Decision Making and the Will of God Pt.1

Lately I've been reading a book called Decision Making and the Will of God by Garry Frieson.

First let me give you some background on why I picked this book up and how I found out about it.

Today, in most Christian churches, a main point of concern is finding God's will for our lives, mainly his individual and perfect will for our lives. We are taught to go about finding this individual will by going on counsel from other more mature believers, inner leadings or impressions from the Holy Spirit, the Word of God, and other "signs" that you may see as significant.

The problem is, it isn't always this simple. I can't tell you how many times I've used the methods described above when it came to making an important decision. The more popular questions are "Who to marry?, "What college to go to?", and "What career path or ministry to take up?"

All of these are very important in our lives. But is there ONE path that we are destined from birth to take? In Proverbs it says that a man plans his way, but the Lord Directs his steps. But does this mean that there is a specific road map that God has set for us to take, and if we are to deviate off this path in a major decision, are we out of his perfect individual will? Will we just have to settle for God's second best?

Things to make me question this view or mindset were many situations in my life, as well as other believers in my life.

In Frieson's book, he makes the case that wisdom is indeed the scriptural way to go rather than the "traditional view"

For example if there truly is an individual will in which when we are faced with major decisions, there can only be one choice, then this must also apply to minor decisions such as which shoes to wear, which brush to use, or which hat to wear. The problem is that the traditional view seems to abandon an individual will in these cases which contradicts itself.

Instead, in his book, Frieson suggests that the Word of God is sufficient enough to make all decisions and that when making decisions, we are free to chose USING WISDOM within the moral will of God (which unlike the individual will, has been fully revealed)

Of course there are instances where God directly told someone to do something such as Moses, Abraham, Jonah, etc, but these were not normative experiences. These experiences especially the ones in the New Testament were needed to further the Gospel at a crucial point in history.

I must say that after reading halfway through this book, it speaks right to me and makes more sense. Now of course this isn't an excuse to just "wild out" and make rash or sinful decisions based on "My decision is honoring God" or to get out of service in the ministry, but it is more so saying that in major decisions of what calling to do or what ministry to serve in, you don't have to feel paralyzed or anxious about making the wrong decision and "falling out" of God's will and missing the bullseye.

This is also not saying that God is left out of our decision making process. By using the Word of God, which is filled with his literal words, we are using wisdom as it says in Proverbs. "Wisdom is the principle thing"

We can make our decisions knowing that God is leading us, even though it may not feel like it and that his Sovereign will will be accomplished no matter what.

I will probably have more on this subject as I read through. What are your thoughts?