How Do We Know?

I suspect, if you hang around the church for any length of time and talk with Christians, you will undoubtedly here these words, "I felt lead by God (Jesus or Holy Spirit) to do (go or say) such and such." It is a rather common way of expressing how one may be following the "will of God" in certain circumstances.

There is not a desire on my part to disparage that kind of language. However, it would be good to know if there is any commonality in that among believers. I often struggle to know, hear, or understand what God may be saying to me through ANY means, let alone through His spirit.

In Acts 16:6-10 we see an instance where Paul and Silas are being directed by certain aspects of God's revelation. In verse 6 it says they are forbidden to go to a certain area of Asia by the "Holy Spirit".  In verse 7 it is translated as "the spirit of Jesus" that prevents them form going to certain areas. Then in verse 9 Paul has a "vision" that he takes as a motivator to got to Macedonia. All three instances seem to be responded to without question or discussion outside of the third, where they "conclude" that "God had called us (Paul, Silas & Luke) to preach the gospel to them." (v. 10 ESV)

Having these kind of experiences of influence appear to be commonplace among believers. There was a recent article in Christianity Today about this very thing. Something I wrote about on this blog and wrote a letter to the editor of CT in response. Nevertheless, my focus today is knowing when or how God may be "leading us."

I struggle with this a great deal because it is hard for me to keep my ego, my desires, my intentions subjugated sufficiently to actual "hear" or sense God's leading. Often, admittedly, my actions are a result of a desire I have cultivated in my heart and now want God to bless as part of His will.  Other times, I sense some direction from God then masticate on it long enough to make it a reality now when, in fact, God's intention may have been "in time."

There is no answer that I can offer that sufficiently explains this phenomenon of knowing God's direction or intention. However, I am learning new things about it each day. For example, I mentioned a few days ago our search for a new Corvette. Well, as of now, that is on hold because of what I understand about stewardship and responsibility for our resources. This decision came as a result of mulling what I knew scripture teaches about stewardship; what I knew might be the right thing to do at this time; and what might allow us to do better things with our limited resources than replace a "toy" in our lives. 

That conclusion did not require a vision or a specific word from God. It simply required sorting through what I knew to to be the right thing to do with the resources God has provided.  Believe me I was tempted and I have used all the rationalization one could imagine to make it work, but it was just not something that I could conclude would be pleasing to God or a good mark of stewardship.

Would I invoke the same process or come to the same conclusion if it involved missions or writing a particular article? I do not know the answer to that. Often I must wrestle with my own doubts and fears more than an understanding of what God wants in my life.

How do we know what God's leading or direction is for our lives? There is not magic bullet. However, part of my conclusion is that sensing God's leading might need to be filtered through His Word and our understanding of what might please Him as opposed to what might please us.

God bless.