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Today, I was 12 years of age.
I always sat on the second row and the first seat on the aisle on this particular Sunday, a lady was preaching and I don’t exactly remember what she said.
In fact, I don’t remember anything she said, except when they gave the invitation.
It was about seven steps to the altar.
I went straight to the altar, got on my knees and asked the Lord to save me.
And before I knew it, I had five of my Sunday school buddies around me praying that I’d get saved.
But I remember thinking, ok, now, Lord I’m saved. Now. What?
And nobody ever said another thing to me about anything about the future. Nothing.
Then I began to think. Well, Lord, you save me. What do you save me for anyway?
And then I began to think and pray about it.
And I thought, well, Lord, maybe you have something for me to do wasn’t very long before I realized and learn and reading a scripture.
God has a will, a plan for all of his Children.
And if you will turn to Colossians for a moment and I want us to begin reading in this ninth verse and read through the 12th verse.
And I want you to listen very carefully to this message in the ninth verse.
Paul writes to the logs for this reason.
Also, since the day we heard of it, we have not ceased to pray for you.
And to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding so that you will walk in a manner worthy of the Lord to please Him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and in increasing in the knowledge of God strengthened with all power according to his glorious might.
For the attaining of all steadfastness and patience, joyously giving thanks to the father who has qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints in life filled with the knowledge of His will.
When is the last time you ever thought about that God has a will.
He has a plan for your life.
You probably uh were saved at some point in your life and thought, well, that’s it.
And you got baptized and joined the church and you just sort of been living out your life.
Has anybody ever told you that God has a plan for your life?
We’re not like a herd of cattle.
We are specifically people singular responsible to almighty God for our life.
He has a will and a purpose and a plan for every single one of us.
The tragedy is that most people will go through life and never hear that.
They’ll always think that I’m just one of a herd of people that God saved and I’m on my way to heaven and that’s it.
No, he saves you one at a time personally because he has a will for your life.
What is his wheel? Listen to this.
I want to be sure you get it clearly that which God approves of and determines to bring about it concerns God’s choices of what to do and what not to do in our life.
God has a will and a plan for your life.
It doesn’t make a difference how old you are where you came from? What the situation is.
God has a plan for your life.
Don’t ever listen to someone tell you, well, you’re not important any time anybody looks at you and tells you you’re not important.
You look at the cross and say, I’ll tell you why I’m important. He died for me.
He not only died for me but he died for everyone but everybody is important.
So, have you ever thought about the fact that God has a will for your life?
He knows all about your background, all the things that you would bring up say, well, God couldn’t use me.
He couldn’t do this. He can’t do that. He knows all about you.
He knew about you before you were ever born.
He has a will and a plan for all of our lives.
The tragedy is that most people will never think about that.
They were never told that they never thought about that. That God had a special plan for their life.
Yes, he does. Well, what’s God’s plan for my life? Have you ever asked him?
I’ll bet most of you have never asked him because you never heard the fact that he has a plan for your life, you think?
Well, he saved me, I guess that his plan, step one, that’s step one.
He has a plan for your life.
He wants to accomplish something and you’re not the same thing for everybody, but something for you personally specifically.
And I think about my mom, for example, she lived to be about 80 some years of age and um she spent her life working in a textile mill for 40 years.
And probably if you had asked her and I, we used to talk about this, ask her, what Rebecca, what do you think God’s purpose for your life was?
She’d probably say, well, I don’t know, I guess it’s just bringing you in, into the world, raising you.
That’s probably what she’d say. And so I think about that is one of his purposes in life.
Don’t ever underestimate what God can do with a little bit.
And God has a plan for your life and what I want to ask you to do is to listen carefully because there are three aspects of this plan.
And so think about it in this light. First of all, that’s God’s predestined will.
And that means he’s referring to those things that he will do.
His predestined will will happen and nothing can interfere with it no matter what’s happening in the world.
He has a predestined will, those things he will do.
This is his overriding sovereign will by which he operates in the world in general and in our lives personally, it is irresistible, unchangeable and unconditional.
