How God Guides Us

Dr. Paul Carter, Senior Pastor

October 5, 2008

First Sermon at New Site

A church fund-raising campaign has a goal of raising a certain amount of money. But that’s not the main goal. Money is simply a tool. How we use it often is a good picture of our hearts. So our stewardship and capital campaign will spend more time talking our hearts and spiritual growth than it will trying to excite us to give.

The first question is about knowing God’s will concerning what we how to give. How does God guide His people and from that how can we expect to be led to know how we are to use our time, talent, and treasure that He has given to us. One of the passages that describe God’s guidance is Exodus 13:17-22. In these verses we find that God guides through: His protection, our recollection and supernatural directions.

His Protection

First, the passage teaches us that God guides us by protecting us from unknown dangers. Vs. 17-18 Other than the resurrection of the Lord Jesus and Creation, the Exodus stands as the mightiest expression of God’s power in the Bible. Six Hundred thousand men, with their wives, children, and their animals left Egypt to go to the land God gave. There were problems with Pharoah over leaving but in the providence of God the Egyptians ended up helping the Jews on their journey. Though Egyptians were loosing their labor force they paid the Jews to leave.

The Unexpected Route

Where you see God’s guidance is in the route that they took to the promised land. He did not take them by the shortest most direct path. God guided them by the long, indirect, and unexpected route. (Exodus 3:17) There were two ways to go to the promised land from Egypt. One was the short way which would have taken five days or so to reach. That would seem to be the most reasonable and obvious path to choose. Instead God sent them by the long route. They trekked South along the waters of the Suez arm of the Red Sea. More than that, it appeared to be a bad alternative. Having lived there for the past 40 years Moses must have known that there nothing out their to eat or drink and that times would be tough. But there was no mistake. God intended to lead them by the longer route.

God’s direction for their future began with a detour. Maybe you identify with that. You’ve asked many times “why does God lead me in such a long way around” or to put it another way “haven’t I learned this lesson well enough yet?” Why does God lead us on long detours when the direct route seems so clearly superior? God led the Israelites on the long route because of their timidity. There were enemies they were not yet prepared to face. When Pharoah made it hard for them to make bricks they wanted to kill Moses for causing them problems. Along the short, direct route were the philistine armies whose home they were taking. Would they face armies any better than the lack of straw to make bricks? Probably not. As it was, the first time they encountered a problem in the desert, they wanted to go back to Egypt because slavery seemed a lot better life at that moment.

God leads us on detours because we will refuse to face enemies along the short way. We need some time to learn to trust Him, to see His provisions from unexpected sources, to see His work in relatively small things so we can trust him for the big battles. And so, the people of Israel stood on the shore watching the Egyptians come behind them and the water in front of them. There was no hope of getting away but they were safe and never had to do anything but watch as God made a path through the water for them to walk.

To Build Faith

Later they had a bigger part in God’s battles. But not at first. God lead them by the long way to build faith for the times when their hearts were invested more fully into God’s work. He has been doing that in your life these many years you have known Him. God is more interested in your character than you are. He is more interested in your being what He wants a Christian to be than getting you where He wants you to go. So He took 40 years to build into the Israelites the character He wanted them to have before they finally were allowed into the land. Only after the 40 year discipline were they brought into the land. During that time they saw His daily care and provision; even His daily leading.

So look back on your life and you will probably see some spots where the difficult circumstances were really not as hard as what could have been had He led you on a slightly different route. The path He led you has strengthened you to take the next steps of faith by teaching you that God is trustworthy.

Our Recollections

Which brings us to the next point: God also guides us by our recollections of His past faithful guidance. Exodus 13:19 tells about the people leaving Egypt with the body of the long dead Joseph. You remember the story of Joseph. As a young man he was taken by his brothers and sold into slavery to Egypt. There he served faithfully and was promoted to manage the household. Then he was jailed because of a spiteful and immoral woman’s false accusation. Yet God elevated him to the second position in all of Egypt.

Is there any better example of a man whose faithfulness was tested but that God blessed in the end and used to protect His people during famine. But personal power and influence wasn’t the promise that Joseph was most interested in for his life. He knew because of God’s faithfulness to him and through him to Abraham’s family, that a day would come when His people would be taken out from Egypt and given the land promised to Abraham and His descendants. So Joseph’s last request was based on his past experience of God’s faithfulness and his willingness to believe God would be faithful to his family after he was dead.

Your Stories of God's Faithfulness

What are your stories of God’s faithfulness to you and your family? I know many of you have them because I have prayed for your children over the last 24 years; some of whom were far from walking with God at times. Yet now some of the worst of them are faithfully walking with Jesus. Some of you have been without money and didn’t know where you would get it. But you gave from your poverty to God’s work and saw God’s provision. God has built in you a richer and deeper knowledge and experience of Him because you counted Him faithful enough to be faithful yourself.

