Discerning God's Will | Pr Steven Soon

You're listening to a message to go from as church.

We hope this message will light up your day.

Okay, I'm gonna start off with this, all right. So

how many of you know about the Titanic?

Some? Maybe most? All right?

So the Titanic, you guys know, is in the nineteen hundreds.

It was big shape that went out sailing. So this

is what happened, right, and this is gonna connect to

my message. So that she was sailing and of course

they weren't able to outmaneuver an iceberg that they were

sailing to us, right, and they hit the ice work.

So what happened the how was breached?

Water started pouring in, the engines started to fail, and

then the captain started to call out all hands on

that our crew get ready.

We need to try to at first keep the ship afloat.

Let's try to see what we can do, all right,

So he called for this, can somebody call for our

senior engineer, Will senior engineer, will, get him on board

here with me. We need to figure this out. But

the crew was like, why we have other senior engineers?

Why does it have to have to be will of

all people? And the captain look straight into every person's

eyes and say, when there's a will, there is a way.

That's my introduction. All right, So, uh, this is completely

fictional that I taught on the spot just now right there,

sitting there thinking about how can I set us off?

Not bad at this original story? Okay, all right? But anyways, Yes,

the topic today is discerning God's will. Discerning God's will,

all of us here have at one point of time,

or still in this moment, thinking about God, what is

your will for me? Why is your purpose? Why are

your thoughts for me? What am I gonna do after

I graduate? Why am I gonna? Am I gonna stay

in this job for a long time now? Or you know,

is it time for me to transition to another company?

We have a lot of questions Lord, who will be

my future partner? Who will I'm marry?

Right? These are things that we would love to know.

These are things that.

All of us here I believe, have asked before or

are still asking Lord, what is your will for me?

And there are many of us here in the deepest

recesses of our spirit we may be asking Lord, what

are your divine purposes for me?

What is your calling in my life? Right?

We have questions like this, and today we are gonna

hopefully explore some of the ways that we can discern

God's will. We can hear God's boys, we can know

what is it that the Lord wants us to do. Okay,

we're gonna look at Proverbs Tree five to six. I'm

gonna read from the NLT versions says this, trust in

the law with all your heart. Do not depend on

your own understanding. Seek his will in all you do,

and he will show you which path to take. As

you can see the will here, it is not capital.

So he's not talking about a person right like the

senior engineer will. But he's talking about his purposes. And

here's a cool thing. Right when we seek says here

in the word, sik his will in all you do,

and he will show you. It's not sick his will,

And he may consider it's not sick his will, and

he'll think about it whether to tell you which path

to take. He's not playing hide and seek over here.

The Lord says, you seek my will and I will

show you which path to take. It's a guarantee. It's

a guarantee. And that's what I want to start off with.

First.

Remember this that when we see God's will, He's not

interested in playing hide and seek, meaning to say, when

you genuinely are searching for God and asking from the Lord, Lord,

what is it that you want me to do? The

Lord will not hide himself. The Lord will not keep quiet.

The Lord will make known to you the path you're

supposed to take. So from the back of her head,

then you must now remember that it is not when

we seek the Lord and there's no answer, it's no

longer the Lord's problem, you see, because God says I

will show.

You the way.

So the thing that we must consider is could it

be us? Stand all right? So just put that at

the back of your head.

Now.

One key foundation I'm going to divert to this, One

key foundation of the Christian faith is this. It's recognizing

that we are never in control. Right, you talk about

other people, you talk about the world today, many of

them say, I am in control of my destiny. I

decide what I want to do with my life. I

have in my hands the power to decide my future.

That's what the world believes. But believe us in the house,

you know, that's not what we believe. We are never

in control and that itself is a key foundation to

our faith. We need to first recognize that right and

to recognize that actually God is the one that is

in control. You may feel like because Steven, you're preaching

to the choir. We know this, But you see, knowing

in our minds and knowing and our heart is two

different things. Because many times we say God, yes, you

are in control. But how many of us are struggle

with letting God control?

I do?

I find it hard to release control of certain things.

I find it very anxiety inducing to say, Lord, I release.

Control, take the whalehord. You decide whatever you want. I

would just follow. It's very scary.

You know how many of you there to pray prayers

like this, Lord, whatever you say, I will do.

Some of you shake your hate already.

But yet you say, yes, we are never in control, Goddess.

You see the conflict here. We know that God is

in control. We know that God is a good God.

We know that his ways and he starts higher than ours.