That is his predestined will cannot be changed. No matter what happens who it happens in through cannot be changed.
And a good example of his predestined will is a cross.
He predestined the death of Jesus before the world was ever created. He makes no mistakes, his predestined will.
We can’t do anything about we, we’re just here. Then there’s his moral will now watch this.
This applies to every one of us and let’s go back to Exodus chapter 20.
And, and you know what this says, listen to this. You shall not murder period.
You shall not commit adultery period.
You shall not steal, you shall not bear false witness.
You shall not covet your neighbor’s house and belongings.
That’s just part, that’s just part of his moral will.
And then I’ll turn to first Thessalonians chapter four.
And um, this is a part of his will also his moral will now listen to this.
It’s 10 commandments. We understand that, that, that’s it, his moral will.
That’s his will morally for all of us, for everybody, no matter who they are or what does his moral will say.
And then this fourth chapter finally, then bren, we will request and exhort you in the Lord Jesus Christ as you receive from us instructions as to how you ought to walk and please God.
Just as you actually do that, you excel even more.
And then listen to what he says, this is his moral will.
But you know what commandments we gave you by the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Listen carefully for this is the will of God, your sanctification to live a holy life.
That is that you, to be specific, that you abstain from sexual immorality that each one of you know how to possess His own vessel in sanctification are not in lustful passion like the gentiles, unbelievers do who know not y now this is a part of God’s moral will.
We have the 10 commandments. And specifically, he identifies in this chapter of Thessalonians.
This is the will of God, your sanctification that is that you abstain from sexual immorality.
That is the law of the living God. It doesn’t make a difference what you think.
It doesn’t make a difference, what group you belong to or where you’re from or whatever it might be.
And it is a moral law of God for which all of us will give an account for by the way we respond to it.
And we have people today who want to, they want to defend all kinds of things.
The scripture says abstained from sexual immorality that each one of us should know how to handle ourselves.
Not in lustful passion, like the gentiles, like the unbelievers who do not know God.
Every believer knows God through Jesus Christ.
We live under the moral law of God to abstain from sexual immorality, which is a major, major, major cause of sin, wickedness, violence, and a lot of other things in this country.
And people can reason all they want to.
When you go back to the word of God, it is absolutely crystal clear that it is a sin against almighty God, a sin against His moral law.
Then of course, uh there is one other and that is God’s desired. Will.
We say his predestined will cannot be changed. His moral law is the law we should live by God.
God’s desired will. Is this, listen carefully, those things he desires for us salvation, baptism, the fruit of the spirit in our life.
Service, giving, forgiving, loving, praying about everything, many decisions in our life that is there are three parts to his will.
His predestined will, which cannot be changed. His moral will for which we are responsible.
God’s desired will is through our whole life. Somewhere in this.
You are today most people will go to church year after year after year.
And nobody ever mentioned the fact that God has a will for your life personally specifically, and you’re responsible to give an account, why, why all these passages about judgment and give an account for our life.
If we weren’t responsible, we are responsible and all of us who proclaim the word of God, we are very responsible for reminding ourselves and each other that we have a moral law by which God wants us to live.
We have a spiritual law of the Lord Jesus Christ who lives within us to be obedient to him in every single area of our life.
And so here you are today at this age in this place and time of history and you are living out a life.
The life that you feel like at this point in your life is the best or maybe you, maybe you don’t like your life, maybe you change a lot of things in your life.
So let me ask you this. What about your moral life?
What, what about the fact that God has a He has a will for your life?
He has a purpose for your life. He has a plan for your life.
You said, well, I don’t know what that plan is. Have you ever asked him?
Have you ever asked God what, what’s your will for? What am I doing here?
No way, Lord, what, what, what, what’s my purpose? God has a purpose for every single person.
We don’t understand all that God does, but he has a will for us because listen, we’re not one of a bunch of sheep.
Each one of us has a name, a heritage, a personhood. We are specific persons made by Almighty God.
And he has a plan for our life. They’re not the same.
It doesn’t mean one is better than the other. It’s just where we are in life.
