briefly, for time flies, how does God speak to us? How can we know his will? In this age of grace we've been given two wonderful, wonderful gifts. God's great gift to us is the Lord Jesus Christ. and we have two great gifts that Father and Son have given to us, the Word of God, written, the Bible, and the Spirit of God who comes to live in our hearts when we put our trust in the Lord Jesus Christ.
And we need the two, operative in our lives, the written Word and the Spirit of God, if we are to know God's will. This all on the basis that we are Christians who are yielded to the Lord Jesus Christ himself. And I have no hesitation in saying that if you and I are yielded Christians and the Spirit of God and the Word of God are reigning and ruling in our hearts, we shall know God's will. But one other thing one must say, and it's this, we are called upon to walk by faith, not by sight.
And in the knowledge of God's will, faith in God is always necessary and always must be operative. In other words, God does not give us a kind of a formula whereby suddenly we'll see in bright light the next thing we're to do. That would be walking by sight. But rather God wants to bring us to that position where we have faith in Him, The light of the Spirit of God through the Scriptures is shining into our hearts and we are convinced that this is the way that God wants us to take. It's in conformity to the Word of God. Conditions around us seem to indicate that this is God's will and by faith we take the step.
But it's always a step of faith. There's always got to be the element of faith. We do not walk by sight, we walk by faith. But within our hearts there will be the witness of the Spirit of God in relation to the teaching of the Word of God that this is the way we want to take. And then afterwards as we look back we can say, yes, the Lord did lead me. The only absolute certainty in terms of the sort of walking by sight I have is to look back over past years and say, yes, the Lord really did lead me. But you see, we can trust God because God is a living God.
We can trust Him to keep us from going astray. We can trust Him to keep us from making a false step if we're in this wonderful relationship of yieldedness to Him. As I said the other night, there are some people who just take the word of God and neglect the spirit of God and they tend to become academic and rationalistic. And they're always throwing out texts like someone shooting peas out of a pea shooter. And then there are other people who neglect the Scriptures and they just depend upon what they call the Spirit of God and they become subjective and emotional and sentimental and imaginative and God said this to me and God said that to me and the boy says, well, this blonde, she's the one God's chosen for me and six months later it's a brunette and I sometimes say, God doesn't change his mind, something must be wrong somewhere.
No, it's the Spirit and the Word, the Word and the Spirit. Our authority is not tradition. Our authority is not a pope. Our authority is not a church. Our authority is the Word of God and the Spirit of God. Can anyone take the Bible and get instructions from God? No. Do you realize that the Bible is a closed book to an unconverted person? For the natural man does not receive the Spirit of God The things of God, neither can he know them, for they are spiritually discerned. A natural man cannot really understand God's truth until he's born again.
And I can give you many stories illustrating the truth of that verse from First Corinthians two, fourteen and fifteen. But even as Christians, we just can't go to the Word of God with our enlightened intelligence. Every time we go to God's Word, we need to use the words of the psalmist. Oh, Lord, open thou my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law. Lord, speak to me, Dete, through thy word. I do hope each of us have a meeting place with God every day. It's hard, hard to make time for God, but you make time for breakfast. You make time to clean your teeth. Why not make time each day to spend time with the Lord over the Word?
And as you go to the Word of God, lift up your heart and say, Lord Jesus, naturally I'm blind. Sin creeps in so easily. Lord, give me a word from thyself through the Scriptures today, and God will speak to you to reassure and to guide, for that's what He does. The Bible is God's word objectively. Whether I receive it or not, I can say this is the word of God. This book is the word of God. But because it is God's word, it can become God's personal word to me as God the Holy Spirit speaks. And that's the reason why we need to depend upon the Holy Spirit to speak to us through the word of God.
and then it becomes a divine imperative it becomes the voice of God in our hearts and lives and we all we do understand don't we the Bible isn't just to give us information the purpose of all the information and truth of the Word of God is that we may know God's will that we may do God's will and that we may become the men and women that God wants us to be or that this may be true of you and me in every respect Now, how do we know God's will through God's Word? Well, of course, we're confident in God's Word. We believe it's the Word of God which liveth and abideth forever.
We believe the Word of God is true. It is authoritative. It's divinely inspired. It is inerrant. It is infallible. And it's by faith, we know, having confidence in God and confidence in His Word. I made a statement the other day that all the will of God for your life and mine is in the Word of God. I wanted to have asked, how could that be true? And I've tried to suggest to you that the Word of God is a book of principles. I'm going to suggest just a few of them as guidelines in a moment or two. And the Spirit of God takes these basic principles representing God's will and applies them to our lives.
and then by faith we go forward and we can be absolutely sure of the way that God wants us to take. It's in accordance with His will. May I suggest three sets of guidelines to you? These are basic things and I think in terms of these things we understand everything else in life. What is God's will for me in relation to God Himself? We've been told that already this morning. We are to love God. Isn't it a wonderful thing? God wants me to love him. More than that, we are to worship him.