And later we're gonna look at that scripture, but yet

we find ourselves struggle to let go of control. There's

something for us to think about, because I believe these

are some of the lies that the enemy will tell us, Hey,

if you release control, things won't go well if you

release If you don't have a ten year plan and

stick to it, if you're not confident in what you're doing, WHOA,

you're in danger, you're being irresponsible. But yet we are

taught again and again by the Lord that we are

never in control. Please plan, Please have your plans. But

those of us here who have had ten year plans

set out know that God does not work in that fashion.

I have experienced that, right, So I just wanted to

start with that. We all know this truth here, we

know it. But today I want to address the heart

and pray that at least by the end of the

day we'll get to go like, Okay, God is difficult,

but at least I will try.

I will try, Lord, to follow your will. I will

try you, God, Lad, even though it's scary. But to

trust in you.

And that's what Josiah declared at the start, To not

just trust God, but to trust in God, trusting in

his character, believing that he is a good God, that

he loves us so much more than we can ever

love ourselves, that he plans all us so much better

than we can ever plan for ourselves?

There, get a good amen here.

You see, we can't even determine what the weather is tomorrow,

and in Malaysia in one day there can be multiple seasons. Yeah,

what I'm saying right can be super hard. It was

thirty nine degree celsius a few days back, and in

the evening it was raining.

Cats and dogs.

Right, how many of you here can guarantee me that

tomorrow is going to be sunny? Anyone here but the

weather focus says, so, how many of you can guarantee

me tomorrow is going to rain? No one dared to

raise your hand. You see, we can't even guarantee the

web tomorrow. How can we guarantee our future? We cannot,

We cannot. Sounds scary, sounds nerve wracking, But don't worry.

Good news is coming your way. I mentioned about Isaiah

fifty five, verse eight nine. I'm gonna read that scripture

for my thoughts, the Lord says, are not your thoughts,

nor are your ways my way?

Says the Lord.

I'm gonna pause you for a little bit. Thank god

his thoughts are not our thoughts. Thank God that his

ways are not our ways, because if it is, I

don't think I can trust this God. Thank God that

his thoughts are different from ours, His ways are different

for ours. In fact, not just different, his thoughts and

his ways are higher.

And just now we see Proverbs Tree.

He says this, lean not on your own understanding, because

we may think that we know, We may think that

we have got everything to get. But let me tell

you this, my dad thought the same way. But in

two thousand and three, three years after the Asian financial crisis,

my dad went bankrupt. We can't even determine how the

market will be tomorrow. So friends, where do you put

your trust? Is our own ways? Is it our own thoughts,

our own plans? Please we must still also have our

own thoughts, have our own ways. Please have plans, please plan.

But yet, remember that even with all this, we can,

we should, and we can do our very best do

all this, but we are never in control. It is

the Lord that allows all these allowed things to happen.

And my second point is this between good and God.

The first point is we are not in control. The

second point is this between good and God. You see,

if I were to tell you guys this right, and

this may sound a little bit brutal, Okay, let me

change an example because it's brutal.

Okay, and let me let me tell you this.

Hey, you can go ahead to a bank and rob

a bank without any consequences. Would you do it? Don't

raise your hand, don't answer me. I fear that I

have to open the altar later to deliver some demons.

But see if I were to tell you that there

will be no consequences on earth. Right, you can go

ahead and rob a bank, take money that's not yours,

that belongs to others, all of us. I pray, and

I hope will say. I won't do it because it's wrong.

It's evil, it's not right to steal, it's not right

to do all these things. See, as Christians, many times

we think about the will of God. When we have

to discern the will of God, it is betten good

and evil. Friends, I tell you those things we will

passed with flying colors. You know what will be hard,

And this is what we are faced with every day

when we have to choose between good and God.

Not easy.

I wrestle with that all my life. Good and evil easy.

We can see black and white. But the moment is

good and God, between good and God, there's where many

of us stumbled. Me included I recently had a campus

student came up to me and said, pssus Steven, I

am distraught because I have a choice to do this thing. Basically,

the person is deciding, after finishing his studies for his internship,

where he should intern act right, both options were great,

Both things were great. And to add to the mixed

the person was also saying, Hey, bass, the day I'm

going to share very transparent and if you guys, the

person told me, my friend has asked me to.

Go and plan the church with her. Wow are you go?

Wow?

That sounds great.

But at the same time he told me this my

churchplan Cordain is from another church plan. My churchman coordinator

has asked me to sow into our church.

What do I do now?

If you were in my shoes, what would you have said?

