Author Archives: deefduke
The Perfect Will of God
In my teenage years I began to realize that God had plans for my life. I came to that conclusion slowly and intuitively as I began to realize how infinite God was in His rule and reign over His creation. I thought, there is no way that God is a victim of His own creation, that some part of what He has made can function without His permission. As I began to sense that God was calling me into ministry instead of being a dairy farmer, I wanted to know for sure, but I wasn’t sure how, so began my quest on discovering the guiding principles into knowing the will of God for my life. That quest was primarily a study of literally hundreds of verses in the Bible on the topic of God’s guidance in our lives, here are a few.
Psalms 16:11a You will make known to me the path of life;
Psalms 139:24 lead me in the everlasting way.
Psalms 5:8 O Lord, lead me in Your righteousness because of my foes; Make Your way straight before me.
Psalms 31:3 For Your name’s sake You will lead me and guide me.
Psalms 23:3 He guides me in the paths of righteousness For His name’s sake.
Psalms 143:10 Teach me to do Your will, For You are my God; Let Your good Spirit lead me on level ground.
Romans 12:2 And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.
From my study I came up with what I called “A Dozen Simple Principles to Successfully Navigate Through the Distractions of Life into the Perfect Plan of God for my Life”
Principle #1 – God has a perfect will and plan for my life.
Principle #2 – Inside the realm of God’s sovereignty I can choose to live outside God’s perfect plan either because of pride, self-sufficiency, rebellion, or ignorance.
Principle #3 – I will be successful and bear much fruit inside the will of God for my life, and I will fail and be miserable outside the realm of God’s perfect will and plan for my life. It doesn’t take a highly intelligent person to understand that principle.
Principle #4 – God wants me to know His will and plan for my life more than I want to know it, and it usually takes failing before I am motivated to seek His will.
Principle #5 – God expects that I am going to seek His will diligently, I won’t find it if I don’t. My ignorance of exactly what His will and plan is for my life is generally a result of apathy and laziness in seeking it.
To be continued
Burying Mom
Today we had Mom’s burial service. We buried her right next to my Dad in the Trout Lake cemetery, and we did it just like my Dad’s. We built Dad’s casket, but Mom had purchased an antique quilt box years ago and had said that she wanted that to be her casket. When she died on Friday we got a local doctor to sign the death certificate, then Patty and others cleaned Mom up, dressed her in her favorite cloths, combed her hair and put her in the box. Today a bunch of family drove to Trout Lake and we sang some of Mom’s favorite songs, shared stories about her life, then us boys loaded her into the back of the pickup and drove her up to the cemetery. Everyone else drove up as well and we lowered her into the hole, sang another favorite song, and shoveled in some dirt. We ended the day by praying, thanking the Lord for the gift of her life to all of us. The entire day was so beautiful, the sun was shining, there was snow on the ground, and Mt Adams filled much of the northern sky. Mom had 5 children, 24 grandchildren, and 85 great grandchildren plus husbands and wives of the children and grandchildren so there is a great gang of family, though not all were able to make it today. We are going to have an awesome Memorial service in 2 weeks with lots of music, pictures, and testimonies. My Mom lived an amazing and full life and influenced many people. She ran the race of life hard and finished a winner. It would have been so cool to have heard the first words of Jesus to Mom as He welcomed her into His home. Today was a very good day for me as we celebrated Mom’s life. Most of my grieving was done over the last couple of weeks so today was a day of great joy. I will miss Mom and I will continue to thank the Lord for all that I am because of her, but I won’t be sad again because she is gone, I will just anticipate seeing her some day in heaven.
Coping with Trials
Yesterday I gave a list of 7 disciplines to keep in order to be strong in the midst of a major trial. It is a sad thing to me to see people who are supposedly Christians experiencing a trial the same way a lost person does. During the days before mom died and after she died I cried, got choked up when I tried to talk about it, and had periods of sadness and depression. But during any tough time I don’t ever think that God is somehow being unfair or unloving to me, I don’t think that I have more than I can handle, I am not grouchy or unkind to others because of my pain. During tough times I can act strong, talk nice, smile and tell funny stories. If I choose to act the way I just described I will be observed by those who don’t know Jesus and they will be attracted to my strength and want to know the reason.
One of the disciplines that I mentioned in yesterday’s blog was act strong and soon you will be strong. When I say act strong I am not meaning to pretend to be someone you aren’t. People pretend in order to impress other people. When we choose to act strong, we are choosing to behave in a way that is right, in a way that is considerate of others, and in a way we know is pleasing to God.
In the book of Ezekiel God tells Ezekiel that his wife is going to die and when she does He doesn’t want Ezekiel to mourn for her as part of a prophecy and message of judgment to the nation of Israel.
Ezekiel 24:18 So I spoke to the people in the morning, and in the evening my wife died. And in the morning I did as I was commanded.
The question is, how was Ezekiel able to do that? And the answer is, because God told him to. When we are seeking to obey God and please Him we have strength, we become a strong person.