Navigating Life's Choices: Embracing God's Guidance
Devotional
Sermon Summary
Bible Study Guide
Sermon Clips
"Now, we do not know as human beings how to hold those together. Human categories of thought cannot hold those two things together. Okay? We feel like either our choices matter and they're significant and they have consequences, and that means our destiny is not fixed. Its history is open. Or we believe everything is fixed, and therefore, if everything is fixed, who cares how you live? It doesn't really matter what you do." [00:05:36]
"In the Bible, we're told, and you can see it, that we are absolutely free and we're absolutely determined at the same time. That's even the words it uses. In fact, even though as we're going to see, there's many other places narratively where this is spelled out. This is where the Bible shows us in actual accounts of people's lives how this works out." [00:06:27]
"Your plans are yours. Your choices are yours. You are responsible for them. No one's forcing. God's not forcing you in any direction on that, see? It's yours. If you do something stupid, if you do something wicked, if you do something selfish, if you do something cruel, there's gonna be bad consequences, and people are gonna hold you accountable, and they should." [00:06:58]
"And God will hold you accountable, and he should. Your plans are yours, but what actually happens as a result of those plans, what actually happens in history, whether it's words, in verse 3, or actual deeds, in verse 9, those are absolutely controlled and totally fixed and set by God. Nothing happens that's not according to his plan." [00:07:14]
"Now, it may be true that intellectually it's almost impossible to hold together this biblical concept, that we're absolutely free and absolutely determined. We either believe we're determined or we believe we're free. But if you believe either of those, you're cooked. It's impossible to live a decent life that way." [00:09:33]
"But what happens is, as time goes on, you become the kind of person whose plans become better and better and wiser and wiser. And there's only no, that's the only way to do it. You become a wiser person from this radical commitment. And look at all the other verses which tell you, look at the third verse, the way of a fool seems right to him, but a wise man listens to advice." [00:29:14]
"Plans fail for lack of counsel, but with many advisors, they succeed. Here's how you make your decisions. Here's how you get God's guidance. You commit yourself to him utterly. That slowly turns you into a person of wisdom. Because of the humility you get, you turn to everybody else. And so you generate lots of options. You're not a fool. You don't think you know everything." [00:29:51]
"And because of the love that you feel from him, at the same time, you're bold, you're diligent, and you make plans. And that's how God shows you what you should be doing. Now, this isn't necessarily, however, what most Americans want to hear. When most people have come to me over the years, as a pastor, they come to me and they say, I have decisions to make, and I want God's guidance. I want to discern the will of God." [00:30:25]
"Guidance is as much something God does as something God gives. And therefore, I knew by selling my house and coming on up here and getting started and signing a three-year lease, oh, my gosh, that if I failed to plant a church, God was preparing me for something I couldn't envision. You see?" [00:35:22]
"When they said, Master, you're not really navigating us through this storm, here's what Jesus is saying. There is a real storm coming, a cosmic storm, a storm of God's wrath, a storm of eternal justice, a storm of the justice that we deserve for everything that we've done as human beings. And he says, I am going to bow my head before that storm and I'm going to take it for you." [00:39:36]
"He's going to abandon me. But don't you see, I am going through the ultimate storm without navigation so you can be sure that in spite of the fact you don't deserve it, you will always have me at the helm. I will be the only righteous person in history, I'm going through the ultimate storm without navigation. I didn't abandon you to that storm, and therefore I will not abandon you in this storm." [00:40:20]
"And to the degree you know that, to that degree you will be able to commit everything to him and become the kind of person who makes wise decisions. You know, there's a man who is very prone to clinical depression who wrote a wonderful hymn. This is how he got through it. His purposes will ripen fast, unfolding every hour. The bud may have a bitter taste, but sweet will be the flower." [00:40:47]
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"In the Bible, we're told, and you can see it, that we are absolutely free and we're absolutely determined at the same time. That's even the words it uses. In fact, even though as we're going to see, there's many other places narratively where this is spelled out. This is where the Bible shows us in actual accounts of people's lives how this works out." [00:06:27]
"Your plans are yours. Your choices are yours. You are responsible for them. No one's forcing. God's not forcing you in any direction on that, see? It's yours. If you do something stupid, if you do something wicked, if you do something selfish, if you do something cruel, there's gonna be bad consequences, and people are gonna hold you accountable, and they should." [00:06:58]
"And God will hold you accountable, and he should. Your plans are yours, but what actually happens as a result of those plans, what actually happens in history, whether it's words, in verse 3, or actual deeds, in verse 9, those are absolutely controlled and totally fixed and set by God. Nothing happens that's not according to his plan." [00:07:14]
"Now, it may be true that intellectually it's almost impossible to hold together this biblical concept, that we're absolutely free and absolutely determined. We either believe we're determined or we believe we're free. But if you believe either of those, you're cooked. It's impossible to live a decent life that way." [00:09:33]
"But what happens is, as time goes on, you become the kind of person whose plans become better and better and wiser and wiser. And there's only no, that's the only way to do it. You become a wiser person from this radical commitment. And look at all the other verses which tell you, look at the third verse, the way of a fool seems right to him, but a wise man listens to advice." [00:29:14]
"Plans fail for lack of counsel, but with many advisors, they succeed. Here's how you make your decisions. Here's how you get God's guidance. You commit yourself to him utterly. That slowly turns you into a person of wisdom. Because of the humility you get, you turn to everybody else. And so you generate lots of options. You're not a fool. You don't think you know everything." [00:29:51]
"And because of the love that you feel from him, at the same time, you're bold, you're diligent, and you make plans. And that's how God shows you what you should be doing. Now, this isn't necessarily, however, what most Americans want to hear. When most people have come to me over the years, as a pastor, they come to me and they say, I have decisions to make, and I want God's guidance. I want to discern the will of God." [00:30:25]
"Guidance is as much something God does as something God gives. And therefore, I knew by selling my house and coming on up here and getting started and signing a three-year lease, oh, my gosh, that if I failed to plant a church, God was preparing me for something I couldn't envision. You see?" [00:35:22]
"When they said, Master, you're not really navigating us through this storm, here's what Jesus is saying. There is a real storm coming, a cosmic storm, a storm of God's wrath, a storm of eternal justice, a storm of the justice that we deserve for everything that we've done as human beings. And he says, I am going to bow my head before that storm and I'm going to take it for you." [00:39:36]
"He's going to abandon me. But don't you see, I am going through the ultimate storm without navigation so you can be sure that in spite of the fact you don't deserve it, you will always have me at the helm. I will be the only righteous person in history, I'm going through the ultimate storm without navigation. I didn't abandon you to that storm, and therefore I will not abandon you in this storm." [00:40:20]
"And to the degree you know that, to that degree you will be able to commit everything to him and become the kind of person who makes wise decisions. You know, there's a man who is very prone to clinical depression who wrote a wonderful hymn. This is how he got through it. His purposes will ripen fast, unfolding every hour. The bud may have a bitter taste, but sweet will be the flower." [00:40:47]
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