The Perfect Will and Plan of God for my Life

Because I believe that when I am doing God’s perfect will for my life I can’t fail I work very hard to discover what it is. God wants me to know what His will is more than I want to know it, but He waits until I search diligently for it before He makes sure that I know what it is in detail.

A key ingredient on my part is a commitment to do His will no matter how hard or difficult it might be. Every morning in my prayer of commitment for the day I begin with the pledge,

“Today, Lord Jesus I declare you to be my Lord and King, You have purchased me with Your blood and I do not belong to myself, I belong to you and I now present myself to you and I commit to do whatever you ask of me no matter how difficult or how hard it might be.”

When I was on the dairy farm struggling with what God’s will for me was, I prayed every morning saying, “Dear Lord, you know me, you know that I really want to farm, I do not want to be a pastor, the thought of being a pastor scares me to death. But I commit to doing whatever your will is for my life no matter how hard or scary it is.”

If God knows that we won’t do His will even if He wrote it in the sky, He won’t reveal it to us. Our willingness to follow, to obey, no matter what, is very important if we expect God to make clear to us what His sovereign plan for our life is.

The church parking lot filled up with water and ran into the lower end of the sanctuary. A bunch of us packed sand bags and barricaded the water away from the sanctuary. Tomorrow some guys are coming with big vacuum cleaners and will vacuum up all of the water in the sanctuary and then we will set up some big heaters and dehumidifiers and hopefully everything will be as good as new.

I am sitting in my recliner writing this, and my back and arms are killing me from lifting all those 65-pound bags of sand. (50 of them) There was a day when I could pick up and throw 70-pound bales of hay all day long, our goal was 1000 bales a day from the field stacked in the barn, and I never got sore. Those days are long gone, though I am trying hard to hang onto them by lifting weights, riding my stationary bike an hour every day, and going on a 4,000-mile bicycle trip across the United States, coast to coast this summer.

A crucial part of God’s plan to develop the character of Christ in us is bringing challenges, barriers, obstacles, and problems into our life that we need to solve, overcome, and conquer. Weariness and fatigue is probably one of the most nagging and irritating problems that comes with age. An added problem for me is Parkinson’s. Those with Parkinson’s often experience a feeling of deep tiredness that does not improve with rest. About half of people with PD report fatigue is a major problem and a third say it is their most disabling symptom.

I am attempting to conquer this mountain in my life by regular strenuous exercise. Some other commitments and disciplines that I have made are never to say, “I am tired,” never complain while packing sandbags because of flooding, try hard to keep up with the young guys packing sandbags, never to allow myself to think self-pity thoughts, to rejoice always despite fatigue and soreness, to ask God for His strength every day, and to work hard at standing up straight and walking like a 20-year-old man, not like an old man.

Luke 1:31 And behold, you (Mary) will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall name Him Jesus.

Luke 1:35 The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; and for that reason the holy Child shall be called the Son of God.

Luke 2:21b He (Jesus) was conceived in the womb.

Hebrews 2:14a Therefore, since the children (that is us) share in flesh and blood, He (Jesus) Himself likewise also partook of the same,

Hebrews 2:17 Therefore, He (Jesus) had to be made like His brethren (you and I) in all things, so that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.

Philippians 2:6-7 although He (Jesus) existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men.

Luke 2:7 And she (Mary) gave birth to her firstborn son; and she wrapped Him in cloths, and laid Him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.

Luke 2:11-12 for today in the city of David there has been born for you a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. This will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.

1 John 4:2 By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God;

John 1:14a the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us,

Luke 2:52 And Jesus kept increasing in wisdom and stature,

Hebrews 4:15 For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin.

How do I know God’s will for my life? When I was younger I would ask that question a hundred times a day or so it seemed. I now have a seven part strategy for knowing Gods will for my life. The first part is to ask God to show me His will. He wants me to know it more than I do. There are dozens of verses like the one below just in the book of Psalms. When you read through the book of psalms high light every verse like this one and read them often. I read through Psalms every month by reading 5 chapters each day in Psalms.

Psalms 143:10 Teach me to do Your will,
For You are my God;
Let Your good Spirit lead me on level ground.

God gives the command, “do not fear,” over a hundred times in the Bible. There are another hundred commands given that are synonymous with “do not fear,” such as “be strong,” “do not tremble,” “do not be dismayed,” and “be courageous.” If a command is given that many times it must be important to God, and He must really want us to be strong and unintimidated by life.

