To become more like Christ through pursuing holiness, love for God, and love for others. In order to do this, you must seek God’s kingdom first. We can see this especially in Matthew 22:37-40 and Matthew 6:33. I believe if you live these verses out you are living in God’s will for your life. 

You can use these verses to ground your decisions. You can ask yourself if I am seeking God’s kingdom first (Matthew 6:33) and loving God and others (Matthew 22:37-40) by making this decision or taking this action. If the answer is yes, then that is likely the right thing to do. 

Sometimes a decision isn’t this black and white unfortunately, that is where getting a bigger understanding of God’s will and knowing what scripture and theologians have to say about God’s will and living the life of a Christian. Below, I will unpack what I have learned about God’s will through my studies on this topic.

Before we jump in, I want to share this quote from his book, Just Do Something about God’s will. I think he beautifully sums up what God’s will is like here, “Be holy, like Jesus, by the power of the spirit for the glory of God.” – Kevin DeYoung

What Can We Know About God’s Will?

God’s will is most clear from scripture. While not everything is in scripture, many life circumstances are, and the things that aren’t, we can usually find a principle to help us decide. Especially in books like James and Proverbs.

Then, for the things that aren’t in scripture exactly, we should try to pray collectively and individually to discern and understand sometimes God lets us decide.

Additionally, God’s will will often scare us a little or a lot because to step out in God’s will means we are trusting in faith that He will provide the means instead of us providing it. If we head in a direction that if God doesn’t show up and we don’t fall flat on our face, then we aren’t actually walking in faith. This is what Henry Blackaby calls a Crisis of Belief from his book Experiencing God.

Can I Know God’s Will for My Life?

It depends sometimes God makes His will clear and sometimes God doesn’t. We can always know His will will never go against the Bible. If we think it is, we must be hearing Him wrong or hear our own voice.

When we know His will, it is called preceptive will, which is His revealed commands to us or a Christian specifically, or His revealed will, which is God’s will that is revealed in the Bible. 

When God’s will is not known to anyone other than Himself, then that is called absolute, secret, or hidden will. 

Then when we go against God and sin or go the wrong way since God is sovereign, we are still in His will just now in the permissive will. This is where He allowed it and He will teach us something through the consequences.

How to Be In God’s Will?

In short, don’t lean on your own understanding, but take action. “Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make straight your paths.” – Proverbs 3:5-6 This means sitting in scripture and finding verses to help you decide, allowing God to speak to you through prayer, and allowing trusted brothers and sisters to speak into your life.

Sometimes there may be one clear choice you need to make and sometimes there may be a few and you get to decide. This is called the hourglass analogy for God’s will for your life. Just as an hourglass has a narrow middle and a wide ends, sometimes you are going through the narrow part and others you are going through the end where you have a few options that are all in God’s will.

This doesn’t mean that you will always have three choices than one choice after that and so on. This just means because of free will, sometimes there are a few good choices and God wants us to decide while in others He is asking us to do one specific thing.

What to Do When You Don’t Know God’s Will

Sometimes God doesn’t make it clear what to do, and that is when we need to just do something based on wise inputs. This means listening to the wise consul, the Bible, and prayer than making the best decision you can. It is better to make a wrong decision—assuming it isn’t sin—and let God correct you than to stay in indecision for too long.

Short Term Callings vs Long Term Callings

Most decisions are not permanent. God more often will give us a short-term calling than a life calling for the rest of our lives. We shouldn’t wait until we get a burning bush moment to start serving God and living in God’s will. He may call you to serve in student ministry for a year or so, which will help open up your perspective or teach you something. The more yeses you give to God, the better your understanding of God’s will for your life you will receive. Additionally, the faster and farther you will move into God’s will.

Imagine you are going to go on a road trip out west. Along your journey, you would take hundreds of turns and be on hundreds of major and minor roads. Since you can’t fly, your route isn’t directly west, but does that mean you aren’t going the right way, or that some of the roads you are on are wrong? No, not at all. The GPS has the perspective to guide you on what road to be on and what direction you need to go and for how long to get you to the destination.