Think about it for a moment. Not easy, not easy right,

But in that moment, I praise God. His Holy Spirit

helps us discern and identify things. And the Lord does

that for me. Even when I lead XPU. He will

reveal things to me. And in that moment he revealed

to me what all is great, but one is of

his own desire, not mine. Both are great, both will

bear fruit, but not but only one is my will

and my plan. So in that moment I told the students,

I say, brother, I have the answer for you. His

I lead up and I said, but I'm not going

to tell you, and his face immediate change confusion.

Why what? But's why?

Because I told him that, I say it, Actually, you

already have the answer. You know which one is something

that you desired, that you want, and you know the

other one is probably it's going to inconvenience you. He's

an international student the internship who probably is quite far away,

so he doesn't have a car, so he will really

inconvenience him. But in my heart I knew which one

he should go for. But I told him, I'm not

going to tell you the answer, because no one you

know the answer.

And this is between you and God.

Because if I were to tell you what to do

and things and you just go by the fact that, oh,

I did it because Pastor Steven said so, then if

anything goes wrong, you'll blame it on me. But isn't

it better that you hear from the Lord himself? That's

my encouragement to him, because I knew he already knew

the answer. So I told him, brother, you gotta go

pray about it, but I believe you know the answer,

and you just have to discern with this. And this

is one handle that I'll give to you. Guys, Which

do you think will please the Lord more? I just

told him that think about it. Which of these two

options which are great over a great, but which will

please the lot more? And which one is your own desire?

You got to sive that true, and you gotta learn

to see through that noise. So I told him that

he was quite uncomfortable after that. I could see him

wrestling that tension in his spirit. Two days later I

follow up. A few days later, I follow I say, brother,

have you made up your mind? What are you going

to do? Actually, no, it wasn't me that text. He

texted me and say, past the seam, I've decided what

to do. I know what I have to do. I've

made my decision. So I asked him, okay, so what

did you choose?

Right? What do you choose?

And I want you to see this like, this is

what he said to me. I'm going to choose what

coused me more. I did not tell him to do that.

I did not say you have to sacrifice more. I

believe the Lord has spoken to him, and these are

things that naturally we will not decide on.

Right.

Why would we choose between two good things one that

will cost more? Doesn make sense?

So the Lord spoke to him.

And he told me, I know what I need to

do now. I know what is my own desire and

what is God's desire for me. And he made the

decision knowing that this choice is going to cousse him

more literally financially. He had to figure out his transport,

which he hasn't had it figured out yet, probably has

to find a place to stay, and the place that

is quite far from his home where he's going to

have his internship. But that's my encouragement to him and

my encouragement to you. This is usually between good and

bad easy to discern. Between good and God, that's the toughest.

You see, Both decisions may be good to us, but

what God wants may not be what we want. In

Jeremiah seventeen nine, it says this the heart is deceitful

above all things. There are many times that we are

so used with the Christian lingo that we are very

good at justifying our actions. We've got God's words. I'm

going to give you an example. Okay, this during my

UNI days, I had a crush on the girl. I'm sorry, Sharon.

Uni time.

I had a crash on this girl. Right, and I

pray the prayer. I pray this prayer. I say, God,

I like this girl, but if she is not the

one for me, if she is not the one for me,

you take away this feeling. Wow, sounds like a good prayer.

Don't know how many of us pray their prayer. I

pray them prayer many times.

God, if she is not the one, you take the

feeling away from me. Oh, and the feeling did not

go hallelujah, Praise the Lord. I said, it's there. It's

a green light from God.

So there was one night that actually confessed my feelings.

And that's when the girl told me I've gotten together

with your best friend. I'm not making these up guys. Immediately,

I remember I was in my room.

I cried.

And I was angry at who God. I said, God,

how can you do this for me? Have and I

been serving your house?

Oh? Haven't I been praying? This girl also serves in church.

Lord I'm not gonna be unequally yoked while throwing scripture. Now, God,

I prayed and said, if this is not the one

for me, take away this feeling. But you did not.

You did not say no to this. And you know

what the Lord said to me immediately after. But did

I say yes? Me keeping silent? Does that mean it's

a green light? I say, Lord, wouldn't you have at

least taken away the feeling? Helped me a little bit,

and the Lord to teach me. Here's the theology for

you guys, some theology. All right, If I take away

that feeling, says the Lord, I will be taking away

of free will. You have to decide whether you want

to honor me or not. And I learned a very

big lesson that day. Many of us, many times things

go right, we immediately blame it on God. But God

actually is innocent. God did not say no, but he

did not say yes.

But we make up.

Justify, Oh God. We try to put words in God's mouth. Right, God,

your scripture says, but we take it out of context

just to fulfill and justify a validate.

