1. Ask Him to show you His will. He wants us to know what His will is for our life more than we do.

2. Declare Jesus Lord of your life and commit to do His will. I do this every morning first thing.

3. Pay attention to the circumstantial road signs. God opens up doors and provides clues all day long, and if we are paying attention, we will see them

4 Get wise counsel. This is the most neglected of the seven but is very effective because of the humility factor that God loves.

5. Pay attention to thoughts, ideas, desires, and dreams that you have. Listen to your thoughts. God talks to us and we hear him in our mind. The problem is that the devil talks to us as well, and our sinful flesh, and the gone crazy world also talk to us loudly and 24/7. Mature believers have worked hard and have learned to differentiate between the different voices in their head and know when God is speaking to them. One of the things I do is write down on paper something I think God is saying to me. I then put it away for one month and then pull it out and read it. If I am still thinking that it is from God I act on it, but if it seems weird, strange, selfish, or boring, I wad the paper up and throw it away.

The most neglected tool for knowing God’s will for our lives is counsel from others. I am sure that the reason so few people seek God’s will through others is because of pride. And that is precisely why God chooses to give us direction through others, because we are humbling ourselves, and God loves humility.

God can put His will for us in the mind of a person we seek counsel from, and He will do just that as we humble ourselves and follow His instructions.

When my Dad was alive he was my main source for counsel. He knew very little of the Bible, I never saw him read it, he attended church occasionally, and had a poor relationship with the lord. So, why did I seek counsel from my Dad? Because he was my Dad, he was wise, and the Bible says to. I believe the Bible is the inspired, inerrant Word of God, the thoughts, wisdom, and the mind of Christ, so when the Bible says something is true I believe it is true and when the Bible says to do something I do it.

Proverbs 1:8 Hear, my son, your father’s instruction
And do not forsake your mother’s teaching;

Proverbs 2:1 My son, if you will receive my words
And treasure my commandments within you,

Proverbs 4:1 Hear, O sons, the instruction of a father,
And give attention that you may gain understanding,

When I was struggling trying to figure out whether I should stay on the dairy farm or leave and pastor Jefferson Baptist Church, I asked my Dad, and he said, “go pastor for one year and see what happens, sometimes you just don’t know until you try something,” so I did and I have been here 45 years. When I had been pastoring for 10 years things were going very bad for me in the church. Many people were leaving, and there was lots of unrest and disunity. I wanted to quit in the worst way, so I called my Dad and asked his advice, and he said, “never quiet when you are losing, it is what weak men do, and all of your life you will wonder if it was the right thing to do. Wait until you get things turned around and going good, then quit.”

There are older, wise people all around us who would be honored if we asked for their advice about life and the decisions we need to make. The key to success in life is to do things God’s way, not our way.

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

Proverbs 11:14 Where there is no guidance the people fall,
But in abundance of counselors there is victory.

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

Proverbs 15:22 Without consultation, plans are frustrated,
But with many counselors they succeed.

1. Ask God to show you His will for your life. I pray and ask God to guide me every morning. There are dozens more verses other than the ones I listed that are a prayer to God for Him to lead our lives.

Psalm 5:8 O Lord, lead me in Your righteousness because of my foes; Make Your way straight before me.

Psalm 25:5 Lead me in Your truth and teach me, For You are the God of my salvation; For You I wait all the day.

Psalm 27:11 Teach me Your way, O Lord, And lead me in a level path Because of my foes.

2. Declare Jesus to be the Lord of your life, and make the commitment that you will obey Him no matter how hard or difficult His will may be. I make this commitment every morning along with asking for His strength to accomplish His will for my life.

Romans 12:1–2 Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. 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.

3. Pay close attention to the circumstances and details of the events of your life. God opens doors and gives opportunities on a regular basis. He guides us in our life by changing circumstances in our everyday life. The problem for many is that the open doors are open for a short time and many people are so indecisive because of fear of failing that they miss many divine appointments. I am personally very careful in interpreting problems in life as closed doors. Problems and difficulties in accomplishing great things for God are normal, but many bail on pursuing God’s goals for their life because of hard times.

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.