Success? God's will

We must not presume that our future is under our control but rather we must trust in the will of God for our lives and pray for His will to be done.

Intro

we have been looking into where God is leading us as a church, and why that matters. We looked into why we feel God has called us here, our purpose.

At Cornerstone, we exist to, Glorify God as we love each other and make disciples.

we have looked into what we are doing here, our Mission.

…to worship God together while sharing God’s love as His disciples in our community.

We looked into what it looks like to Glorify God in all we do, how we can worship God as the body of Christ in all things, what it looks like to love each other how we are really to Disciple others. In all that we do, it should line up with these things. now the last thing we look at is our vision statement.

Our Vision statement shows us what success looks like. It is not seeing the future, but brings clarity as to what we are about. If we accomplish our mission what would this look like in the lives of people. we are going to spend some time on this to see what God is calling us to, and invite you to get on board with where God is leading us a church. We invite you to join us on this journey.

…to see God’s heavenly will being done through love, service, discipleship,and submission. Love, Serve, Grow, Submit

Just imagine, what it would look like if we all pulled together to accomplish what God has called us here to do. Again not as if we are trying to peer into a crystal ball to see the future but to bring clarity as to why we do this and to get excited about what we could become.

first we look into the will of God, what does this mean for us anyways? We hear the phrase “God’s will” being thrown around a lot in more conservative circles. When we are praying we sometimes pray for healing but end it “but God’s will be done”. But do we actually know what it means to see God’s will done or want God’s will to be done.

We believe that successfully following the Mission and purpose God has called us to means that we will be walking in and following the will of the Lord. But the question that keeps rolling through my mind is what is God’s will and how is that we can even know the will of God? One of the things that came to my mind as I was preparing for this is the sin of presumption, presuming to know what our future will hold without seeking God.

I remember being like this after Bible college. I went into college not having a clue what I was going to do with my life, thinking that maybe I was going to go for 1 year. Then after 3 years I wanted to go into ministry. I had my life planned out, I knew what I wanted to do. I told the school I was going to do a 4th year internship and told Millar. They apparently prayed about all the 4th year applicants and they didn't think I was ready yet and turned me down. Well these where all my plans, I was devastated. The thing I didn't do though was seek the Lord and His will, all the plans that I had made where my plans and not the Lords.

Imagine what it would like like if we where all following the heavenly will of God in all the things that we do. It is amazing to think about. But you may have the same questions that I do, what is the will of God and how on earth do we seek it? This is what we are going to look through today.

The sin of presumption - 13-14

I want to quote a definition of God’s will for you. Wayne Grudem in His Systematic Theology Textbook defines God’s will as God’s will is that attribute of God whereby he approves and determines to bring about every action necessary for the existence and activity of himself and all creation

Wayne A. Grudem, Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Biblical Doctrine (Leicester, England; Grand Rapids, MI: Inter-Varsity Press; Zondervan Pub. House, 2004), 211.

This is saying that God’s will is the Reason by which everything happens. But before we get to much into what the will of God is I want to look at the other side. We are going to be going through James 4:13-17 as it gives a very good example of God’s will.

This passage starts out by dealing with the sin of presumption when dealing with the will of God. James 4:13-14

James 4:13–14 (CSB)

Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will travel to such and such a city and spend a year there and do business and make a profit.” Yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring—what your life will be! For you are like vapor that appears for a little while, then vanishes.

There is a danger in the sin of presumption. What does that mean though? If the God’s will is God’s approving and determining every action for the existence of everything then the sin of presumption is the idea that we can do this on our own without the help of God. It is the idea that by some miracle we can run our own lives, figure out our own future make our own way, pave pour own trail. You know the saying “when God closes a door He opens a window”? Well when I tried to presume I could lead my own life God had to slam the door pretty hard before I came to my senses and actually sought Him and what He wanted for me.

Lets go back to verse 13 to see what we can learn from this. It starts out by saying Come Now. I like the wording here, it is like saying look here child, listen up, or Like God told Job to sit down stop talking and listen. Again, the sin of presumption is thinking that we can chart out own course in life. just look at this, The presumption of the people in this passage is that James 4:13 “Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we We will go to such and such a city and We will spend a year there and We will be doing business and We will make a profit.

you see the sin here is that “We” or better yet “I” somehow think we can plan our own lives and chart our own course while being children of God. Part of being sinful humans is that our pride gets in the way and we start to think this way, I can do it all without anyone help. but there is a reason why this makes no sense even for us to think we can plan our own way.

James 4:14 CSB

Yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring—what your life will be! For you are like vapor that appears for a little while, then vanishes.

This makes it even more hilarious. How on earth do you think we can figure out the will of God for the future for our lives when we have no idea what tomorrow holds? Our life is so temporary and we have no control over what is going to happen why would we even begin to think we can presume to plan our on life. There are millions of dollars spent every year on trying to determine what the future will hold for our lives. Astrology, palm reading, star signs and such. people are trying to see what the future holds for us when Jesus says that we need to focus on something else and trust in someone else.