Our courage and confidence while living life in scary times is probably the greatest indicator of our faith in God that there is. We believe that He exists, we believe that He is infinitely powerful, we believe that He is all-wise and knows precisely what He is doing all the time, we believe that He loves us with great love and will only do what is best for us. If we believe all that we will have no fear of anything.

Positive self-talk affirming what we believe over and over is a key to growing our faith.

Romans 4:20-21 yet, with respect to the promise of God, he did not waver in unbelief but grew strong in faith, giving glory to God, and being fully assured that what God had promised, He was able also to perform.

Genesis 26:24 The Lord appeared to him the same night and said,
“I am the God of your father Abraham; Do not fear, for I am with you.

Exodus 14:13 But Moses said to the people, “Do not fear! Stand by and see the salvation of the Lord which He will accomplish for you today;

Deuteronomy 1:21 the God of your fathers, has spoken to you. Do not fear or be dismayed.’

Deuteronomy 3:22 Do not fear them, for the Lord your God is the one fighting for you.’

Deuteronomy 31:8 The Lord is the one who goes ahead of you; He will be with you. He will not fail you or forsake you. Do not fear or be dismayed.”

Joshua 8:1 Now the Lord said to Joshua, “Do not fear or be dismayed.

Joshua 10:25 Do not fear or be dismayed! Be strong and courageous,

1 Chronicles 28:20 Be strong and courageous, and act; do not fear nor be dismayed, for the Lord God, my God, is with you. He will not fail you nor forsake you

Some people think that the devil, Satan was an oops in God’plan, that as a result of the devil’s success in tempting Adam and Eve, God was forced to make changes in His plan. No, the devil did exactly what God created him to do. He is called our adversary, the one we fight against as we live life. Everything that God has done is doing, and will do is designed to cause us to grow into the image of God, the character of Jesus. He knew that we needed an adversary to make us strong and wise. The word that God uses in Revelation 2 and 3 as He addresses the winners in the churches is “overcomers,” those who have overcome the devil.

I am watching “Thursday Night Football” while I ride my stationary bike and write this blog. On the field is satan and his demons on one side, and the church on the other side. Some think that our battle with the kingdom of darkness is one-on-one combat. Still, almost every reference in the Bible to resisting, standing firm, and battling the devil is plural; even in Ephesians 6, the description of putting on the armor of God to fight successfully against the devil is all plural. We fight and win against our adversary when we fight together in unity as the church, like a good football team.

The Apostle Paul says that the devil has schemes, plays, and we ought not to be ignorant of them. His goal is to create fear in us. When we are afraid we will lose. He does that through lies, the Bible calls him the father of lies. The primary tool that the devil uses to spread his lies is government leaders, religious leaders, and false prophets and teachers. If they would have had newscasters in the Old Testament they would have had first place. If he can create disunity in the church through fear and lies he wins and we lose.

He knows he has only a short time left so he is in overdrive. Jesus said, “know the truth,” don’t be naive, don’t be gullible, be wise and discerning. If you are in the middle of any disunity in your church, family, or among friends, do some honest self-examination and see if you are believing a lie.

One of the attitudes that I try very hard to guard against is thinking that I am pretty smart, and that there isn’t much that I don’t know. When you get to be an old guy like me, and have read as many books as I have read, listened to as many sermons, lectures, and podcasts as I have listened to, and studied for and preached as many sermons as I have preached, it is easy to drift over into the arena of being an arrogant know-it-all.

My Dad used to say, “If you think you are pretty smart you are probably dumber than a fence post.” A characteristic of smart people is they know how much information and knowledge is out there that they still don’t know.

Proverbs 11:2 When pride comes, then comes dishonor,
But with the humble is wisdom.

One of the most important truths in the Bible is that God gives wisdom, and He doesn’t give it to those who think they already have it.

Proverbs 2:6
For the Lord gives wisdom;
From His mouth come knowledge and understanding.

There are five essentials to becoming wiser every day you live.

1. Acknowledge how little you really do know and how much is out there still to learn.

2. Ask God to give you wisdom every day. God loves to give wisdom to those who ask and ask a lot.

3. Seek wisdom like gold, silver, and precious jewels, be a lifelong learner. Read good books, listen to good sermons and podcasts, write what you learn so you don’t forget it.

