How can we know God's Will in our life?

All of us want to please God in our day to day life. We all want to choose the best career, get married to the right person, etc in order to please God. We all know that if we please God, it would be a blessing for us both in this age and also in the age to come. Many preachers and teachers stress on this fact. But seldom have they told us how to please God. On the contrary, most of the time, they would have told the way which would not be pleasing God in reality.

For example, many of us would have thought that God directly speaks to us through Holy Spirit in our heart, so we ‘just need to listen to the gentle voice speaking in our heart’ to follow God’s Will in our life. But we should remember that even Satan can speak to our heart and can speak in a similar voice and give us wrong advice. Others go and ask preachers about their future and believe in their ‘visions’ and ‘dreams’ without discerning. Even Satan can also deceive us by disguising as an angel of light (2Cor 11:14). Paul says in Gal 1:8, ‘even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed.’  Some preachers say that whatever blessings we ask positively, we would receive it, if we have faith in God. But this indirectly means that God can be changed according to our own whims and pleasures. Rather the truth is, God is the one who controls everything including our hearts(Dan 4:32).  

So this brings us back to the question: How can we find God’s will? Please turn with me to Deuteronomy 29:29

“The secret things belong to the LORD our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law.” (Deu 29:29)

The ‘secret things’ refer to God’s will which are going to happen in our life in future. We can look back to our past and know that, whatever things which have happened in our lives, are according to God’s will or not. Since we cannot know the future, we cannot see what exactly God has planned for our lives. But still if we follow the law of God revealed in the Scripture, then we would be following God’s will inspite of the ignorance of our future . For example, at present I am thinking of pursuing post graduation in my medical career. But I don’t know about my future. I have no idea even of the fact that whether I would be alive tomorrow or not. But I am pretty sure that God has a plan for my future. At present I don’t know it. But one thing I can be sure of. If I am following the revealed will of God, which God has written through Scripture, then I would be in according to God’s will. So my duty for today is to work hard and be biblical in my work ethics by being honest and sincere in my workplace and prepare for higher studies according to my capacity.

Another question for us now is this: Is Scripture alone sufficient to know God’s revealed will or do we need extra biblical church traditions, visions, dreams, prophecies etc?

All scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for refutation, for correction, and for training in righteousness, so that one who belongs to God may be competent, equipped for every good work. (2Ti 3:16-17) (NASB)

From these verses, we can know that if we want to do good work, Scripture is sufficient. Therefore, let us read and meditate on God’s word through the illuminating power of the Holy Spirit, so that we will be following the Will of God by our obedience to His precepts.