Deuteronomy 29:29 “The secret things belong to the LORD our God, but those things which are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law.
There are two aspects of God’s will that are revealed in the Bible:
- God’s revealed will, which comes to us through the revelation of His Word as found in the Bible.
- God’s secret will, which is unknown to us until He reveals it to us.
God’s revealed will as described in the Bible, is for the purpose that Deuteronomy 29:29 proclaims; “That we may do all the words of this law.”
There are however, many other aspects of God’s will that are not known to us because He has not yet revealed them to us. These include future events and specific details detailing how He will work out His particular plan for us in our lives. When it comes to God’s secret will, He asks that we simply trust Him.
In God’s revealed will, we see that it is His desire that all people who are born on the earth are saved:
1Timothy 2:3-4 For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.
Jesus said that not everyone who says to Him “Lord, Lord” shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven:
Matthew 7:21 “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven.
This is clearly not God’s secret will, for He has revealed it to all people through His word in the Bible. We know that it is God’s will for everyone to be saved and enjoy the forgiveness of their sins and the eternal presence of God forever. This is a command from God and not a suggestion. He understands that to ignore or disobey this one command will mean the loss of eternal life for those who are disobedient to it.
In James 4:13-15, these verses are not speaking of the revealed will of God, but those secret things that He has planned for us that we need to wait for and trust Him with.
James 4:13-15 Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, spend a year there, buy and sell, and make a profit”; whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away. Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we shall live and do this or that.”
Here, it is clear that the Holy Spirit is not speaking of God’s revealed will for our lives. James points out that concerning what is going to take place tomorrow, we don’t yet know what is going to happen. We can bring our heart’s desires to the Lord and ask Him if these things are His will, but we will not know if they are His will until we actually set out to accomplish them.
We submit our desires to the Lord and then begin to take steps to move in that direction. He may quickly make the way open to us, or He may shut every door we try to walk through. Even in open doors or those that are shut, we may not know if we are truly in the will of God until we continue through the entire process of discovery.
These attempts at knowing the secret will of God for our life can be described as “Ventures in Faith”. They are the things that we do in faith after having prayed about them and submitted them to the Lord. We set out on the adventure of discovery and only learn whether the Lord is in it after we have done our best and committed the rest to Him.
An obstacle in the way does not necessarily mean that we are not in the will of God. It may be that the obstacle will require persistence, trust and even more faith to overcome. In the overcoming and the waiting, we find that we will obtain the intended result that God had for us. This is where “Waiting on the Lord” comes into the equation. Waiting for the Lord to show us His secret will as we persist and prevail over a difficulty until we obtain the promise, is the hardest part of the process. All of us in our fallen nature find that waiting for most things that we want is a very hard thing indeed.
As you walk with the Lord today, be persistent in your desire to find His secret will for your life. Remember that if you have first prayed about the matter and then waited on the Lord to lead you, that it will also require your constant action in moving in the direction of that goal, before you can see if the Lord is in it. Don’t be afraid of failure. If you set out on a goal that you have prayed about and it becomes apparent that the Lord is not leading in that direction, it is okay to stop and regroup. Don’t be afraid to set out again on a new venture of faith just because the last one failed. Who knows that this new walk of faith that you are on may lead you into the most exciting and fulfilling days of your life?
Rob Robinson
