'God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life!'
I'm sure you've heard those words before. They are usually followed with the promise of a life that is rich with meaning, purpose, significance and influence.
Now these ideas are true and right and good. God does love you! He does have a wonderful plan for your life that is rich with meaning and purpose.
But we sell ourselves short when trying to understand what it actually means. Usually we equate God's plan and purpose for us with specific decisions about where to live, who to marry and what to do as a job. Those things are not unimportant to God but they are not what he cares the most about!
In 1 Thessalonians 4 the Apostle Paul tells us straight, in black and white, what God's will and plan is for our life.
In verse 3 he writes, 'It is God’s will that you should be sanctified'
Paul later then concludes, 'For God did not call us to be impure, but to live a holy life. Therefore, anyone who rejects this instruction does not reject a human being but God, the very God who gives you his Holy Spirit.
What's God's wonderful plan for your life? Your sanctification. Your ongoing growth in godliness and christlikeness. That is God's first and major desire for you after you have his love for you in Jesus.
Phillip Jensen helpfully writes this in his book Guidance and the Voice of God,
“God does not have two plans, one general and one special. He has only one plan, and it is both general and special. He wants all people, and each of us individually, to be under Christ. [...] he has a plan for each Christian to make us like Jesus by guiding us along a path of good works until we reach perfection on that Last Day.”
And Paul says to reject God's plan for our sanctification is to reject God himself and work against his Spirit.
So how much attention do you give to God's will in your life? His desire to grow you to be more like Jesus?
Grace and peace,
Andrew
eNews - 9th June 2023