The Lord’s Will be Done

Job 16; Acts 21-23 

“…Through the Spirit they urged Paul not to go on to Jerusalem…a prophet name Agabus came down from Judea…The Holy Spirit says, ‘In this same way the Jews of Jerusalem will bind the owner of this belt…’ When he would not be dissuaded, we gave up and said, ‘The Lord’s will be done.’”

Acts 21:4, 10, 11, 14

Our love and compassion for people can sometimes color our capacity to hear well and discern God’s will. Paul’s friends and church leaders were clearly hearing the Spirit say that suffering and imprisonment awaited Paul. Yet as they heard Paul’s determination to follow through on a pathway of testifying to the gospel through suffering, the church leaders surrendered to the Lord’s will over their natural impulse to prevent further suffering in Paul’s life.

Is there a higher will, or path, than the avoidance of suffering?

Paul’s focus was on testifying to the gospel until the point of death, if that was the Lord’s will. Jesus’ example had become Paul’s primary orientation in his processing of the Lord’s will.

What, or who, guides our discernment of God’s will in our lives?

“Your kingdom come, your will be done in my life as it is in heaven.”