Category: Uncategorized

Discerning our “will” and God’s “will”

“I will be there.” 

“I will be praying for you”
“I will love you forever”
“I will not let you down.”

Have you ever made one of the above statements, or ones like them, only to fail to do what you said you would do?  I confess that I have done that more times than I’d like to admit.  Perhaps our intentions were well-meaning and something legitimate came up, or maybe you just forgot, or worse yet, maybe you had no intention of doing what you said you would do but you wanted to save face.  After all we are finite, in that our knowledge of things is limited, which is why we are instructed in James when we make plans/promises to say, “Lord willing,” because he may other plans for us.  But we’re not just finite, we’re also sinful, which means our desires are corrupted so that we may agree to do something because we are more interested in getting people to like us than being honest.

Whatever the reason for the breach of our promise, the aftermath of being on the short end of a person’s broken “will” still hurts.  As a church planter trying to grow a church, I often feel let down when I meet a new person who seems interested in our church and says they will come next week, but they don’t show up.  If it happens enough, I might even become desensitized to such promises of the “will” or worse, become cynical, whether I am justified or not.

This leads me to ask the question, “Is God like that?”  Our initial response is, “Of course God isn’t like that,” but I think each of us has a threshold where that belief remains intact until it is tested by a disturbing circumstance that leaves us wondering the validity and timing of God’s promises.  Certainly the psalmists wondered such things and you probably have as well.  What they found and what we need to find is that God’s “will” is sure and certain.  I love what the writer of Hebrews said in Hebrews 6:17-20:

So when God desired to show more convincingly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of his purpose, he guaranteed it with an oath, so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us.  We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain, where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf, having become a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.

Did you see what he said? “It is impossible for God to lie.”  In other words, it is impossible for God to say that he will do something and not do it.  Moses says it best in Numbers 23:19, “God is not man, that he should lie, or a son of man, that he should change his mind.  Has he said, and will he not do it?  Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it?”  My prayer for myself in 2010 is that I would believe the gospel promises of God more and more and that when I am confronted with making promises to others that I would remember the power to offer my “will” comes from God’s “will” through his gospel promises. 

Discerning our “will” and God’s “will”

“I will be there.” 

“I will be praying for you”
“I will love you forever”
“I will not let you down.”

Have you ever made one of the above statements, or ones like them, only to fail to do what you said you would do?  I confess that I have done that more times than I’d like to admit.  Perhaps our intentions were well-meaning and something legitimate came up, or maybe you just forgot, or worse yet, maybe you had no intention of doing what you said you would do but you wanted to save face.  After all we are finite, in that our knowledge of things is limited, which is why we are instructed in James when we make plans/promises to say, “Lord willing,” because he may other plans for us.  But we’re not just finite, we’re also sinful, which means our desires are corrupted so that we may agree to do something because we are more interested in getting people to like us than being honest.

Whatever the reason for the breach of our promise, the aftermath of being on the short end of a person’s broken “will” still hurts.  As a church planter trying to grow a church, I often feel let down when I meet a new person who seems interested in our church and says they will come next week, but they don’t show up.  If it happens enough, I might even become desensitized to such promises of the “will” or worse, become cynical, whether I am justified or not.

This leads me to ask the question, “Is God like that?”  Our initial response is, “Of course God isn’t like that,” but I think each of us has a threshold where that belief remains intact until it is tested by a disturbing circumstance that leaves us wondering the validity and timing of God’s promises.  Certainly the psalmists wondered such things and you probably have as well.  What they found and what we need to find is that God’s “will” is sure and certain.  I love what the writer of Hebrews said in Hebrews 6:17-20:

So when God desired to show more convincingly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of his purpose, he guaranteed it with an oath, so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us.  We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain, where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf, having become a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.

Did you see what he said? “It is impossible for God to lie.”  In other words, it is impossible for God to say that he will do something and not do it.  Moses says it best in Numbers 23:19, “God is not man, that he should lie, or a son of man, that he should change his mind.  Has he said, and will he not do it?  Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it?”  My prayer for myself in 2010 is that I would believe the gospel promises of God more and more and that when I am confronted with making promises to others that I would remember the power to offer my “will” comes from God’s “will” through his gospel promises. 

Posted via email from BRETT EUBANK