And it’s just the fact that God has placed us here and given some people, they mean they hard times, sometimes it’s easy times watch this.
We are morally responsible to God to live a moral obedient life.
And he is responsible for enabling us, helping us, strengthening us, giving us wisdom and guidance in life.
So watch this. Now, what does He say?
You have to be like her, you, you had to be like Him.
No, God has a will for your life. And He is more than willing to show you.
And the primary reason most people don’t know God’s will for their life is first of all, they never even heard that He has a will.
And secondly, they won’t know how to talk about it or what or what to ask.
I’m simply saying to you that you are a specific person and that God has a purpose and will and plan for your life and He will bless you according to your obedience to what you know, and so I think about so many people who live out their lives, they’re not happy, they don’t feel fulfilled.
If you said if you had another chance, you could start life again. Where would you start?
Would you, would you change anything? Most people have changed something but watch this.
Here’s one thing you will never be able to change. God loves you perfectly.
He loves you perfectly. He has a will for your life. You may have.
You may be at the point in your life that you’ve lived half your life or 3/4 of it, or 90% of it.
But God has a plan for you. Listen to me, life is a jewel.
It’s a gift from God and he gives us abil abilities and talents and skills that for example, you think about the people who do things that I absolutely would have thought 50 years ago.
It’s impossible. They’re brilliant people. They’re so brilliant in some areas. They think they don’t need God.
What a tragedy. We all need Him.
What no two of us are alike and God loves every single one of us just the same.
So let me ask you, where are you in, in light of the will of God?
You say, well, I’ve never thought about it.
Well, you need to start thinking about it today because you’ll have to think about it today because I’m reminding you of it.
You have to think about it.
That the Holy God almighty God before whom all of us will stand one day and you give an account for our life.
Read frustrating is we’re gonna, we’re gonna give an account for our life and some people will die having only known the Lord a few days or a few weeks, sometimes a few minutes.
So you said, what about so and so and so and so and so you know what I forget so and so you think about your life, you’ve heard the gospel.
You’ve had opportunities, you’ve had awesome opportunities. Maybe you didn’t have too many opportunities.
Maybe you’ve never felt loved in your life. God loves you. He has a plan for your life.
You say, well, what about this, this point in my life? Listen carefully.
He’ll pick you up right where you are right where you are. He’ll start today in this minute.
If you said God, I never thought about this before. I want to do.
I want the rest of my life to be in your will.
Lord, whatever it takes here, I am, he’ll pick you up right where you are. And he watch this.
He will enable you to do your best the rest of your life.
But what he needs and is waiting for is your willingness to surrender to his will because watch this.
He always has the best. Does that mean the same?
No, I don’t understand why he allows some people to suffer the way they suffer.
I don’t understand why people grow up the way they have to grow up situations and circumstances.
But God knows and all of his judgments will be according to his perfect will.
He knows, he knows our opportunities.
He knows the things that people have plagued with and he knows the opportunities he’s given us.
So the issue is this not what have I done or what have I missed?
But God beginning today, maybe you never thought about the fact that He has a wealthy life.
Well, and you see, watch this. You don’t know what kind of influence you had.
Some of you have had tremendous influence that you’ve not even thought about and some of you have thought about it.
You have an opportunity, you have influence, you have testimony, you, you have the privilege of living a life with God.
If you choose to now watch this.
If you had never heard before, if you’ve never heard before that he has a plan for your life.
What does he do? I say it again.
He picks you up right where you are, begins to show you his will from this point on in your life.
Lord, I, I never knew you had a will. Yes. Well, Lord, I will.
I, I wanna know what your will is. Yes, he’ll show you. Well, Lord, what, what is your will?
He will begin to put people around you in your path.
Something, something you read something you hear message, you may hear that you begin to realize.
Oh God, I never thought about you having a will for my life.
Well, lord, I want my life to you that, that whatever you have in mind for me.
Lord, here I am. Watch this. That’s always the place to start.
God, he knows what opportunities you’ve had and have not had and he knows that he’ll take you wherever you’re willing to surrender yourself to Him.