God is like the GPS. He has the ultimate perspective and knows how long you need to go in what direction to get you to the right place. Sometimes He will send you what might feel like the opposite direction to form something in you, so you are prepared for the next road or calling He has for you. While you might want to find a shortcut, each road leads to the next, and if you try to cut across a field, you might pop a tire or get stuck. Leading to taking a longer time or you could get off track and lost. 

Trust the short-term callings that lead to long-term callings. Most of us don’t get a burning bush moment (Exodus 3:1-14) where God tells us our big calling. Even Moses wasn’t given the full game plan right up front. However, God will guide us to short-term seasons that lead to other short-term seasons, which will continue to lead us further into God’s will for our lives.

Key Verse for Understanding God’s Will

The Bible is full of great verses to help us understand what God’s will is like and how we can understand and submit to that will. These are just a few of these verses. They really boil down to being like Christ. If you are being like Christ or imitating Him (1 Corinthians 11:1) then you are living in God’s will. 

Proverbs 3:5-6 – Lean On God’s Ways

“Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make straight your paths.” – Proverbs 3:5-6

The key here is to trust God and lean on His ways and his understanding. His understanding is perfect, while ours is imperfect. By leaning on His way of understanding or God’s Worldview, we can live life the way He would have us to live which in turn will make our paths straight. We should seek to replace our understanding with God’s. This is done primarily through reading scripture. Then prayer and receiving teaching along with counsel from trusted mentors.

Psalms 34:14 – Seek Peace

“Turn away from evil and do good; seek peace and pursue it.” – Psalms 34:14

God is a God of peace, not evil, fear, and anxiety (2 Timothy 1:7), so when trying to discern God’s will for your life, looking for which route God would give you peace in and would lead you away from sin can be guiding. It is important to distinguish between what is easy and what you have peace with. Shadrach, Meshach, and Bendigo had peace going into the fiery furnace instead of bowing to an idol because they resolved in themselves to not dishonor God. By no means was this the easy choice, but it was what they had peace with and they pursued it. (Daniel 3:16-18)

Related Article: Why Christians Can Have Joy in Hard Seasons When Others Can’t

Related Article: What Jeremiah 29:4-9 Teaches About Being in the World but Not Of It

James 4:13-16 – God Should Set Our Plans

“Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”—yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.” As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil.” – James 4:13-16

We often make plans and we should, but we must let God set our plans and let our plans be in submission to God. God isn’t always going to clearly say “do this or that,” but we should seek His clear guidance, and when He provides it, we need to listen. This doesn’t mean wait around and do nothing until we are absolutely certain about God’s will. While we do need to wait (Romans 8:25) many times we can feel in the dark until we find the way forward. For example, testing out a career in business before realizing a call to ministry. I believe we should put our hand to the plow (Luke 9:62) and God will help us see where to point as we push.

Romans 12:2 – Test and Approved By God

“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.” – Romans 12:2

When discerning God’s will, one thing we can be certain of is God doesn’t want us to conform to the world. If we are given into the peer pressure of this world, we can know that is wrong and out of God’s will. Instead, God’s will is to be transformed into the image of Jesus and live life like Jesus. We see this truth evident in 2 Corinthians 3:18, Romans 8:29, and Philippians 2:5. 

Then when trying to seek God’s will, we should test every decision and thought (2 Corinthians 10:5) then approve or disprove if it is obedient to Christ. We can approve or disprove by asking if it is good, pleasing and perfect. If it isn’t, then we know it isn’t God’s will, but if it is consistent with these values, then we can approve and take action on it. There is a more thorough list of values to reference in Philippians 4:8 for further considerations.

Everything comes from God (Romans 11:36), so somewhere in every thought or decision, there must be some part of it that is obedient to Christ. We just have to remove the extra stuff and/or reverse the lie. This happens by disproving of the bad parts and leaving the parts that are aligned with God. Another way to think about this is what is distorted and what can’t be distorted or what is corrupted and what can’t be corrupted. God’s truth can’t be distorted or corrupted, so if it isn’t that, then it is God’s truth. 

