Swimming With The Current
Dan Holloway, Pinnacle Associate
Not far from my home is a church with a large digital sign out front that is used to advertise upcoming events. It is often used to advertise an upcoming sermon series and that proved true again this week. This congregation’s new sermon series has been titled “ Knowing God’s Will for Your Life,” and I suspect it is a topic that will have great appeal to members of that church.
Yet I am not sure I would have the courage to preach such a series myself. It is not that the topic of God’s will is unimportant. People of faith should rightly think about God’s claim on our lives and it is a useful thing to wonder what that claim might mean for us both individually and as the gathered people of God. Indeed, much of our work at Pinnacle is entering into partnership with people who are asking those very kinds of questions and they are important and necessary questions.
No, my concern with preaching such a series is not with the topic itself but with the misunderstandings that I often hear around this subject. For some, and perhaps for many people, God’s will is like a bull’s eye on a target, one that we have to hit perfectly each and every time in order to please God. The purpose of our lives is to discover the one thing God requires of us in any given moment, and anything less than that means we have failed in some significant way to be God’s people. Given the fact that we don’t always get it right in life, that we are in fact imperfect people, and that it is not always easy to know what the best thing is in every particular situation, it is easy to see why this becomes a fearsome task for even the most faithful person.
That is why I have come to prefer a different way of thinking about this. Instead of thinking about God’s will as a bull’s eye we must hit, why not think of it as finding where the rivers of God’s will are already flowing in our world and allowing ourselves to be carried forward by the flow of the current? Why not recognize that God is already out in front of us, showing us the way, so that the best way of discovering God’s will for our lives is to see where the rivers of God are already flowing and to immerse ourselves more fully in them.
The Rev. Joan Gray supports such an understanding in her book Spiritual Leadership for Church Officers. She also reminds us that such an understanding has significant consequences for our practice of discernment:
“To enter the flow of the river means that we will not stay in the same place. As the river flows along, sometimes it will be placid; sometimes it will be rough. Our task is not to direct the river or make it flow, but rather to take our place in the current”
So how do we know where the rivers of God are flowing in our world? That is where we are taken straight back to the teachings of Jesus. Live in humility. Practice kindness daily. Love one another always. Wash another’s feet. Share our resources. Be the first to say, “I’m sorry.” There is much in the life of Jesus to show us where the rivers of God are flowing. So perhaps the place to start in discovering God’s purpose for our lives is to go back to the teachings of Jesus as a reminder of what it means to walk more fully in God’s steps. For even if we do not do that perfectly, we will surely be in a good and right place. And now that I think about it, all of that might indeed make a great sermon series.
Contact Dan at rdholloway65@gmail.com