Just Do Something: A Liberating Approach to Finding God's Will

by Kevin DeYoung

Our imaginary questioner has a point. Just look at the book of Acts. We read of numerous visions—a vision to Ananias (9:10–16), a vision of unclean animals (10:10–17), a vision of a man of Macedonia (16:6–10), a vision in Corinth (18:9), and a vision on the road to Damascus (22:17–21). And we read of angels appearing to Philip (8:26), Peter (12:7–8), and Paul (27:23). There are examples of audible voices (9:3–6; 10:13, 15, 19–20; 23:11), and mysterious promptings to go somewhere (8:29; 20:22–23), and a prediction about the future from the prophet Agabus (21:10–11). It seems like God shows up and tells people where to go and guides them by means other than the Spirit speaking through the Scriptures. But there are a couple of considerations that make me think these examples in Acts are not meant to be the normal pattern for our lives. First, it’s important to realize that these events of special revelation weren’t normal even for the apostles. Take Paul, for example. On occasion, God directly told him to go somewhere, but most of the time Paul made decisions like the rest of us. He used rather tentative phrases like, “It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us” (Acts 15:28–29). In almost every case, he simply decided where to go and how to get there (Acts 20:16). In 1 Corinthians 16 he laid out his plans very prosaically, basically saying, “When I arrive, I will make introductions. Then some people will accompany me, if that seems good. Once I’ve gone through Macedonia, I w...