5 Biblical Ways to Know God’s Will (Advanced Edition)

Ephesians 5:17, “Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is.”

As Christians, we all want to follow God’s will. Whether it be in relationships, in our career paths, or when trying to figure out our spiritual callings, none of us wants to walk outside of God’s plan for us.

And yet, as we all know, sometimes it can be really hard to figure out what God actually wants us to do. Should you date that guy? Should you wait for that woman? Should you get this degree? Should you quit your job and work somewhere else? Should you serve in that ministry?

Of course, we often just need to do the basic things to know God’s will: read and apply the Bible, pray, seek spiritual counsel from mature believers, be humble, and so on.

However, in this article, I will give you 5 biblical principles that are often overlooked that will help you follow God’s will for your life.

1. To Follow God’s Will, Find the Places Where Your Gifts Can Satisfy Other People’s Needs

1 Corinthians 4:18-19, “Some are arrogant, as though I were not coming to you. But I will come to you soon, if the Lord wills, and I will find out not the talk of these arrogant people but their power.”

Paul felt led to visit the Corinthians because there was a direct need for him to be there. This is often the guiding principle that will unlock your vision of God’s will for you. 1 Peter 4:10 (NIV), “Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms.”

When God has given you an ability that will satisfy someone else’s need, that is often exactly where he is calling you.

2. To Follow God’s Will, Work Hard Today Rather than Boasting About Distant Outcomes

James 4:13-16, “Come now, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit’— yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, ‘If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.’ As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil.”

James wasn’t condemning the making of plans. Rather, he was rebuking those who were boasting about the future, as though they were God and could make their will be done. The truth is, no matter what we do, for something to happen, God has to will it.

Thus, rather than boasting about outcomes, we are better off focusing on our daily work that will most likely produce the outcomes we hope for. And through our work, God will sovereignly create the outcomes he wants.

3. To Follow God’s Will, Repent of Sinful Motives and Choose Pure Motives

Proverbs 16:2-4, “All the ways of a man are pure in his own eyes, but the Lord weighs the spirit. Commit your work to the Lord, and your plans will be established. The Lord has made everything for its purpose, even the wicked for the day of trouble.”

As you will see in the next point, it’s not biblical to think in either-or terms when contemplating God’s will and human free will. Rather, it’s better to think in both-and terms. Somehow, in a way that goes beyond our human comprehension, God’s sovereign will works through our human free wills. He never violates our human capacity to make real choices with real consequences, and yet we can never violate his power to produce what he wants.

Rather than focusing on how all of this works, Scripture tells us to focus on our motives. When you want a good thing for a good reason, and you commit that desire to God and then work towards it, very often, his sovereign will causes that exact desire to come into existence.

Psalm 37:4, “Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.”

4. To Follow God’s Will, Use Your Free Will While Also Fully Submitting to God’s Sovereign Will

• Acts 18:20-21, “When they asked him to stay for a longer period, he declined. But on taking leave of them he said, ‘I will return to you if God wills,’ and he set sail from Ephesus.”
• Acts 19:21, “Now after these events Paul resolved in the Spirit to pass through Macedonia and Achaia and go to Jerusalem, saying, ‘After I have been there, I must also see Rome.’”
• Acts 20:16, “For Paul had decided to sail past Ephesus, so that he might not have to spend time in Asia, for he was hastening to be at Jerusalem, if possible, on the day of Pentecost.”

As you can see from these verses, when Paul was making decisions about his travel plans, he followed his desires while also leaving room for God to overrule him. This is the simplest way to follow God’s will. We can live with confidence, knowing that we can make real choices and when needed, God will prevent us from doing things he doesn’t want us to do.

If we want to do something good for a good reason and God allows us to do it, there is no reason to assume it is not God’s will. When we know God must allow everything that happens, this frees us to make choices and to then see what happens, which is then God’s will.

This leads us to point 5

5. To Follow God’s Will, Believe in God’s Sovereign Permission

Hebrews 6:3, “And this we will do if God permits.”

Sometimes we get paralyzed in trying to figure out what God’s will is. To solve this problem, we need to believe in God’s sovereign permission. In other words, Scripture is clear that whatever happens, God allowed it to happen. Even when bad things happen, these events do not occur outside of God’s sovereign plan.

This doesn’t mean God causes sinful things to happen. But it does mean he is sovereign over everything, including bad things!

Thus, to follow God’s will, it’s important to live your life in the most biblical way you can while fully trusting that God will permit and not permit what he does and does not want for you (Matthew 6:10).