A Weigh to Find God's Will

by Chuck White



"How many times have I been told that God will call me? But what does he sound like? The question is funny only to you who know the sound of his voice. What is this vague 'sense of call' jazz? What are the 'clearest possible ways' in which God communicates with the rest of Christendom while I walk the earth with only my feelings and God's printed Word to guide me? It's so depressing. Everyone is constantly being 'called' to do this or that. Why is my phone out of order?"



If you identify with the MIT sophomore who wrote these words, then try this new approach to finding God's will. To begin, you need to obtain (from the supply room of your imagination) a pair of old- fashioned laboratory scales and four sets of weights. Each set contains nine different masses and weighs ten times more than the next smaller set. If you begin with a gram set, then you'll have a one-gram mass, a two-gram mass, and so on up to the nine-gram mass. The second set of weights begins with the ten-gram mass and goes up to ninety grams. The third set would be the hundreds, and the fourth the kilograms. Call one side of the balance "option A" and the other "option B." Then load up the two sides with the masses according to the weight of the arguments for each option. The side which is lighter will go up, and then you'll know you can discard that option. Continue this process, weighing the options against each other, until you find which one is heaviest. Then take that heaviest option, confident that you know God's will.



Simple, isn't it?



Oh, there's one little detail that I forgot to mention. You probably will need to label the sets of weights so you will know what they represent.



The Bible Is a Heavyweight



Pick up the kilogram set. (Aren't you glad we're doing this mentally?) These heaviest weights stand for the Bible. God tells us to obey his Word and promises to bless us when we do. In Joshua 1:8 he says: "This book of the law shall not depart out of your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it; for then you shall make your way prosperous, and then you shall have good success." But God only promises his blessing and guidance to those who trust his Word implicitly, and follow it even when their understanding of other considerations seems to go against its direction. In Proverbs 3:5-6 he says, "Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not rely on your own insight. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths."



Because God reveals his will in the Bible more clearly than in any other way, we give it the most weight in our decision-making process. We make it the kilogram-weight set because its massive authority easily outweighs all other factors. When God's Word clearly commands an action, we put all the kilogram weights on the side of that option. When God's Word clearly prohibits an action, we simply put them on the side opposite that option. Obviously the kilogram weights outweigh anything that we have to put against them.



If you were trying to decide whether to punch in at the time clock for a friend so he could get to work a half- hour late without getting into trouble, you would pile all the weights on the side of not doing it because the Bible clearly teaches that lying and stealing are wrong. Even if he were taking his wife to the dentist, and other people got away with punching in for their friends, and doing it would help your friendship so you could win him to Christ, these considerations piled on the other side could not outweigh the forty-five kilograms on the side of saying no.



But what about cases where the weight of the Bible's authority seems to be divided? The Bible clearly teaches that we should use our money to support God's work and to help the poor, but it also clearly teaches that we should care for our families. What if you don't have enough to pay for your children's schooling and also contribute to the local shelter for the homeless? What do you do when the Bible's kilogram masses are piled about equally on each side? Or what about decisions the Bible doesn't say anything about? If you've just been offered two jobs, how do you decide which one God wants you to take? Unless one of them is unethical, the Bible doesn't give any explicit command to help you choose between jobs. What do you do when none of the Bible's weights goes on either side?

Reason Enough



When the Bible doesn't give decisive guidance, you need to get out your second set of weights. These one- hundred-gram masses stand for reason. As we saw in Proverbs 3, God tells

us not to rely on our own understanding of the situation if it opposes his Word. But when reason is guided by the Bible, it is one means God uses to show us his will. In I Corinthians 14:20 God says, "Brethren, do not be children in your thinking; be babes in evil, but in thinking be mature." God wants us to grow up mentally, to leave childish, ill-considered judgments behind. And in Romans 12:2 he promises to renew our minds so that we can use them to know his will: "Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may prove what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect."



God expects us to use the minds he gave us to discern his will. We do this by abstracting principles from the commands and examples we have in the Scriptures. Then we apply those principles to the situations we face. If you are trying to decide whether to take a job teaching children or one stamping out Frisbees, the Bible doesn't explicitly tell you what to do. But it does tell you that people are more valuable than things, that we are to use the abilities God has given us to the greatest possible extent, and that money is a good thing when used wisely. On the basis of these principles you may put the one- hundred-gram mass on the side of the Frisbee job because it pays two thousand dollars more, and the two-hundred- gram mass on the side of the teaching job, since it enables you to work with people and challenges you more.



Ask for Directions



Now pull out your ten-gram set. This one is labeled godly counsel. In Proverbs 11:14 God tells us, "Where there is no guidance, a people falls; but in an abundance of counselors there is safety." Alone, we can only see things from our own limited perspective. But when we have many counselors, we see things from a variety of viewpoints. This gives us a clearer picture. In Colossians 3:16 God tells us, "Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teach and admonish one another in all wisdom, and sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs with thankfulness in your hearts to God." The "you" in this verse is plural, indicating that God can reveal his will for us through the Christian community. God imparts his word to us as we are taught and admonished by other Christians. God has given some people the gifts of knowledge, wisdom and discernment. Their role is to help us know his will. We need to listen to those who may know more of the Scripture and more about life. Then we can carefully weigh their advice on our scales.



The Easy Weigh Out



Finally we come to the one-gram set--our desires. This set can't out-weigh the others, but if the sides are almost equally balanced these weights can tip the scales. Some people feel that if they want to do something, then it can't be God's will for them. They fear that their wishes often go against God's Word. But, to the extent that we love God, our desires are good and are put in our hearts by him. In Psalm 37:4 he promises: "Take delight in the LORD, and he will give you the desires of your heart." This verse doesn't say whether God will grant us the desires that are already in our hearts or put new desires inside us. But either way, if we really are delighting in him, then we can trust our desires to help indicate his will. After all, he made us, and he certainly can arrange things so we desire what is right. Since these are the smallest masses, we can add them to the scales with confidence. We know that they will never outweigh the Bible, reason or godly counsel. But when these heavier considerations don't eliminate either side, we can trust our desires to pick the better of the two good options.



Smart shoppers watch the butcher when he's weighing out their meat. An old trick is to press his thumb on the scale to add a few extra ounces. For a butcher, that's dishonest. But there is a sense in which we can ask God to do this with our scales when we're balancing the options. Sometimes his Word doesn't give clear guidance. It is then possible for the weight of reason, godly counsel and desires to tip the scales in the wrong direction. There are times when what God wants us to do seems unreasonable, times when God's people give faulty advice and times when we don't want to do the right thing. In these rare cases God may gently put his thumb on the scales to make them tip in the correct direction. Isaiah 30:20-21 makes this promise, using a different metaphor: "Your Teacher will not hide himself any more, but your eyes shall see your Teacher. And your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, 'This is the way, walk in it,' when you turn to the right or when you turn to the left." Remember that God is even more anxious for you to know his will than you are to learn it. He has provided the means of Scripture, reason, godly counsel and your own desires to help you weigh the alternatives. And he promises that if you stack up the weights wrong, he will gently redress the balance.