He will begin right there and do what work out the best in your life.
You don’t ever give up, you never quit because God doesn’t give up. He doesn’t quit on you.
He’ll take you right where you are. Some people are brilliantly brilliant in many areas.
Some people have a little of that.
You know what God takes them both, right where they are and when they stand before them, they will not be judged on the basis of how smart or how ignorant they were.
They’ll be judged. We, we will all be judged on the basis of what did we do with what we knew and what we had that puts us all in the same category, the smarter and those who are less fortunate, whatever it might be.
God has a will for your life.
And when I look at this, he says that we may be filled with the knowledge of His will, which means that God, he listen, he’ll give you whatever you need to begin today.
If you ask him, Lord, I missed it somewhere back.
I uh please forgive me, but I’m surrendering myself to you today that whatever you wanna do with my life, God, here I am.
I probably, I probably messed up Lord. But here, here I am. Will he forgive you? Absolutely.
Do you have to beg him to know all you have to do is surrender your life at this point?
Lord, from this point on, I want whatever you have for me, you may be surprised and amazed at what He does with your life.
Even after you’re 65 or 70 years of age.
Remember, we’re talking about God who knows no limitations and some people do their greatest work very late in life.
God knew what was inside of Him. Listen, he knows how to arrange you opportunities.
You could never figure out for yourself. He knows how to change things that you think are not changeable.
He knows how to, he knows how to reserve the best blessings for you later in life.
The issue is, have you ever thought about it?
Have you ever thought about the will of God for your life?
And so when I think about that, and I think about the fact that He will show us, it’s consistent with the character of God to show you His will.
That was we’re talking about beginning right now.
We, we can’t change the past, but here’s what we can do. We can say God, I blew it.
I, I, I, I, I thought I had another chance. I, I might have done something else.
But I’m asking you to forgive me for my failures, forgive me for my ignorance. Maybe I didn’t pursue it.
Lord asking you to forgive me and Lord just enable me from this point to walk in your footsteps and to follow your will.
Listen, all of us have had second chances.
3rd, 4th, 5th, how many chances all of us have had the grace of God, the love of God.
Listen, God isn’t up there trying to judge you.
God wants to live his life in and through you and he’ll take you wherever you have surrendered yourself to Him.
You can’t do better than having Jesus, the Lord, the second version of the 20 living his life in you and picking you up where you are and, and taking you on to what he had in mind to begin with the will of God, the purpose of God, the plan of God.
And it’s out of listen, it would be out of God’s character to refuse to hear you.
Somebody says, well, I’ve been so bad. God can’t hear me.
Listen any time you think about that, think about the apostle Paul, he’s killing Christians, murdering Christians, taking away everything that they had and God reached down, blinded Him till he couldn’t do anything but said, the Lord have mercy upon me.
Listen. Nobody who ever prayed God be merciful to me.
God never turned a deaf ear if he could use a fellow like the Apostle Paul who spent most of his life destroying Christians.
And then look what happens every time I open this book and I turned to one of these books like Colossians.
And I think about the Apostle Paul people hated him and they were scared to death of him.
Look what God did with him. Watch this campaign. Listen and say, amen.
You can’t be so bad that God won’t save you.
You can’t be so evil that God can’t change you.
You can’t be so bad, so wicked, so vile that He can’t make something out of you that amaze you don’t give up, don’t quit and don’t think that God doesn’t care about you anymore.
And when I think about God, hallelujah.
You can use anybody if we’re willing to let him do it.
So where would you consider yourself to be as far as the will of God in your life?
Maybe you said, well, I never even heard about it before.
All I knew about it, but I was too busy doing my own thing.
I knew about it, but I had something else in mind and here you are this morning and you’re hearing about it again.
I pray that you won’t ever have to hear about it another time before you surrender your life to the Lord Jesus Christ.
And see what he’ll do in your life. He said, watch this. Here’s the problem.
Satan whispers in their ear. You can’t do that.
Who do, who do you think you are gonna be? Don’t listen to the devil.
