Finding God's Will? Pt 8
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Seek Godly Counsel
Seek Godly Counsel
One of the ways God leads us to right choices is through godly counsel.
14 Where there is no guidance, a people falls, but in an abundance of counselors there is safety.
22 Without counsel plans fail, but with many advisers they succeed.
18 Plans are established by counsel; by wise guidance wage war.
6 for by wise guidance you can wage your war, and in abundance of counselors there is victory.
15 The way of a fool is right in his own eyes, but a wise man listens to advice.
When it comes to the big choices we should not make a decision without gaining counsel.
If we want to get any help from counsel, we need to choose wise and careful counselors.
We should not expect to receive good counsel from people who are only going to tell us what we want to hear.
We should also beware of counselors who only tell us what THEY want us to hear.
Does good counsel involve telling people what they ought to do? Should you make people’s decisions for them?
When is the only appropriate time to tell people what is God’s will for their lives?
When a clear biblical requirement is at stake.
What is the main responsibility of giving good counsel?
To help people think through the decisions that they must make. We should guide people through the various considerations that ought to inform their decision.
What are the various considerations that we should point out to help people make their decision?
Biblical principles
Any circumstances that could affect their choice
Help people understand their own personal giftedness, abilities, and proclivities that might shape their decisions
In short, good counselors will play a supporting role, assisting people to exercise wisely their prerogatives as believer-priests before the Lord.
Counsel does not usually consist in telling other people what to do. Why not?
Only very immature people need or want to have decisions handed to them. Mature people should wish to make their own choices, and they should exercise sound judgement when they do.
Offering counsel is a matter of helping them to be sure that they have weighed every necessary consideration before making their choice.
When Proverbs speaks of a “multitude” of counselors, what kind of people should you seek counsel from?
People with knowledge, expertise, or insight into the kind of decision your’re making.
They should be people who know you. Why?
They should also be people with experience, often older, who have done lots of living and have shown that they know how to make good decisions.
Who are the best counselors for married people? Their spouse. Why?
Our spouses know us like no one else does. They usually understand our choices in greater detail than any other.
Can anyone speak from experience in this area? My wife is my wisest counselor. Her insights have helped me time and time again in making good decisions.
I would not dream of making a major decision without discussing it with her first. How is this different from the normal behavior of unsaved or immature husbands?
I also would not make a decision she was convinced was wrong. The process of home-shaping decisions is and ought to be shared.
Some Christian husbands might be tempted to think that sharing household decisions with their wife could violate marital submission (Eph. 5:22-24, 33).
It does not. Rather, for a husband to ensure that his wife has a voice in those decisions is one of the ways in which he implements the love that he owes to his wife (Eph. 5:25-33).
Even a wife who is by nature deferential needs to be involved in the decisions that affect her future, and a loving husband will make sure she is.
A husband who fails to solicit his wife’s counsel, or one who neglects or ignores it when it is offered, is simply a fool!
15 The way of a fool is right in his own eyes, but a wise man listens to advice.
However, the same thing can be said of wives who neglect their husband’s counsel!
Besides spouses, parents often make the best counselors. Believing parents are best. The ones who know the Lord and the Bible well are some of the best counselors in the world!
True friends also make wonderful counselors. What makes a true friend?
5 Better is open rebuke than hidden love.
Someone who is willing to wound you when necessary.
Pastors, spouses, parents, or friends cannot counsel you by making decisions for you. What they can do is to make sure you’ve examined every legitimate factor that ought to affect your decision. They can point out any considerations that you may have neglected. They can talk with you, pray for you, and help you to weigh the various elements that affect your decision.
On rare occasions we may be confronted with decisions that must be made in isolation. Under normal circumstances, however, we ought to surround ourselves with as many wise counselors as we can. We should talk to them freely, hear them fully, and weigh their counsel carefully. Our counselors cannot take responsibility for our decisions, but they can help us to find God’s leading.
Application Questions:
Who are the first three people whom you might ask for counsel in your most important decisions? Why these three?
Have you ever made a decision for which you did not seek counsel but later wished you had?
Can you envision any important decision for which you might not seek counsel? Why not?
