Featured Does God have a detailed plan for our individual lives?

Hello LWG

Many who have been saved by God.....see this plan detailed in Romans 8:28-39...
God works in us!!!

 

God directs everything according to His plan...Ephesians 1:11. And there's no need to worry because it'll be all good...(as Icon posted) Romans 8:29-30.

 

No......you indeed are fully responsible and accountable for the plans you make.
Do not confuse what is biblically revealed truth from the Divine side.....with those actions that we are responsible to do, even as we are dependant on God to enable us.
An example of this can be found in Deut 8:10-18.

Sinclair Ferguson wrote a book called discovering God's Will.....that might be helpful to you.

 

We can thwart God's will for our lives.
That's why I'm hesitant to say God's plan is detailed.

I don't always walk step-in-step with God.
Some may walk away from God's plan, only later to listen to his voice.
God works with humble, broken people.

Rob

 

No, we CAN'T. Nothing can thwart God's will and purpose for our lives.

"Then Job answered the Lord and said: “I know that you can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted." (Job 42:1-2)

 

Let's purpose to work though this difference of views politely.

In 1 Samuel, God chooses a king for Israel, the people's choice; handsome, head and shoulders about all others (9:2; 10:23); God anoints Saul (10:1), provides for him (10:4), the Spirit comes upon him and turns him into a "different person" (10:6). God is with him (10:7).
Yet Saul chooses a different direction. He is not a man after God's heart.
King Saul is reprimanded in 1 Samuel 15:19

"Why did you not listen to the voice of Yahweh and fall with shouting on the plunder? You have done evil in the sight of Yahweh!” (LEB)​

We are reminded in verse 29 that God doesn't change.

"Moreover, the Glory of Israel will not break faith and will not regret, for he is not a human that he should regret.” 1 Samuel 15:29 (LEB)​

God is unchanging in his nature and his character, to include his being, purposes, and promises. But there is some interplay with the free will of man.

In verse 11 (and similarly in 35) it says: “I regret that I made Saul king, for he has turned back from following me and has not kept my word.” (LEB)

Mathew Henry says "Repentance (regret) in God does not alter his will, but wills an alteration." Saul's actions changed the way God worked with him.
If he had a heart for God, God would have worked with him.

Rob

 

Lets back up and consider exhaustive determinism, God predestines whatsoever comes to pass. If that view is valid, then God has a detailed plan which He compels. However, if God either causes or allows whatsoever comes to pass, then God's plan must be flexible enough to accommodate our decisions which are inconsistent with God's desire for our choices. Someone has said, God is the God of second chances, and while the idea is valid, a better view is God is the God of our continuous chance. Every day, no matter how we failed before, God has a plan for us to follow that day.

 

Proverbs 3:5-6. 'Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all you ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths.'

Acts 15:18. 'Known to God from eternity are all His works.'

God is never taken by surprise and never frustrated by the actions of man. For Christians He works everything for their good (Rom. 8:28)- even our sins and our failings.

So don't seek to know God's plan for your life, just pray for His wisdom and guidance, and He will give it to you (James 1:5).

Guide me, O Thou great Jehovah,
Pilgrim through this barren land.
I am weak but Thou art mighty,
Hold me with Thy powerful hand.......'

 

Van, such a comment is not helpful to the thread. Your own bias is being displayed, and it is just inaccurate.

It is ONLY the believer that has total "freedom of choice" because they may choose what is fleshly or choose what is Godly. The heathen have no such option, but may only choose what is from the realm in which they abide - that which is of the flesh and corrupt.

I have to say, that I rarely am surprised at what some pass as sound doctrine, but the about statement meets that measure.

First, God doesn't need to be "flexible." The Lord Jesus Christ stated, "Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven." Do you think God is flexible in heaven?

What has God established? The law of reward. A life spent fulfilling the flesh will of that same reap what is sown. No better example than Charlie Sheen's admittance. God is NOT flexible.

Second, God does not "accommodate our decisions which are inconsistent with God's desire(s)." That is completely out of the character and nature of God. God's desires are always accomplished.

Third, God is certainly God, and although humankind fails, God will use what God chooses to use. HOWEVER, Do not mistake that for suggesting that God will again use a person for a situation in which that person by sinful behavior has been ruined. There may be other less noble areas of service, but that once ascended place is no longer available.

Fourth, God is not our "continuous chance" as Paul stated about some of the Corinthians that were dead because of the unrepentant sinful behavior.

 

I do not see any need to respond to Agedman's exhaustive determinism bias.

God does not need to be flexible, if exhaustive determinism is valid. But if exhaustive determinism is true, then God predestines our choices to sin, making God the author of sin. Thus exhaustive determinism is an utterly unbiblical doctrine.

Every day that you are alive, if God credits your faith in Christ as righteousness, He will transfer you into the kingdom of His Son, forgive your sins, make you spiritually alive (born anew) and put His Spirit into you.

 

Lamentations 3:19-26

19 I remember my affliction and my wandering,
the bitterness and the gall.

20 I well remember them,
and my soul is downcast within me.

21 Yet this I call to mind
and therefore I have hope:

22 Because of the LORD's great love we are not consumed,
for his compassions never fail.


23 They are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.

24 I say to myself, "The LORD is my portion;
therefore I will wait for him."

25 The LORD is good to those whose hope is in him,
to the one who seeks him;

26 it is good to wait quietly
for the salvation of the LORD.

 

But you did, didn't you. So much for not seeing "any need to respond."

If, in fact, that was the teaching, then you might have something worth posting, but because it is not the teaching, but your own biased view of the teaching. Therefore, your inaccurate statement is merely a distraction at best and firing the furnace of confusion at worst.

You are attempting to use Romans 4, but use it inappropriately.

This isn't a thread for that discussion, but to let the readers know.

 

Rob
God does not have regret or any other human emotions or passions. God does not repent.
He puts things in language we can understand.

 

RT already covered Job 42:2.

Job 5:12 : He thwarts the plans of the crafty
Psalm 33:10 : He thwarts the purposes of the peoples
Pro. 10:3 : He thwarts the craving of the wicked
Is. 8:10 : Devise your strategy, but it will be thwarted
Is. 14:27 : For the Lord Almighty has purposed, and who can thwart him?

 

Life with God,

Yes, God does have a plan for everyone's life as He has predestinated everything that comes to pass. Natural man does not like this doctrine as it exalts God's will, not man's.

"A man's heart deviseth his way: but the Lord directeth his steps" (Proverbs 16:9) God directs our steps, one cannot deviate from His plan as God does not misdirect any person's steps.

In the book of Psalms it says: “The steps of a good man are ordered by the LORD... (37:23)” Notice the italicized word “good”. That word was added by the translators, thus the verse actually says, “The steps of man are ordered by the Lord.” The word for “are ordered” means “causatively to set up, fixed, established.”

In the book of Jeremiah it says: “O LORD, I know that the way of man is not in himself: it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps. (10:23)” If it is not in man to direct his steps, then who is directing them? Paul tells the Philippian brethren that “it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure. (2:13)” Scripture is consistent through and through!

"And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose." (Romans 8:28) "All things" mean exactly that and includes sin as sin is a thing.

" being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will:" (Ephesians 1:11) Again, "all things" means exactly that and we see here how God's will is the first cause of all causes. If God is not the first cause of all causes he isn't God.