Make God's Will Our Will

[Chad]

MAKE GOD'S WILL OUR WILL

A.W. Tozer

The mystery of man's free will is far too great for us! God said to Adam and Eve: "Thou shalt not eat from this tree." Here was a divine requirement calling for obedience on the part of those who had the power of choice and will. When they disobeyed they usurped the right that was not theirs! The poet Tennyson must have thought about this for he wrote in his In Memoriam: "our wills are ours, we know not how; our wills are ours to make them Thine!" "We know not how;" then Tennyson girds himself and continues, "Yes, our wills are ours to make them Thine." As created beings, that is our only right-to make our wills the will of God, to make the will of God our will! God is sovereign, and we are the creatures. He is the Creator and therefore His is the right to command us with the obligation that we should obey. It is a happy obligation, I might say, for "His yoke is easy and His burden is light!" It is important to agree that true salvation restores the right of a Creator-creature relationship, acknowledging God's right to our fellowship and communion!

 

[MelodyC]

Jesus is always our finest example.

LK 22:39 Jesus went out as usual to the Mount of Olives, and his disciples followed him. 40 On reaching the place, he said to them, "Pray that you will not fall into temptation." 41 He withdrew about a stone's throw beyond them, knelt down and prayed, 42 "Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done." 43 An angel from heaven appeared to him and strengthened him. 44 And being in anguish, he prayed more earnestly, and his sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground.

My Hubby prays often, "may your will be done on Earth as in Heaven". He figures that covers just about everything when he doesn't know what to pray for (specifically).

 

[gospelpreacher]

MAKE GOD'S WILL OUR WILL

A.W. Tozer

The mystery of man's free will is far too great for us! God said to Adam and Eve: "Thou shalt not eat from this tree." Here was a divine requirement calling for obedience on the part of those who had the power of choice and will. When they disobeyed they usurped the right that was not theirs! The poet Tennyson must have thought about this for he wrote in his In Memoriam: "our wills are ours, we know not how; our wills are ours to make them Thine!" "We know not how;" then Tennyson girds himself and continues, "Yes, our wills are ours to make them Thine." As created beings, that is our only right-to make our wills the will of God, to make the will of God our will! God is sovereign, and we are the creatures. He is the Creator and therefore His is the right to command us with the obligation that we should obey. It is a happy obligation, I might say, for "His yoke is easy and His burden is light!" It is important to agree that true salvation restores the right of a Creator-creature relationship, acknowledging God's right to our fellowship and communion!

How can there be free will in the will of God? God's will is his plans he made before he created anything. Our whole eternal life was planned by God and that's what we each live every second of the day. God is control of every tiny detail. Besides, if he didn't plan everything, there wouldn't be such a thing as prophecies.

Deuteronomy, chapter 32
39: "`See now that I, even I, am he, and there is no god beside me; I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal; and there is none that can deliver out of my hand.

Isaiah 45:7
I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things.

Amos 4
6: "I gave you cleanness of teeth in all your cities, and lack of bread in all your places, yet you did not return to me," says the LORD.
7: "And I also withheld the rain from you when there were yet three months to the harvest; I would send rain upon one city, and send no rain upon another city; one field would be rained upon, and the field on which it did not rain withered;
8: so two or three cities wandered to one city to drink water, and were not satisfied; yet you did not return to me," says the LORD.
9: "I smote you with blight and mildew; I laid waste your gardens and your vineyards; your fig trees and your olive trees the locust devoured; yet you did not return to me," says the LORD.
10: "I sent among you a pestilence after the manner of Egypt; I slew your young men with the sword; I carried away your horses; and I made the stench of your camp go up into your nostrils; yet you did not return to me," says the LORD.
11: "I overthrew some of you, as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomor'rah, and you were as a brand plucked out of the burning; yet you did not return to me," says the LORD.
12: "Therefore thus I will do to you, O Israel; because I will do this to you, prepare to meet your God, O Israel!"
13: For lo, he who forms the mountains, and creates the wind, and declares to man what is his thought; who makes the morning darkness, and treads on the heights of the earth -- the LORD, the God of hosts, is his name!

Isaiah 45
5: I am the LORD, and there is no other, besides me there is no God; I gird you, though you do not know me,
6: that men may know, from the rising of the sun and from the west, that there is none besides me; I am the LORD, and there is no other.
7: I form light and create darkness, I make weal and create woe, I am the LORD, who do all these things.

 

[james g]

The new birth places us in union with the life of Christ, a Life which is immutably inclined toward righteousness and holiness. Contrary to time-worn theory, the Christian does not receive or regain free will at the new birth.Romans Seven -- that even as a believer he does not have free will. Even when he does will good, evil is present with him. "The good that I would, I do not; but the evil which I would not, that I do ... I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members" (Romans 7:19,23).In his captivity to the law of the indwelling sin nature, the growing believer learns the truths of his identification with the Lord Jesus in His death unto sin and in His ascension in Glory. As he reckons himself to be dead unto sin, and alive unto God in Christ Jesus (Romans 6: 11), he begins to experience something of deliverance from the power of sin.He comes to realize that there is yet another law within him, "for the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death" (Romans 8:2). He begins to learn to "stand fast, therefore, in the liberty with which Christ hath made us free" (Galatians 5:1).In Christ, the believer lives in the freedom of His Father's will, not his own. Consider the Source of his new life, the Lord Jesus, who came to live in the freedom of His Father's will. "Lo, I come to do thy will, O God" (Hebrews 10: 9). "I do nothing of myself; but as my Father hath taught me, I speak these things" (John 8:28). "I have not spoken of Myself; but the Father, who sent me, he gave me a commandment, what I should say, and what I should speak" (John 12:49).