The alternative - vs 15

The sin of presuming to think we can determine our own future apart from the will of God. with that being said does that mean we have free will then even? I cant get into this to much but free will and God’s all knowing work together. We have been given the choice, but God knows what we are going to choose for He has all things under control. What I have learned is that when I try to plan my own future apart from seeking God It never usually ends well for me. One thing to know when it comes to God’s will and His plan for us. We can not mess up God’s plan. God is not in Heaven and thinking that “oh no, Michael messed up my plan again, on to plan f I guess”.

So if this is what we are to go away from then what is the alternative?

James 4:15 CSB

Instead, you should say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.”

Don’t we all pray like that? instead of presuming that we can determine our own future what this says is that we need to ask for the Lord’s will for our life. so what we are to do then is to come to the Lord and ask what His will is for our lives for we don’t usually know until we come to him. Even then there are time where we are taking one step at a time in prayer hoping that we are doing the right thing. I want to explore for a minute what this looks like.

God’s will means is the ultimate reason why everything happens the way that it does. There are many other factors at play here but in general all things happen the way they do according to the will of God. We can see partly what the will of God is by looking at the nature and character of God. You see the thing is that God can not act contrary to His nature. God is both the God of love and the God of wrath against all those who chose to refuse to follow Jesus. God is patient and long-suffering and giving people a chance to turn to Him but this will not last for ever. This and so much more. So there are things that God can not do, that is to act opposite of His nature. We have but to read the word of God to see the part of what the will of God is.

the bible is clear that there are also secret things, God’s secret will that we will never know.

Deuteronomy 29:29 CSB

The hidden things belong to the Lord our God, but the revealed things belong to us and our children forever, so that we may follow all the words of this law.

There are certain things about God that we will never know this side of earth. The way God runs the universe, how everything works the way that it does. This is God’s secret will. You see God is free to act the way that He wants, He is under no external restraint whatsoever. He is all powerful, and all knowing and we are called to trust that all things will work out for His glory. What this calls for is trust and dependence on someone other then ourselves, that we do not really have quite the grasp on life that we may have thought. But one thing that we need to remember is though God’s knows the evil that is going to happen and He can use it for His good purpose God does not bring about evil. It is our free will and Our sin that brings evil.

Ezekiel 33:11 CSB

Tell them, ‘As I live—this is the declaration of the Lord God—I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that the wicked person should turn from his way and live. Repent, repent of your evil ways! Why will you die, house of Israel?’

This is but scratching the surface and I encourage you to come talk to me if you would like to know more.

The problem with Presumption - 16-17

the last 2 verses remind us that we should not boast and think we know what our lives will hold, that in our pride we can actually understand what is going on. James 4:16-17

James 4:16–17 CSB

But as it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. So it is sin to know the good and yet not do it.

Our own arrogance can lead to sin. We know the good we ought to do so why aren't we doing it? This is the big problem with the sin of presumption, casting aside the one who knows the good we ought to do the one who created the world and yet we constantly thumb our nose at God.

So What?

As usual we end with a summary of how this should change our lives. What are some things we should work on when trying to figure out God’s heavenly will?

We cant presume to think that we might know and plan our own future without seeking God.

This passage tells us that due to the temporal nature of our lives, we are here today and gone tomorrow how arrogant it is to think we can even plan our own lives. but how is it that we can even begin to understand the will of God.

It is okay to pray “if it is your will”

Some Christians tell people it is a cop-out, or a lack of faith when we pray for the will of the Lord to be done. But the reality is that we are told to ask for God’s will to be done. There are a couple sides to this. The first is that we can have great confidence when asking the Lord for something that scripture promises to us. For example God already promised through scripture that if we ask for wisdom we will be given wisdom, so ask in confidence knowing it is Gd’s will.

Then there is the other side, that sometimes there are things we do not know and it is okay, and we have been told by Jesus to ask for the Lord will to be done. Grudem in His theology book phrased it well. But it is always right to add, either explicitly or at least in the attitude of our heart, “Nevertheless, if I am wrong in asking this, and if this is not pleasing to you, then do as seems best in your sight,” or, more simply, “If it is your will.

We must be seeking the will of the Lord in Payer and through the scriptures.

We can see the will of the Lord through what we read of His character and His nature in the Bible. God will never act contrary to this. But there are many things we do not know. We seek to become a people that wants to see God’s Heavenly will being done. In order to become a people like this we must be seeking the Lord in all things and asking Him to line us up with what He wants for our lives. Part of the praying for God’s will is also being silent and listening to Him. To wait upon the Lord. Let us seek to become a people that wants to seek the will of the Lord in all things.

Imagine what iot would be like, if we where all to strive to see God’s heavenly will being done in all things.