What we want.

We have to be very careful with that because these

very things if you're not careful and we don't discern,

we will get disappointed with God.

None of his fault.

By the way, we get so disappointed and jaded and discourage,

we leave God and say God is God doesn't care.

Sometimes we do this to our own parents right when

we were growing up. You don't care. I want to

eat ice cream for breakfast. You don't give me what

I want. You don't care. You know that it's because

your parents care. They're not allowing you to eat ice

cream for breakfast. But you see, even as adults here,

many of us here, we will still go to the

same thing with our God the Father. But praise God,

Praise God. I learned my lesson. I learned my lesson,

and the next time I really fasted and prayed, and

I pray for nine months, don't know, eleven eleven months,

eleventh eleven months for my partner. And today we are

two months away from our wedding. Yeah, two months away

from our wedding. And Sharon would tell you so just

what happened in that eleven months of prayer was that

there was interest already. Right, we liked each other, we

can feel their interests. But I knew that I wanted

to do right before God. I cannot let my emotions

come in the way like last time I learned my lesson.

I'm like, not another heartbreak, Lord, no more. If I'm

gonna date this person's word's marriage, Lord, I prayed, and

what happened was I stopped texting her. We only talk

about church stuff because we were planting this church right

with a team. So it became from talking jokes and

all that. It became just fully just business. Oh you're

going to do this today? She would tell you her

virtual story. She would say that was the first time

my eye broke her heart. She thought I fell in

love with another person ready and lost interests. But I

needed to guard my heart. I needed to make sure

that when I hear from the Lord, my emotions are

not in the way. So eleven months I prayed, and

the testimony is that that God blessed us and blessed

this relationship.

So what is God's will? What is God's will?

We have to be careful to not be the one

holding the pen to rise God's will for ourselves because

many times you are tempted to do so. You see,

what is good, it's not always of God. But what

is of God is always good. This is a truth

that many times maybe we forget. We just think that

what is bad is of course not from God.

Why is good?

It is from God. I'm going to challenge that theology,

your understanding of God. No, I'm going to say, what

is good is not always of God. Because when Jesus

was tempted, what the devil brought to Jesus was really good.

I'll give you the whole world, All that is in

front of you will belong to you if only you

abow down and worship me. Thank God, Jesus had wisdom,

he was able to discern between what is good and what.

Is of God.

But you see, even though we may think that what

is of God, we follow through it will cause us.

How many of us know, God is no man's debt.

God will never short change his children, no matter how much.

When God asks us something that caused us something. Don't

you think God has something better prepared for you? Don't

you think God will multiply? This is true scripture. You

see times of obedience in Scripture are times of pain

for many, but resulted in blessings greater than the initial

I don't know initial plan or arrangement that the person had.

The Lord knows better. His ways are higher, his thoughts

are higher. So what is of God? It's ultimately always good.

It's just that with our limited understanding, we can never

see it in that moment. I'm gonna end with this,

and because of time, I'm not going to go to

a third point, but I'm going to go to the

guiding tots to discern God's will. In conclusion, No, when

you think about God's will for your life, I hope

these will become some guiding thoughts for you. When God

us of us something, it will never go against his

own word. Remember this, it will never go against his

own written word. God's will will never cause us to sin.

I'm not saying that we will. When we follow godswel

we will see no more. I'm saying that his will

will not directly cause us a sin. Whatever sin that

happens after that is of our own doing, okay for

the nature of man. But God's will, when he asks

us to do of something, do something, it will never.

Lead us to sin. Remember this.

I had a friend, This was more than ten years ago.

Good friend. This person came up to me, and this

person has a homosexual tendencies, all right, same sex attraction.

One day, the person in tears called me and says, Steven,

I think God is calling me to get into the

relationship with this person who is of the same sex,

so that I can minister to this person and I

can reach this community. That time, I was nineteen years old.

It sounded good, Wow, how honorable. I was almost gonna say,

thank you for your sacrifice.

Why was this straught?

I didn't know how to answer, so I went to

a church leader. I'm like, my friend just called me

and told me, this sounds right, sounds good. Immediately retalingly delayed, leader,

just say that is wrong, because God's will will never

lead you to sin. Of course, I use a very

obvious example. God's will will never lead you to pride.

When he gives you something is never intended to draw

you away from him. If it draws you away from God,

that's not from him. Very clear, very clear. So that's

the second point. The third one is this I mentioned this,

Does it please the Lord? This is a very good

guidance thought if you live today just remembering this. I

think it's a very good handle to have already when

you're discerning between good and God. God, what is it

that you want me to do? Ask yourself this question,

does it please the Lord? Which one pleases the Lord?

