January 15, 2023
FOCUS Part 3: What is God’s Will?
(Proverbs 29:18 MSG) If people can’t see what God is doing, they stumble all over themselves; But when they attend to what he reveals, they are most blessed.
(Romans 12:2 NIV) Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.
(Matthew 6:10 NIV) Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
What is God’s Will?
(1 John 4:1 NIV) Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God.
1. Am I in my _______________?
(Romans 12:2 NIV) Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.
2. What _______________ are driving my decision?
(Proverbs 16:2 NIV) All a person’s ways seem pure to them, but motives are weighed by the Lord.
3. Does it agree with _______________?
(Luke 21:33 NIV) Heaven and earth will pass away but My words will never pass away.
4. Do I have _____________________?
(Proverbs 18:13 NLT) Spouting off before listening to the facts is both shameful and foolish.
(Proverbs 18:17 LB) Any story sounds true until someone tells the other side and sets the record straight.
5. Have I sought _________________?
(Proverbs 11:14 NIV) For lack of guidance a nation falls, but many advisers make victory sure.
6. Is it my _______________?
(Romans 14:4,12,22 NIV) Who are you to judge someone else’s servant? To his own master he stands or falls…So then each of us will give an account of himself to God…So whatever you believe about these things keep between yourself and God.”
7. Do I sense _________________?
(1 Corinthians 14:33 KJV) For God is not the author of confusion but of peace.
8. Does it make me ______________________?
(Romans 8:29 LB) From the very beginning God decided that those who came to him—and all along he knew who would—should become like his Son.
(Ephesians 4:22 MSG) Everything connected with that old way of life has to go. It’s rotten through and through. Get rid of it! And then take on an entirely new way of life—a God-fashioned life, a life renewed from the inside and working itself into your conduct as God accurately reproduces his character in you.
9. Is it _____________ or _____________?
(Matthew 26:39 NIV) My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will.
My Will or Thy Will?
- I want what ___________.
(James 4:13-15 NIV) Now listen, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.’ Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, ‘If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.’
- I want what God wants – ________.
(Mark 10:21-22 NIV) Jesus looked at him and loved him. ‘One thing you lack,’ he said. ‘Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.’ At this the man’s face fell. He went away sad, because he had great wealth.
- I want what God wants – ____________.
(1 John 2:17 NIV) The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever.
(Luke 9:23 NIV) Then he said to them all: “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.”