Have you ever worried that your sin or willfulness or ignorance will cause you to thwart God’s will for your life (and your loved ones)? At my women’s Bible study, we examined Proverbs 19:21, “There are many plans in a man’s heart. Nevertheless the Lords counsel—that will stand.” Donna, our wise leader, reassured us that God will redirect us, even when we sin or make mistakes. His good plan will always prevail. Of course that also means that evil people cannot thwart God’s plans either. So please join me as I share this reassuring post about the sovereignty of God’s will for our lives.
The New International Version translates the last part of that verse, “The Lord’s purpose will prevail,” and The King James Bible says, “The counsel of the Lord that shall stand.” The message translation says, “We humans keep brainstorming options and plans, but God’s purpose prevails.” No matter how we look at these translations, we realize God will always choose his own will over any of our plans and despite any of our actions.
Perhaps this fear of losing out on God’s will came from scary things people believe. Some people believe in two wills for God: God’s perfect will for us, and his permissive will. I’m not sure this is Biblical though. Yes, God does want the best for us. He gave the best to Adam and Eve. In that sense, God did have a “perfect will” for them. Yet before he made them, God knew Adam and Eve would fall. But their sin and ours in not God’s will for us. Rather, God knows we will sin, and he already had a plan to redeem all people, (Ephs. 1:4 + 11b “Even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes.” + “…he chose us in advance, and he makes everything work out according to his plan.”) God already had good plans for everyone’s life (Jer.29:11 “I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”)
God neither planned for us to sin, nor willed our sin to happen, and God cannot be tempted (1John3:9 “Those who have been born into God’s family do not make a practice of sinning, because God’s life is in them. So they can’t keep on sinning, because they are children of God.” James 1:3 “When tempted, no one should say, ‘God has tempted me,’ for God cannot be tempted by evil nor does he tempt anyone.”) So I will not say, for sure, this dual-will idea is wrong. It certainly sounds like it can scare people, so I think we should explain our lives the way the Bible does, and that means we must trust that our sins will never thwart God’s good plans for our lives.
This means we can trust that we have not messed up God’s best plans for our lives. We are not living in the “second to best” option God has for us. This also means we must be gentle and forgive ourselves for present weaknesses and past mistakes. When we were younger, we lived our lives to the best of our abilities. We may have grown up in families that passed down generational lies. These may have even sounded godly. Whether these lies embodied workaholism, legalism, shame, or any other lie of Satan, we may have believed we needed to live our lives according to these lies. As a result, we may have either made foolish choices or even down-right sinned, because we lived according to those lies. God knows this weakness of ours. Look at Psalm 103:14, “The Lord is like a father to his children, tender and compassionate to those who fear him. For he knows how weak we are; he remembers we are only dust.”
God is also our best encourager, and he does not leave us in this place of weakness. He believes we can grow in wisdom and holiness (James 1:5 “If you need wisdom, ask our generous God, and He will give it to you. He will not rebuke you for asking.” And 1Thess.4:13, “God’s will is for you to be holy.”) Holiness is fruit, not labor. We can grow in the Lord, so we can follow his will, by growing in these fruits. For example, Romans12:2 says, “Be transformed by the renewing of your mind,” which we can do as we pray and read the Bible. Gals.5:16 says, “Walk in the Spirit and you shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh.”
We will still sin, even when we grow in the fruits of the Spirit, even when we read our Bibles, have quiet times reflecting on the Word and praying. But we will grow in God’s wisdom, and we can sin less. We can live to please the Lord. And we can trust that we are living to fulfill his will, whether or not we sin.
I pray we have blessed you with today’s brief post. I love to find ideas other women have shared (like Donna did at our Bible study) and then expound on them and share them with you my readers. You are my friends. So please share your ideas with me so I can share them with my other readers.