Matthew 6:33 – God First

“But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.” – Matthew 6:33

In today’s world, it is easy to seek first worldly success like comfort, wealth, physical health, and happiness. There isn’t anything wrong with these in themselves, but when we seek these first instead of God, then they become idols and ruin us. God is infinite and if we put anything in an infinite hole, it will never measure up and we won’t be in God’s will and we won’t be fulfilled. However, if we seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, all the things we need will be given to us. That doesn’t mean we just pray all day and God will send us money to provide for our needs. It means put Him first and let everything else come second and God will provide us opportunities like a job to provide for the rest.

Related Article: Importance of Priorities During Life Change for Christians

John 10:3-4 – Know His Voice, So You Can Respond

“To Him the gatekeeper opens. The sheep hear his voice, and He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When He has brought out all his own, He goes before them, and the sheep follow Him, for they know His voice.” – John 10:3-4

To know God’s will, we must first know God’s voice. If we can’t recognize His voice, how will we recognize His will? The people we spend the most time with we will know their voice really well, and we also can spot a fake when someone sounds similar but isn’t the same. To understand where God is telling us to go we must first know what He sounds like by reading scripture. We should read as much scripture as possible and read it often to get it into our hearts and be ready to take action when we hear the voice we can not recognize.

1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 – Rejoice, Pray, & Give Thanks

“Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.” – 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18

This verse is very clear about what God’s will is. We must always rejoice not just some of the time or when things are going well, but always. Then pray without ceasing, which is to be in constant communication with God. This means to listen and speak all the time, but it doesn’t mean you don’t do your life. It just means that God is with you and you acknowledge His presence always and speak with Him. Then give thanks always in good and bad times, give thanks and have a spirit of gratitude. 

If you truly rejoice always, praying without ceasing, giving thanks in all circumstances, you are living in God’s will. These may lead you to do other things but these are the root.

1 Corinthians 12:8-11, 18 – God Equips & Places Us 

“For to one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another, to another the ability to distinguish between spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. All these are empowered by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as He wills…But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as He chose. – 1 Corinthians 12:8-11, 18

We all are members of the body of Christ with our unique purpose and position. God empowered us to have that unique ability and He arranged our position. It is up to Him not us to decide where we should be placed and what gifts to empower us with. He may tell us this call or may not it is up to us to be obedient and to be a good steward of the gifts and position He has placed on us. By doing that, we are living in God’s will.

What Do When Your Questions Aren’t in Scripture

While much of discerning God’s will can be in the verses above or in the Bible elsewhere I believe the following points from Wayne Grudem’s book What the Bible Says about How to Know God’s Will can be helpful. He came up with these four dimensions to consider when making decisions about God’s Will. 

4 Dimensions to Consider When Makes Decisions:

1. The action itself
2. The person’s attitude about the action
3. The person’s motives for doing the action
4. The results of the action

By taking these steps and praying through it you can get a better picture of God’s will in your circumstance. This is most helpful to avoid making decisions for the wrong reasons. Whenever you can be more analytical when making decisions, you often make better choices.

What Do Theologians Say About God’s Will?

The common theme of what theologians have said about God’s will over the centuries is that it is God’s will for all to be saved (some Calvinist may disagree with this point), through reason we can come to faith in Him, He wants us to be in relationship with Him through prayer, His will is certain and unstoppable, His will covers every aspect of creation, we should care well for people around us, work and pray for earth as it is in heaven, and we and our sin is the blame for all that is bad in the world.

As we progress, we get more into the debate between predestination and free will. Most people early on seem to be for free will and then it becomes more even split. 

St. Augustine tried to reconcile free will, and predestination. He argued that while humans possess free will, their ability to choose good is dependent upon God’s grace. Those who are predestined to salvation receive this grace, enabling them to overcome their sinful nature and choose the good.

As for sanctification, most believe this happens over time, but some believe it can happen in a moment through faith earlier in life.

I pulled together a table with brief summaries on what major theologians thought about God’s will which informed my points above. View this table of what theologians believe in God’s will here. Note I found varying points across the web in my research and it is hard to know what is correct. If you notice issues please point them out to me.

Where to Go From Here

I hope some of these tools and concepts help you walk better in God’s will and make better decisions about where He is leading you. Remember, it all is summed up into seeking first the kingdom of God and everything else will be added to you. Focus on putting God first in your life and the rest will fall into place.