Knowing God's Will

[<2 min read]

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         Do you know God's will?

         Has anyone ever suggested that you seek "the will of God"?
         What does it mean to understand God's will?

         For many years, I've struggled with questions like these, wondering how I could ever know the will of God. To add to my confusion, there's a passage in Isaiah that says God's thoughts are not mine. Neither is His ways mine (Isaiah 55:8-9 NASB). So in my spiritual quest, how was I ever going to come to understand "God's will"?

         Since 2010, I've met regularly with a group of Christian men for the purpose of fellowship, prayer, and accountability. It's not uncommon for one of us to share struggles in our prayer lives and the most frequent encouragement is with Paul's instructions to pray without ceasing (1 Thessalonians 5:17 NASB). Recently, I came across a fuller explanation of this passage in my personal study (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 NASB). It turns out there are two additional instructions that Paul includes and all three are to help us to understand God's will.

         What are these other instructions?

        I'm glad you asked. The first is "rejoice always", followed by "pray without ceasing" and then the third - "in everything give thanks". I noticed that these instructions have a "how" we are to rejoice, pray and give thanks in common. The commonality is - "always". We're told that rejoicing, prayer, and thanksgiving - always - is God's will for us.

         Over the next several weeks, I want to take a closer look at each of these topics - joy, prayer, and thanksgiving - and explore them through my lens of personal experience. In the meantime, I invite you to consider what joy, prayer, and thanksgiving might mean for you.

I look forward to your company on this journey!

~~Ken

Part 2 of this series: Rejoice Always
Part 3 of this series: Pray Without Ceasing
Part 4 of this series: In Everything Give Thanks