Best Methods To Finding God's Will?

Is It Ok To Try Hearing God By Opening The Bible Randomly?

Question : Is it ok to try hearing what God is saying, by randomly opening the Bible and reading the first verse that you see?

Answer: I have grown up in a denomination where in our Sunday school days, they used to encourage us saying that God will speak to us in this way mainly. So we used to pray and open the Bible to see what the will of God is. We also used to depend our entire salvation experience based on the verse we get randomly on the first time we open it. If we do not get a good verse, we will again pray for a period of time and then open the Bible again like in the same way we had done previously. We used to do these things until we get a salvation verse which will assure us that we are saved. Such a habit later made us to pray and randomly open the Bible until we would get the verse we want. This has mislead and misguided us in to confusion and fleshly fulfillment too.

For example, say you want to marry a girl whose name is grace. Then you are praying for a while and are opening the Bible to find the verse, "...My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” (2 Cor 12:9). You can wrongly conclude this as God's will both for yes and a no. If yes you can take this verse as God saying, "My [daughter] grace is sufficient for you" or else if you are already having a no in your mind, you can take like "God's grace is sufficient for you" and that you do not have God's will to marry this grace.

In the same way if you’re eager to do a particular thing already, you may open the Bible at random to find some confirmatory verse and say that the will of God if a clear yes for you. And if you don’t find it, the chances are that you will keep opening the Bible until you find the verse that says yes to what you want to do! That’s how you can deceive yourself in to destruction and fleshly indulgence.

There is a story of a man who was trying to find God’s will in this way, who opened the Bible at random and read, "He went away and hanged himself" (Matt.27:5)! He opened the Bible again and found, "Go and do the same" (Lk.10:37)! He opened the Bible a third time and read, "What you do, do quickly" (Jn.13:27)! That cured him forever of trying to find the will of God in this way!

Yet at certain times God may give a verse and quicken it in our spirit-man exactly according to our exact need in order to encourage us when we have opened our Bible randomly without any previous intention within us to see such a verse. So this is quite ok when we need encouragement from God, but when we want guidance from Him, this may not be a good method to find the will of God.

So primarily it is good to find the will of God through our circumstances, counsel of godly mature elders and spiritual leaders, fellowshipping with our fellow believers, by receiving and expecting a prophetic word from two or three different people, expecting God to reveal it through dreams and visions, reading the word of God to let God quicken His word within us and also pray to God to receive the peace of God within to know that we are in the will of God.

Thanks and Blessings....

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The Lion Within And Without

I Yet Not I

By Abraham Israel

"I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me." (Gal 2:20).

The one revelation that we all need to get to live an overcoming life is to know that the lion of the fallen sin nature within us is the biggest destroyer of all humans. Samson was a anointed man and a man full of zeal for the Lord. The supernatural strength of the Spirit that came upon him as a gift made him to be unique against all the forces that tried to destroy him.

The word of God says, "5 So Samson went down to Timnah ...Now to his surprise, a young lion came roaring against him. 6 And the Spirit of the LORD came mightily upon him, and he tore the lion apart as one would have torn apart a young goat, though he had nothing in his hand. But he did not tell his father or his mother what he had done." (Jud 14:5-6). Here in the above verse we see that when a real lion came to his surprise, he destroyed it so easily. We also see that Samson was a humble man to keep such a great news to himself and this shows that he was a humble man who did not want to boast about what he did as he knew that it was God who was doing it through him. God gives grace to the humble and uses them for His Glory always without fail.

But such a supernaturally anointed He-man had a She-weakness, this was the actual spiritual lion that was hiding inside him as though it is a harmless friend. This insidious deceptive lion of the appetites and passions of his body was not taken seriously by Samson to kill it. So the sin-nature began to set camouflage in a very thoughtful way to destroy this great He-man who cannot be destroyed by any other natural means or methods because of the great Spirit He had as a gift of God.

Now whenever Samson was empowered by God without, he was pulled in to the deep pit of she-weakness from within. He began to sense the fight between the evil forces of the enemies from the inside and the outside. Paul the apostle beautifully wrote saying, "16 I say then: Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. 17 For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish." (Gal 5:16-17). This means that Samson must have submitted his own wish in to God's hand sacrificially and must have sought God's help to deal ruthlessly against the lion of the sin nature within him. But sadly, Samson began to develop a soft corner for his own wish, whims and fancies. Slowly the lion within him became stronger and stronger, then finally one day it directed his fleshly passions and appetites towards his own untimely demise. And thus through a seductive harlot the secret of his strength which God told him to keep it as a secret was revealed to his enemies.

The enemies of God the Philistines took him and put out his eyes, and brought him down to Gaza. They bound him with bronze fetters, and he became a grinder in the prison (Jud 16:19-21). Thus the great God's He-man Samson was overcome by the lion from on his inside because he took this enemy within lightly and dug his own grave.

Paul even though was a great preacher and teacher of the word of God (2 Tim 1:11), he did not take the lion within lightly but instead dealt within seriously and ruthlessly to keep it powerless over him. Paul himself said, "I really fight against all the appetites and passions of my body by God's grace! I am my body's sternest master." (1 Cor 9:27, Abi's Translation). The very reason Paul fought with the lion within perpetually, is the reason he was able to overcome it victoriously by the grace of God.

If you fail to take the lion within seriously, you will one day get destroyed by it. When you by faith in the victorious death of Jesus Christ stand against the lion of the sin nature within, soon God's grace will help you tame it and keep it under the power of the spoken word of God that comes through your mouth. When you let Christ within, He will live through you and give you the liberty and mastery over all the sinful passions and appetites that tries to destroy your life from within.

On one hand we can use the word of God which is the sword of the Spirit to kill the lion that comes against us and on the other hand the sanctified will within us can be used like the whip against the lion within to tame it consistently (Eph 6:17). Jesus used the anointed word of God to defeat the lies and doubts of the devil face to face (Matt 4:4, 7, 10). The Psalmist says, "Your word I have hidden in my heart, that I might not sin against You." (Psa 119:11). When we use these above things consistently, we can keep the lion tamed and powerless against us. We master our sinful flesh, yet it is not really us but the power of the Holy Spirit who lives with in us. There is nothing to boast about except about our God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ consistently (1 Cor 1:31; 2 Cor 10:17; Rom 7:25).

Pray With Me This Prayer Saints :

Dear Heavenly Father, Thank you for your unconditional love, unceasing mercies and abundant grace that you have given to me through my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I realize the deceptive and the insidious nature of the lion of sin nature that lies within me, help me to keep it powerless against me through your power and also thank you for the anointing upon me that destroys the lion of evil forces that come against me from the outside. Help me to stay humbly without any pride. Strengthen my will through sanctifying it with your holiness. Help me to keep your word in my heart so that I might not sin against you being deceived by the sin nature within. Help me speak your word against all situations that come against me. Thank you and praise you for all your good plans in my life that you are unfolding day by day. In Jesus mighty and wonderful name I pray.., Amen and Amen!!!!

"The greatest enemy of every human lies not outside him but lies hidden within him as a venomous snake coiled to strike him anytime, unless the venom is milked and the snake tamed by death to self, passions and appetites daily." — Abraham Israel

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