And what does worship mean? It really comes from the word worthship. We are to appreciate the intrinsic worth of the living God, all His greatness, all His glory, all His majesty, all His love, all His grace, all His holiness, all His compassion. We appreciate how wonderful God is, and our hearts are bursting with a thrill and joy of the wonder of God, and we just tell Him so. In other words, that God becomes the most important being the most significant factor, the thing of the most intrinsic worth in the world.
Some people see the latest model racing car and they say, Boy, isn't that terrific! Or someone sees some new fashion of dress and she says, Isn't that wonderful? These things are terrific and wonderful, but for the Christian there's something of supreme worth. that excites us just as much as a kid gets excited over a hot rod. I don't want to be a reverend. But we become excited and thrilled over the wonder and glory and perfection of God. And our heart moves out in excitement and joy at the wonder of God.
That's worship. In reverence and holy fear. God wants us to love Him. God wants us to appreciate Him. God wants us to obey Him. So all the details of life have got to be seen through the glass of God and God's will for Himself. What is God's will for me? God wants me to be separated from the world, not to be conformed to the world. That one little principle shall settle all sorts of do's and don'ts in our lives if we make business with God. Should I go here? Should I do that? Should I wear this?
What does God want me to be? He doesn't want me to be conformed to the world, but separated from the world. And if we honestly apply that principle, lots of questions will settle themselves automatically. He wants us to live in fellowship with Him. But my friendship with this person or that person, I can't have fellowship with God when I'm with that person. And may I say that friendships are one of the great factors that lead people away from the Lord Jesus. It's one thing for little boys and girls of five and six and seven and eight to play with people with children their own age.
But when we begin to get on to our teens, If we make close friends with unconverted people, they will pull us down. If I was standing on a table and you were on the floor, would it be easier for me to lift you up to the table or for you to give me a jerk and drag me down to the floor? You know the answer. and if you're going to spend time having close friends with unconverted people you're not going to be having fellowship with the Lord Jesus now I'm not talking about witnessing to someone to win them to Christ but don't kid yourself lots of us say oh I'm running around with him I hope he'll become a Christian but we're just kidding ourselves we're running around because we like that person our chief intent and thought is not to win them to Christ and incidentally it's a pretty good rule in witnessing, I think it's better for boys and their teens to witness to boys and girls to girls.
There are a few exceptions, but I've always got a rather a question mark when I see a boy running around with a certain girl and he says, I'm trying to witness to her. Well, maybe he is, but maybe he isn't. And then the Lord wants us to grow in grace. You and I take good nourishing food in order that we'll grow physically. We've got to take good nourishing food with all the most favorable circumstances and environment that we may grow spiritually. So ask yourself, will this help me to grow spiritually?
Will this amusement, will this pleasure, will this friendship help me to become like the Lord Jesus? But you say it's an awfully tough test, isn't it? It's terribly tough. It's impossible, as a matter of fact, unless we have yielded ourselves to the Lord Jesus. But you see, once we're yielded to the Lord Jesus, the impossible becomes possible, and that's what the Lord wants of us. He wants us to live holy lives. He wants us to have victory over sin, over our sinful flesh. The Lord Jesus overcame the flesh. He overcame the world.
he overcame Satan and his victory may be your victory and mine they overcame by the blood of the Lamb of the Word of the testimony we may be overcomers through the Lord Jesus and then in relation to others the world around us we are to be witnesses we're to go and preach the gospel may I say this this seems a horribly narrow thing to say but I must say it because I'm sure it's true the only real relationship we should have with an unconverted person is to witness to them of the Lord Jesus Christ and to seek them to win them to Christ as a Christian you and I have got no business in having close friendships with unconverted people for our own sakes now there are just three guidelines where at time one could give much more What is God's will for God Himself to love, to worship and obey Him?
What is God's will for me that I might become just like the Lord Jesus Christ Himself? What is God's will for me to others that I might witness to them and win them to Christ? Let me ask you a question. Are you prepared to accept that sort of will for your life? Are you prepared to yield to the Lord Jesus? on those terms. If we begin to think and live along these lines, yield unto the Lord Jesus Christ, the open word of God before us, depending upon the Spirit of God to speak to us, we shall know God's will.
Not God's will for twenty-five years ahead, but God's will for today. And tomorrow God's will for tomorrow. And the next day God's will for that next day. And then looking back, we'll be able to sing out of full hearts all the way my Savior led me. And he will lead you. And girls and fellows and men and women, there is no need for any of us to go astray. But we must will. to know and to do God's will. How many of us are really prepared for God's will on those terms? There are no other terms.