Chapter 12: Making Tough Decisions

Summer before junior year story

What ministries to do? What ministries to let go?

What does God want me to do?

Embracing the seasons of waiting and uncertainty

Stone analogy

Knowing God's Will for Our Lives

Train of thought to Knowing God

The struggle during the season of waiting: The battle of control versus surrender

Work on the tasks ahead of you

Battle is not ours but God's (2 Chronicles 20)

Confession

Response

No power

No Knowledge

Position Yourselves

Stand still

See the salvation of the Lord

Trying to control the situation is not trusting that God will take care of things for you

Surrender to God is trusting in His promises and what He has done in the past

My type A personality

So you moved. You make a decision, but things aren't clear

Things don't go according to plan

Talk about decision to stay with Spiritual Life

In the height of doubt, it's hard to see God. You might not feel like trusting God. But remember faith is not wholly dependent on feeling. It is a balance between the emotional and the intellectual

Inner circle, firends that surround you to remind you of who God is and what He has done in your life already

Things still seem uncertain

There's a lot more unknown

Story: Light unto my feet

God doesn't call the qualified. He qualifies the chosen

Daniel and Hebrew youth stayed faithful, not knowing what was in store for them

Light in those days is not a flashlight

Tied in with the Inner Life chapters

Decision Making time

Costs and Benefits (Prayerfully)

Reach out to trusted counsel

Personal heart preparation

Jesus went alone on a mountainside to pray

Be open to other perspectives, you don't know everything

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Making Decisions without listening to God can have drastic consequences

David/Bathsheba

Abraham/Sarah

Israel with a king

Surrender our desires for His desires

Matthew 6:10 - Lord's prayer: your will be done

Luke 9:23 - Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me

Jesus at Gesthenmane

Character focus is primary

Conquering overthinking

Men are looking for better methods, God is looking for better man (EM Bounds)

To think like God to feel like God will help us to make decisions in God's will

Wherever your decision lands

Clearing the noise around us

Find out who God wants you to be more than what He wants you to do (tied with Knowing God)

If we are more focused on what to do rather than who to be, we won't have the character to face the tasks that God wants us to do

You can't control a problem more by overthinking. I'm not saying not to think. But at some point, you've done all that you can. Put the problem in the box and leave it in God's hands

Trust me, I suck at this too. Whirling through the multitude of possibilities that could happen. As my friend Sarah said, you're only falling into a rabbit hole

Move forward

We are the driver, God is the driver on the other side

You have the gas pedal. God doesn't force us to move

But if you start moving, God can steer us in another direction.

Dwelling in the thoughts of fear will only paralysis us. At some point, we must surrender and move forward.

Courage is not the absence of fear, but the ability to move in spite of fear.

Biblical examples of waiting

Abraham and Sarah waited 25 years for God's promise for a son to be fulfilled

Jews waited 483 years for the Messiah

Noah

Hannah waited years for her own child

Women with the issue of blood waited for twelve years with no cure

Saul going into battle

God asks the ill-equipped to serve Him so they know that it was God who did all things through them. Chris Estay

You'll know its God - 2 Corinthians 4:7. We are but earthen vessels with God as a treasure

If you abide in me, and my word abides in you