4. A practice that pleases God very much is to ask people around you to give you advice and counsel. The humility factor is a huge deal to God. He will sovereignly funnel information and wisdom through them because of your humility of seeking knowledge from another person.

Proverbs 1:5
A wise man will hear and increase in learning,
And a man of understanding will acquire wise counsel,

Proverbs 12:15
The way of a fool is right in his own eyes,
But a wise man is he who listens to counsel.

5. Read the Bible every day, and memorize two verses a week until you die.

From May 1st until June 30th, I am going to be riding my bicycle with a few others across the country, ocean to ocean. We are going to drive back to the East coast with our support vehicle which is a 25 foot motorhome, and start at Yorktown, Virginia and in 60 days ride back to Jefferson and then to Newport, Oregon. It is about 4,000 miles and we will need to average 67 miles each day to make it.

I just finished mapping out each day of the trip. I even have each campsite picked out with phone numbers, and in a couple of months, we will start calling making reservations. I have checked out the entire trip via google earth. I didn’t travel it all with the Google earth camera, but I did check about every 20 miles to see what the roads were like, and the terrain. I did quite a bit of research on each of the campsites checking the recommendations and critiques left by former bicyclists. Some places are definitely bicycle-friendly, and other sites regard bicycle riders as crazy and the enemy.

I will have my little tent, a little camp chair that is short so I can sit on it in my tent if the mosquitos are bad, a jet one burner cookstove that I heat water with for my freeze-dried meals, coffee, and oatmeal. I have a very comfortable air mattress, a lightweight but warm sleeping bag, a blow-up pillow, and a bag of a few extra clothes. I also have a bag of tools that will work to fix anything on the bicycle, spare tires, tubes, spare cables, and a repair manual. I will also have a bag with toothpaste, toothbrush, razor, soap, sunscreen, Parkinson’s medicine, vitamins, ibuprofen, and lots and lots of butt butter. I will also have my iPad and cell phone so that I can read and write on the entire trip. My goal is to write at least 40 sermons on the trip. I have come close to that on all previous bicycle Trips except last year because it got cut short because of the severe heat. I usually listen to about four sermons each day while riding as well.

Way back when I was a Freshman in college I used to watch Perry Mason every day at noon in the “Student Union” building right after I ate lunch at 11:30 am. There were about 20 of us crammed into the TV room watching every day. About half way through the program we would start debating who the real killer was, those were real mysteries.

The Bible talks about mysteries, things or information hidden from us, or things just too difficult for us to grasp fully. One of the mysteries is God in the person of Jesus Christ becoming man, 100% flesh, exactly like us in every way. He even experienced conception, growing as an embryo, being born as a helpless baby, helpless in every way as we all were. As a child, he grew in stature; he grew in wisdom, he learned skills, the verses that he quoted to the devil he had to memorize. Jesus got tired, he got discouraged, he got angry, and he got hungry.

Philippians 2:6-7 who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men.

Hebrews 2:17 Therefore, He had to be made like His brethren in all things, so that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.

Hebrews 4:15 For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin.

1 Timothy 3:16 By common confession, great is the mystery of godliness: He who was revealed in the flesh, Was vindicated in the Spirit, Seen by angels, Proclaimed among the nations, Believed on in the world, Taken up in glory.

The only way that anyone can understand the mysteries of God is for God to make them clear to us, and He does that for those who want to know the answers. If we seek Him and His truth, He will make it clear to us.

I am restoring a 1969 mustang with my grandson Isaac. When we get it done, it will be his car. The engine in it is a 250 cubic inch inline-six-cylinder. We bought a rebuild kit with bearings, new valves, camshaft, gaskets, and an oil pump. I purchased a Holley Snyper EFI and a distributor, coil, and computer together as a plug-and-play kit. We worked very carefully on the engine and mounted it on a wooden, home-built engine stand with a radiator and all gauges when we finished the rebuild. Yesterday we held our breath and flipped the toggle switch to start, and it started and runs like a top. Whoooooeeeeee that was a tense moment, but hallelujah it started! Check it out. You may hear a metallic clicking sound when I move to the back of the engine. I put another bolt in the plate behind the fly wheel and the noise went away! Whhhooooeeee

You know God is rebuilding each one of us into the image of Jesus Christ so that we will be like Him in character, but unlike an engine we have to cooperate with God or all His efforts on us won’t work. We need to seek him through Bible reading and prayer, and always rejoice, never complaining or grumbling.