Bible Reading: Psalm 119:57-64
I pondered the direction of my life, and I turned to follow your statutes. Psalm 119:59
IT’S HARD to have any sympathy for these oddballs:
Girl genius Lotta Graymatter graduated from the university and entered law school at age twelve. But in seven years of law school, Ms. Graymatter has failed every class she has taken. “Law books are so heavy, and they don’t have pictures,” Lotta explained to her disappointed family. I’ll just have to become a lawyer my own way.”
With his dying breaths, a scientist dictated to his assistant, Sinus Naselmeister, a secret formula that would cure the common cold and surely win Naselmeister a Nobel Prize. After typing the formula into his computer, Naselmeister shut down the machine and began experimenting. His best medicine so far is a cough syrup that tastes so bad even lab rats won’t take it.
You can’t become a lawyer if you don’t read the textbooks and pass the bar exam. And you can’t develop a cure for the common cold if the formula is rotting on your hard drive.
No one is that dense-but some folks come close. It seems like a lot of Christians make the same mistake as our two weird friends above. We want to find God’s direction for our lives, but we overlook the most obvious directional device God has provided: the Bible. It’s our textbook for wisdom and understanding. It’s our formula for dealing with problems. If we don’t turn to the Bible for direction, we’re worse off than both those dunces rolled together.
God’s direction for your life-or his “will”-can be divided into two categories: his universal will and his specific will. God’s universal will is clear and indisputable because it is spelled out in his Word. It’s God’s will, for example, that you trust Christ for salvation, obey your parents, share your faith, remain sexually pure, pray, and so on. God’s specific will includes details like whom God wants you to date and marry, what college you should attend, and what career God wants you to choose.
You won’t find a verse in the Bible that says something like, “Thou shalt attend State University and prepare for a career as a fruit-fly breeder,” or “Thou shalt date and marry that cute girl from chemistry class.” But as you commit yourself to following the universal directions God put in the Bible, he can start showing you his specific directions for you.
REFLECT: How do you feel about the fact that God loves you enough to give you all the direction you need for your life?
PRAY: Spend some time sharing your appreciation with him.
