The Will of God and the Mystery of Life
I’m sure at some point in your life, you’ve probably heard phrases like this:
“Why is this happening to me?”
“What did I do to deserve this?”
OR even, more religiously,
“Is God punishing me for what I’ve done?”
But most plainly, this is what these people are saying:
“I don’t know God’s will for my life.”
I think this is probably the biggest question for most of us Christians. What did God put me here on Earth to do? What should I be doing with my time that is most in line with His Will? Am I doing what He tells me to do?
These are simply general questions, but often we find those questions asked in ways during important crossroads in our lives.
What job should I take?
Should I marry my boyfriend?
Should I join a ministry?
Should we have kids?
And the list goes on and on.
But as I’ve mentioned earlier, it all boils down to this question, “What is really God’s will for my life?”
It’s a big question needing to be answered. Let me offer my thoughts:
While the Bible tells us a lot of things, you’ll realize that it never really answers any of those questions that are pertinent to you. Sure, you know that you shouldn’t commit immorality, but how about something like ‘which job should I take?’
Well, my answer to that is: there is no answer. There isn’t meant to be a correct answer to this. You see, much of life is a mystery, and God meant for it to be that way.
We have to embrace that mystery in our lives, and learn to trust Him in the dark.
What we shouldn’t do, however, is to try to create answers for ourselves.
Isaiah 50:10-11
“ Who among you fears the LORD?
Who obeys the voice of His Servant?
Who walks in darkness
And has no light?
Let him trust in the name of the LORD
And rely upon his God.
Look, all you who kindle a fire,
Who encircle yourselves with sparks:
Walk in the light of your fire and in the sparks you have kindled—
This you shall have from My hand:
You shall lie down in torment.
The Bible makes it clear that when we don’t have answers, the one thing NOT to do is to ‘light fires.’ What it means is: don’t fall back on your own wisdom for answers.
Today, the world has lighted many fires. Dating websites come up with love calculators, astrologers use star signs, and people consult fortune tellers, and so on, all with the intention of unraveling what God has made mystery.
I’ve had one Christian come ask me, “do you think a God loving Christians should take a job in with regular hours so that he has time to serve God, or a job that is hectic and he will have very little time to serve God?” Of course, his tone told me he believed deeply it was the first answer.
And that applies to every other question you can ask even as a Christian.
“I’ve having a hard time with my boyfriend, should I carry on or give up now?”
And as I told the no. 1 fan of my blog, you can’t use your head to answer these questions. You can argue both ways for almost any case, and even bring in Scripture to argue both sides of the case.
But what you need now is to trust in the Lord, says the Bible. How to trust in the Lord? Listen to the still small voice of the Holy Spirit about what to do, trust in Him in the darkness. But let me get back to that later.
But God is silent to me now. What if making the wrong choice takes me out of the will of God?
No doubt, this is a constant worry in the hearts of many a believer. All of us sincere believers who love God want to walk in His will. But most of the time, we’re not just simply not clear about what He wants at the moment.
Let me offer some words for comfort. In the Great Divorce, CS Lewis explains a very complex concept of Heaven and Hell through his allegory. In the Great Divorce, a group of people from Hell visit the outskirts of Heaven, where the spirits of Heaven try to convince them to follow them into the Kingdom.
So in the story, George Macdonald tells CS Lewis, if a person chooses to leave the “Hell” and follow the spirits into Heaven, then the “Hell” would just have been a purgatory, a holding place for a soul before he enters into Heaven . If however, they reject the invitation into Heaven, then the place that they’ve been would have been Hell all along.
It means that the choices we make in our lives today give context to our past choices.
Example from the Bible: the story of Joseph.
Joseph went to the lowest of lowest points in his life to the very top through his life process. But when did his life make sense? At the very end of it. Only at the very end of it could Joseph say, “You meant it for evil, but God meant it for good.” Let me say that again:
Joseph’s life only made sense at the end of it!
Did he make the wrong choice in telling his brothers about his dreams of greatness? I mean, after all, he wouldn’t have gotten into trouble if he kept to himself, right?
Did he make the wrong choice in not choosing to have an affair with the lady of the house? He might have promoted to the head of the house, since everything he did, prospered, right?
I hope you’re getting what I’m driving at. The thing is, whether something is the right or wrong choice is never known in a specific point in time. You can never decide that something was right or wrong based on its immediate consequences.
So I say, whether your life makes sense at all or not, whether you are in God’s Will or not, is not dependent on what has already been done before; it in fact, is dependent on the choices you make today.
If you’ve been trusting God, your life will make eventually make sense. At the gates of Heaven, the purpose of every suffering, every tribulation, every victory and defeat will become clear in your eyes.
Your life will only make sense at the end of it IF you have been trusting God.
Instead of asking, am I in the Will of God, ask: Am I trusting Him today?
The Express Will of God
Honestly, God has already told us His Will in the Bible.
Living in the Will of God is really tough, but simple.
The Bible already states to us how we should live very clearly in the Bible. All that, treating your neighbor as yourself, don’t go stealing, lying and worshipping idols. Just do what it says, and don’t violate the express commandments of the Lord. AND most importantly, Love the Lord your God with all your heart soul and strength.
I love the simplicity by which Mother Teresa makes the Christian life.
“Spend one hour each day in adoration of the Lord, and never do what you know is wrong. Do that, and you’ll be fine.”
Before you ask God for the things like which job to choose and which girl to pick, ask yourself, are you doing what He already is telling you to do through the Bible?
Are you spending time in prayer, praising and worshipping Him? Are you serving and living in love?
What I find is that, the people who spend time in the Presence of God do not have these questions. They don’t ask too many questions about the job nor the girl nor the next decision to make. They just simply know as the Spirit speaks. Like how you know that you have the Holy Spirit, you just simply know the next step to take.
The Holy Spirit gives clarity
The Holy Spirit is the opener of eyes. To the one who does nothing of this sort, there will be many questions; there will be confusing thoughts, complex decision making processes, many weights and balances involved.
This is the veil upon every single person whose eyes are not open in the Spirit. The world creates complex thinking upon complex thinking in a bid to light a fire, to use worldly wisdom to solve heavenly things, but when the Spirit comes upon you, momentarily, the veil is lifted and you can ‘see.’
So to the person who’s confused, who’s unsure about his/her next step, being concerned about living in His Will. What I say is this: Do what He tells you to do. Pray to Him, seek Him, worship and praise Him, do what is right, and you will have your answers.
Enter into the presence behind the veil and I promise, you will see what you need to see.