Some of you have imagined in the past that tithing is a bad joke on people who can barely make ends meet. How can you tithe on your income with your expenses now and those coming up? But now some of you who thought that are consistent and persistent to believe it is more important and more exciting and more rewarding to faith and eternity to give what God has given you to His purposes. You would no more spend the tithe money on yourself than jump off the roof of the church. Because God has been faithful to you and you will not be faithless. You don’t care if you are well-known or not because you gave what for you is “the widow’s mite.” But because you know God’s plans and His faithfulness will continue throughout your life and beyond, you will use what you have now to promote what you won’t ever see in this life.

A Decision in an Unclear Future

As individuals and as a church family we are in the midst of a campaign that calls for decision. We have to look ahead in the midst of an unclear future. Gas prices are rising. We are never sure what interest rates will do next. Economic news changes day to day. No job is safe anymore except maybe those of our tenured professors. As we assess what God would have us give, it is in light of an uncertain future. But it has always been that way. There was a day when this church could have bought the whole block our current building is on 30 times for what we now believe it will cost to build a new building. We don’t yet know how much we will get for the building we now have. We don’t know how much we can raise among ourselves.

Is our future to stay landlocked and bound to these limited ministry opportunities? Look at the number of children. That alone makes us realize we have problems. We know that our ministry is being undermined by parking. I’ve had members say that some Sundays they don’t come because of the distance they have to walk once they get to church. You know that if people committed to the ministry face that problem those who are not will not put up with it. I have had people tell me they do not come to worship because the building is too crowded for them.

Does it seem to you that this is our future; that times are too hard and the costs too great for us to move forward? Some said that years ago when fire made them think God was done with this church. Some said that when it seemed too costly for my family to move from the second floor of the church so that space could be used for ministry. Some said it when we spoke of bringing on a pastor of youth and Christian education. But all of those moves have expanded our opportunities to join in the work of God more fully in this community.

If you have never trusted God in the past and seen His provision then you may think that we can go no further than what we are now doing. You will say “God’s will is for me to be still. God’s will is for me put out another unbelieving fleece. God’s will is for to be “reasonable.” What is God’s will for you? Look to the past work of God. Has He ever failed you when you moved forward for His purposes? Look at the plan of God to expand His kingdom throughout the earth. Does He not intend you to join Him in it? Then make your plans to join yourself to His working now and into the future.

Supernatural Direction

Finally, God leads by supernatural direction. Beyond God’s protection and our recollections of the past lies the fact of His unexplained guidance. Exodus 13:21 Israel never forgot this striking manifestation of God’s presence with them. They talked of the pillar of cloud and fire in the Psalms, the Prophets, and in the New Testament. This supernatural guidance was timely. When they started their journey the track was marked but at a place called Etham they entered the wilderness which had no road, no markers, no signs, or maps; just desert. At the very moment they needed the intervention of God and just when they needed it, they found it.

God Uses Circumstances

JI Packer commented that God will not give us His guidance until we need it so that everyone around us will know that it is indeed God’s guidance. What are the practical lessons of all of this? God guides externally and internally. He uses circumstances. Among the circumstances are the people He brings into our lives who counsel us. He uses consequences of the past to help us do differently in the future by making wise not unwise decisions. He guides us by common sense.

Do not imagine that God is in it only when no planning is involved. After all, we talk of God’s plans all the time. Do you imagine the great planner would not invite us to plan and would not guide our planning? It is not more spiritual to think that only they mysterious things are from God and the rest are not. That kind of thinking limits our ability to recognize God at work and so shows less faith not more. He leads us internally. He leads through our consciences, through the use of our reason. But it is not the unredeemed conscience and reason that is based only on our own resources. A Christian conscience and reasonableness is assumed. And those are gained by knowledge of the revelation of God and His ways that is found is His word.

God Uses His Word

Where will you get your information about God? Where will you learn of what God has done and so what He can do for His people in any time and in any place? Where will your faith be built best? Where will you learn the plans of God so that you can join in them? Where will you learn that God is unimpressed with amounts we give but that He is more interested in, in fact, loves the cheerful giver, the faithful giver, the sacrificial gift? Only in His word.

Conscience and Reason without the teaching of Scripture are simply self interest applied to a new situation and calling it God’s will because you are pleased with your own thinking. That kind of decision making is based on an idol. The will of God is difficult only because we want to know everything at once. God is pleased to build faith.

What You Give

I don’t know what you should give, can give, or will give to this ministry. I will never know. It really is a decision you make before God based on your knowledge of God from His word and experience of Him in real life. He is glad for you to know His will. When you seek Him and make a decision based on His character, your circumstances, His commitments in this world, and your commitment to Him, it is the right one.

So pray. Pray often. Read the Word, Study it often. Ask for the mind and heart of God. Remember that all things are His given to you to be a steward of them. And make your decision freely based on the grace that is shown you. You don’t have to give anything. You can give it all. The question is one of circumstances and commitments and faith. Expect God to show you what He would have you to do based on where you are spiritually in your knowledge and experience of Him. Expect Him to show you based on the commitment you have to His work in this world, and expect Him to bring some unforeseen events that will help clarify your thinking and decision making.

Pray, read and study His word. Pursue Him Amen