Finding God's will for your life

One of the greatest mysteries of life is determining what to do with your life. If you believe in God, you may have wondered what His will for your life is. What is that individual, special thing that He has prepared for you and only you to do?

Many of us live waiting for an audible voice from Heaven to go left, right, forward, stop.

Finding God's will for our lives seems so clouded in mystery; though that mystery has been created by us not by Him.

Proverbs 16:9 says, "The heart of man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps."

Discovering God's will first begins with knowing Him. In learning who He is and what it means to know Him, so much about what His will for you is revealed. The Bible has much to say on dating, marriage and family -- how to build your career with integrity and financial suaveness; what it means to manage your finances, raise your kids and leave a legacy for generations. Before you move to the one special thing, stop and look at what He has said to everyone.

Next, this proverb tells us to make a plan. Most of us would rather have the plan downloaded to our phones and begin to mark it off as a "to do" list. But God says know Him and then make a plan.

Planning helps you figure out where you want to be and what it takes to get there. When you plan your vacation, you first think about experiences you want to have and start planning from there.

One of the ways we discover God's will for our lives is to begin to make a plan, to figure out where we think we would like to end up.

When we do that, we start moving in that plan, gaining experiences and figuring out what we like and what we don't.

Third, trust Him in your plan. Part of the plan is saying: "This is where I'm headed, trusting that if you have another direction, you'll reveal it." And He does. He takes men like William Wilberforce from slave trading. He places a burden in the hearts of women heading into public education to move toward mission. It's often in that act of doing what we think the next step should be that God reaches into our souls and reveals what the next step is.

We plan. He establishes.

Rob Hurtgen is a husband, father, minister and writer. Read more from him at robhurtgen.wordpress.com.