Listen to the spirit of God who will take you right where you are, forgive you, cleanse, you fill you with the Holy Spirit and do more through you in you than you could ever figure.
Listen, if I should ask you, would you like to have a second chance? Most people would.
There’s some things in my life. I had a second chance.
I changed a few things and I think all of us would. That’s not the issue.
The issue is low. Here’s my life today. Whatever is left.
God, here’s my life today. Look, you don’t look around to watch what other people are doing and you look up to say God, here I am at this point in my life, at this age or the scope of my life, God, whatever you wanna do, I’m offering you what’s left.
Lord. God can do an amazing work in what’s left because He loves us because He knows exactly what we need.
He delights in showing us his will for our life.
And I want to read you three passages of scripture.
Uh So uh let’s, let’s turn to Psalm 16 and um it is the 11th verse and the 16th psalm.
Listen, you will make known to me the path of life in your presence is fullness of joy in your right hand.
There are pleasures forevermore. Look at that you will make known to me that your path of life.
Well, you have to be a certain age and much talent and skill. No, you’re asking. So, watch this.
If you left church today and you were in the home and you got in your bedroom, you got on your knees or sat in your easy chair or whatever.
And you said to Almighty God Lord, I heard it.
I’ve messed up badly, but today I’m surrendering my life to you that for the rest of my life, I want you to have your way in my life.
You will be shocked at what God will do.
Let me give you another verse, Psalm uh Thir uh 32 verse eight.
And uh you, you’ve heard me talk about this verse probably several times.
Listen to this verse Psalm 32.
I will instruct you and teach you in the way in which you should go.
I will counsel you with my eye upon you. Listen to that.
I will instruct you and teach you in the way which you should go.
Is that by a certain age, no certain person know that’s his offer to all of us who are willing to listen to him.
You may think. Well, I’ve really blown it in my life. I really messed it up.
I wish, I wish I had done better.
But Lord today, whatever is left here my life, what would you do with me?
You will be surprised at what he’ll do.
And so I, when I think, I think about these verses and think about how many times Proverbs 35 and six, for example, one of my favorite passages.
Trust in the Lord with all your heart.
Lean not to your own understanding in all your ways, acknowledge him and what’s His promise?
He will direct your path, just trust him, see what He’ll do.
So there are things that often hinder us from discovering and doing the will of God.
And I, I’m gonna give you a little quick list of them because often times we come to a place of decision and we give God some excuse.
So think about this things that hinder us from discovering in the will of God for our life.
Number one self will, we can’t get over over what we want to do, how we wanna do it.
Secondly, the influence of other people with other people influence us.
Oh, that won’t work well, why would you want to try something like that?
You’re talking to God who works the impossible ignorance of the word of God.
Think about all the promises he gives us that answered prayer and then doubt.
Well, I don’t think I could do that in my life.
Listen, the God who created this world can do anything he chooses to do.
No matter what’s been in the past. That’s who he is. Feelings of unworthiness.
Well, it may work for somebody but not for me because I’ve really blunt it. Bad.
God is willing to love you, forgive you, cleanse you and give you a new beginning.
Well, I’m, I’m too busy to deal with that.
Listen, you don’t want to die having rejected Jesus Christ.
Do you think God is going to accept an excuse?
Well, I would have, but I just didn’t have time.
There are people who are so foolishly busy, they don’t have time for God. Listen, fear.
Well, I know that’s what God wants me to do, but I, I just don’t think I could do that.
Probably every preacher who’s ever stood in the pulpit has told God at first. Oh, I couldn’t do that.
I can, I can stand in front of all those. Mm. Mm. Mm. Mm. Mm.
You can’t deliberately willfully choose to disobey God and be happy with your life.
And there are a lot of people because of their money. They can cover up a lot of stuff.
But you can’t cover up a disobedient heart.
If you’ve got millions, you can’t cover up disobedience to God no matter what you have or who you have or whatever it might be.
God has a will for your life. He loves you. He desires the best for you.
And if you’ve missed it so far, start today and tell him, Lord, I don’t know what you can do what’s left over.
