I mentioned in the first devotional that God has a purpose for your life. The text I referred to was Esther 4:14. In Jeremiah 1:5 we read “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart, I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.” I believe we can understand from this statement that God knows each one of us before we are born and has a plan for our lives.
I’m also reminded of Psalm 139:13-16 where David says “For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes say my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.”
When God made each one of us He gave us a will of our own and the ability to make decisions. He will not force His will on us. He will not force us to live our lives according to His perfect will. He wants us to make that decision on our own. As I mentioned earlier the first step in God’s plan is for us to trust the Lord Jesus as our personal Savior. At that point God places the Holy Spirit in our lives to guide and direct us if we allow Him to.
How do you learn God’s will for your life. The most critical element in this process is to keep a clean heart before Him. I John 1:9 says that “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” Any time we realize we have sinned we need to confess that to Him. It is also extremely important that you study the Bible on a daily basis. As you study God’s Word the Holy Spirit will work in your life to show you how to apply it at that particular time. He works through the study of His Word to help you see His plan for your life.
The third element is prayer. I believe there are two things to realize about prayer. First, it is important to have a daily concentrated time of prayer. In order to help me do that I keep a prayer list for each day of specific people or things I want to pray about. Secondly, in I Thessalonians 5:17 Paul tells us to “pray continually”. I believe he means that as we go about our day our relationship with God should be so that it is natural for us to quickly go to Him anytime something arises that we need His guidance or to praise Him for something that He does for us. Talking to God should be as natural as talking to anyone else.
I pray that you will continually seek God’s will for your life. As you do that you will accomplish God’s will for your life and will also be the most satisfied. Someone has said that we are most satisfied with God when He is most satisfied with us.
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