More?

Don't ask the question which one am I more comfortable with?

Ask the question which one does the lot please? Is

the lot pleased?

Then more?

And that will also mean that the option may cause

us inconvenience, and we got to be ready for that. Last,

but not least, surround yourself with godly counsel, because when

we are in that situation, we can be swept up

by emotions. We can be swept up by excitement, We

can be scept up by our own desires and dreams.

And sometimes it takes godly counsel around us to be

able to see true the noise, hear true the noise,

see true, and seef true whatever emotion there is, to

be able to identify the truth of God. So my

encouragement to you is this, if you're not disciples, just now,

josephin share about how the leader find someone to disciple

you in acts. We call it the huddle system discipleship

because with that you have a safety net. You have

someone that can correct you when you think you're going

in the right direction. The person comes in and say, hey,

hold on, I think you need solar a little bit

to rethink what you are trying to do. And sometime,

as many things, we think that we are doing good.

We think that we're doing it for the good of

God or for the good of others. But then sometimes

the heart is deceitful. We are self conceived. So godly

counsel comes into play, and the Bible teaches this, surround

yourself with godly counsel. There's my encouragement to you. And

then you may ask, as I wrap this up, what

if I heard wrongly? I think that all I thought

is the will of God, is his ways and purpose.

I went for it. But what if? What if? I

get this question a lot?

It's one of the top popular questions amongst Christians today.

I'm hearing this, but what if I heard wrong? What

what if I mess up?

I want to tell you this, God's grace is sufficient,

His mercies are new every morning. As long as Matthew

six the the Three says you seek His king Man's

righteousness first, all these things shall be added unto you,

meaning to say, as long as you're seeking God again,

He's not interested to play hide and seek with you.

He's not interested to make you go wrong just for fun.

He will lead you. And even if you messed up,

even if, which is very rare, if.

You're seeing God, if you're seeking God, even if, he

will make what is a mess into a message and

you may not even know you have messed up. That's

how God works. He makes all things beautiful in his time.

But the key point is this that you seek him,

seek his will. We started with that scripture. Seek his will,

and he will show you which path to take. So

even if you'll heard wrong and you're messed up, it's

gonna be okay. God is going to come true for

you because God is your loving father, the last light

good for you to bring back the reflect. Is there

an area of your life you're struggling to give up control?

Why ask yourself that question?

Why dig deeper?

How will you guid your heart from choosing what you

desire instead of what God wants? Write it down? How

will you do it? Is starting to surround yourself with

godly counsel? Is it starting to pray more before you

make decisions? How can you apply what you've learned today

this coming week? Research has shown whatever you learn, be

it in church or in school. If you apply immediately

the following week, chances of it bearing fruit and sticking

is very much higher. If you don't practice the coming week,

you're probably going to forget about it. If the Lord,

and I believe the Lord is speaking to you, take

action right now. But what you can do? How do

you apply what you've learned today?

How do you discern God's will?

How do you put best practices in play in your

life so that it helps you make the right decisions

that will please the Lord? Amen? And that's all for

the word for today. I'm going to close us all

in pray. Can I invite all of us to stand

as I close? Thank you Lordon, Halleli Father load. We

thank you love for today. We thank you Lord for

this world. We thank you God, Law that you love

us too much for us to see us going astray.

You love us too much to see us directionless, because Lord,

you want the best for us. In fact, every single

day you are excited for your plans for us. When

we sleep and slumber a lot, you do not. You're

looking at the next day. Okay, my child is sleeping tomorrow. Tomorrow,

I have a plan for him tomorrow. I've got a

purpose for her. The person's gonna my child's gonna wake

up tomorrow. If a plan all set out, how many.

Of us love that.

To know that the plans or that they have been

prepared for us? And that is our God. He doesn't

reveal everything, but he's leading us, showing us one step

at a time. So Lord, I pray that you'll help

us to discern your will. You help us to be

able to sift through our emotions, our own personal ambitions, desires, dreams,

and Lord, be able to catch what is your desire

for us. And the good thing is Lord, that you

also know our desires, and many of such desires come

from you. They come from you, And like any loving father,

you will also love to see your children fulfilling dreams.

That they have.

But Lord, you always are higher, your thoughts are higher,

and you want the best for us. So may we

all learn to follow your voice. You see, you are

always answering, but we are not always listening. How may

we learn to listen to what you have to say.

We hope you've been blessed by this message. For more

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this week is going to be a good week. I

hit for you, God bless