But God, here I am. Take me like I am. He’ll forgive you, cleanse you. Let me tell you something.
God won’t. Do you want to hear?
Well, somebody does one thing God won’t do to you.
He won’t bring up the past and say, see that I, I told you.
So you, yeah, he doesn’t throw up the past.
He brings up the future of what he’s able to do and can do with you.
It may be late in life or early in life.
But one thing for certain, he’ll take you where you are and you’ve got willful known sin in your life.
Maybe. Now watch this one.
God speaks to your heart this morning in the worship service and he already points to you.
He’s already said to you. But you know, you have to correct this.
You know, you, you have to stop this.
You know, you have to change this and you’re sitting here thinking, oh my goodness, God, what am I gonna do?
You let God take you where you are and watch him do what he’s able to do in your life.
Listen, if you wait till you figure it out, you’ll never do it.
It takes surrender. God. I’m not coming to you claiming that I’m worthy of anything.
I’m coming to you saying Lord I’ve messed it up. I’ve blown it.
I’ve sinned against you no more toleration of excusing.
I’m just laying it before you go, whatever you can do with my life. God, here I am.
Lord, whatever you wanna do here I am. What do you think yard will do?
He’ll amaze you.
First thing he’ll do is give you this awesome sense of peace, forgiven, forgiven, forgiven, forgiven and then watch you work in your life, watch this.
You’re not waiting on God. God’s waiting on you.
He’s waiting to give you his best the past.
He forgives and he forgets it and he gives you the opportunity to start all over again.
That’s the awesome indescribable, eternal will of God for your life.
And the question is, are you willing to be, are you, are you willing to say to Him?
Lord if I only know Him, God, I’m ashamed.
God, thank you for giving me one more chance. And Lord, here’s my life.
I wanna see what you’ll do with me. Now, watch this car.
The devil is gonna say to you, what are your friends gonna think?
Who do you think you’re gonna fool? Well, how can you overcome your past?
That was you don’t listen to the devil. Watch this.
You listen to God who created this world, who created you? Who’s given you the opportunity?
Who works miracle up to miracle after miracle? Who does the impossible?
You surrender your life to him and watch him work like you.
Now, I know what a few people are saying you’re saying.
But you don’t know you. I can hear this now, if you only knew me, I don’t have to know you.
God already knows you and you know what he knows all the secret things you’ve ever done.
And you know what he says, forgiven all the places you did forgiven.
That words, God is a wonderful giving. God.
Here, here’s the battle, the battle you’re having right now is will He, will he forgive me?
Watch this when you put it in that light? That’s an act of pride. Here’s your opportunity.
Today, you came to church today. Here’s your opportunity before you walk out of this place.
Here’s what you can do.
You can say God, I don’t even know how to confess all my sin.
But I’m saying to you, Lord that I know I’ve blown it lots of times I sinned against you haven’t taken advantage of my opportunities.
I’ve overlooked your goodness and love and mercy and forgiveness toward me. But today is best.
I know how I’m asking you to forgive me of my sin. I’m surrendering my life to you.
I probably won’t do a very good job of it.
I’m surrendering my life to you and I’d say to you dear father, forgive me.
And here’s my life. I want you to govern my life from this point forward. Here’s my life.
If you will surrender your life to God sitting right where you are, you don’t have to give him any details.
He knows all the details. All you need to say to him sincerely with all your heart.
God, I’ve messed up. I’ve blown it. I’m sorry. I’m ashamed.
I’m asking you to forgive me and Lord by your help, by your strength, by your wisdom, by your grace, by your goodness, by your love, your mercy.
I want to start all over again.
Think about how awesome God is that he’s willing to forget your past and they’ll let him remember the future.
Amen. Father. We couldn’t even begin to describe how awesome you are. What grace really means.
When we think about all that, you forgive us for all that you’re willing to do innocent through us.
We pray that the Holy Spirit will do His work right now and that every single one of us, we take a fresh look at our life and surrender ourselves totally to you again.
If necessary, we love you and we praise you in Jesus name.
Hey man.