Consider Your Circumstances
Consider Your Circumstances
Wrong ways of knowing God’s will:
Inner voices
Dreams
“Fleeces”
Misuse of Scripture
Biblical principles for knowing God’s will:
Begin by obeying God’s will as revealed in Scripture
Prioritize faithfulness to duties
Bathe decisions in prayer
Gather all the information you can that affects your decision
Seek the counsel of people who know you and who know God
Next principle is to pay attention to circumstances.
Some Christians disagree with this principle. Why? They believe that walking by faith is opposed to walking by sight, and they want to walk by faith. So, walking by taking heed to one’s circumstances is a failure to walk by faith.
This is true up to a point.
When is it right for a believer to ignore circumstances and instead trust God?
17 By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises was in the act of offering up his only son,
18 of whom it was said, “Through Isaac shall your offspring be named.”
19 He considered that God was able even to raise him from the dead, from which, figuratively speaking, he did receive him back.
When biblical commands or promises appear to contradict circumstances, then we owe loyalty to whatever God says.
When our circumstances mean that taking God at His word will costs us everything, then we ought to obey God anyway.
If we are not careful, we can sometimes forget that the Christian life is a life of faith. God does lead us to make sacrifices for the furtherance of the gospel and for the wellbeing of our fellow believers. The will of God is not always for us to do the thing that will result in the greatest personal profit and advancement.
So when we talk about paying attention to circumstances, that does not mean that we should always do the thing that most obviously advances our own interests. Examples?
We must walk by faith, but what must be the object of our Christian faith?
We cannot rightly place our faith in anything except what God has said.
If we know what God has said, however, then do we have to ask about His will? No we only have to do what He has told us.
We only wonder how God is leading us when we don’t know any biblical revelation that would make our decision for us.
So is it right to say “I’m walking by faith” when we have no divine revelation to basis our decision on?
Is it right to assert our own will and then act as if we had a promise from God?
Our own impressions and decisions are not proper objects of faith. If we insist upon following our own will in spite of circumstances that render it unattainable, then we cannot claim to be exercising faith!
Example: I believe God is leading me to take over as the primary church accompanist from now on. What is the problem? But, I really feel like this is what God wants me to do, so I am going to walk by faith!
What is my faith being place in? A feeling! Can I place my faith in my own personal feelings and claim to be walking by faith? Should my circumstances then aid me in making my decision. Being willing to play the piano is not enough. It would take years of practice that, at this point in my life, is not reasonably attainable.
My circumstances ought to tell me that God is not leading me to make such a decision. If I do volunteer to be an accompanist and persist in that decision, then my perseverance is not an act of faith but of arrogance!
Paying attention to circumstances is simply a matter of common sense.
Do we have any examples of this in the Scriptures?
9 Since much time had passed, and the voyage was now dangerous because even the Fast was already over, Paul advised them,
10 saying, “Sirs, I perceive that the voyage will be with injury and much loss, not only of the cargo and the ship, but also of our lives.”
Paul used common sense- don’t sail from Fair Havens until spring!
21 Since they had been without food for a long time, Paul stood up among them and said, “Men, you should have listened to me and not have set sail from Crete and incurred this injury and loss.
He even reminded them that they should have listened to reason!
Circumstances should indeed be taken into account when seeking God’s leading. Simply heeding our circumstances can prevent some very bad decisions.
Illustration: Jared and Rachel trailer
God expects us to exercise sound judgement. Sound judgement requires us to take account of circumstances. When we are seeking God’s direction for decisions in our lives, our circumstances are among the factors that God expects us to consider.
Now, having said that, we must also add that circumstances may not determine our choices. Many of our best decisions will lead us into difficult circumstances. Example: John Paton.
We need to weigh circumstances with a bit of skill and discernment. We need not take every opportunity that we are offered. We will walk past many open doors without going through them. By the same token, not every closed door is bolted shut. Some may open when we rattle the handle or turn the lock, and others may open latter on.
Sometimes circumstances may not make our decision for us, but we should always examine the circumstances and take them into account.
Application Questions:
What role do you think that “closed doors” and “open doors” should play in making decisions?
Should you go through every open door? Is that even possible?
What might God be saying when He closes a door?