Devotions

“How can I find the will of God? How can I be sure that I am walking in His will for my life?”

Have you ever found yourself asking these questions? Do you find the topic of the will of God confusing, or do you live with the constant fear that you are missing His will for your life?

Let’s look at a statement Jesus Himself made concerning the will of God: “If anyone wills to do His will, he shall know concerning the doctrine, whether it is from God or whether I speak on My own authority” (John 7:17). In other words, this applies to anybody who wants to do the will of God.

According to Jesus, if you have it in your heart to do the will of God, you will understand and know what truth is. You will know His voice that says, “This is the way, walk in it.”

Since I was a young Christian, I wanted to do the will of God — even though I did not always fully understand what that was going to look like in my life. I remember going to church, sitting in the congregation listening to the preacher, and thinking, “How in the world can these people sit under this kind of message? Don’t they see how far off this is?” Most of the time they sat and listened but they went to church simply so that they could be blessed.

When people do not want to do God’s will, the first thing that comes into their lives is doctrinal confusion, eventually followed by an inability to discern truth. As their prayers go unanswered, they come to the conclusion that God doesn’t speak to them. They want their lives to be extraordinary. They want the crowds; they want to raise the dead, lay hands on the sick and have them recover; they want to speak in tongues and all the rest of it, but they do not want to walk in the revealed will of God.  

Carter Conlon joined the pastoral staff of Times Square Church in 1994 at the invitation of the founding pastor, David Wilkerson, and was appointed Senior Pastor in 2001. 

When you are shut in with God in prayer, the Holy Spirit will always lead you to God’s revealed Word. Christ is the living Word and He will build up your faith.

We are commanded: 

“Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. . . . Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. . . . And take . . . the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God” (Ephesians 6:11, 13, 17).

Often when you receive specific instructions from the Lord, the Holy Spirit will direct you to a passage of Scripture by whispering to your spirit that you should turn to it. And then God’s Word will speak to you directly, telling you how to get through your crisis.

Many of you reading this message are in a situation that requires a word from God. Nobody on earth can help you and the only way you can get through your crisis is to remain in Christ’s presence until He gives instructions! He must tell you the way through: what to do, when to act. The perfect timing is all in the hands of the Holy Spirit — not too early or too late.

Beloved, you do not need to worry about your trial. God is faithful to respond to your every need and request, so as you pray, simply say, “Lord, I come now not just to have my needs met but also to meet Your need.”

We were made for fellowship with Him, even in our heaviest times. Do you love to be with Him? Do you prefer Him above all others? I trust that you heart cries out, “Jesus, You are my soul’s great pleasure and I love Your company.”

I pray that God will put in all of us a heart that is easily wooed to His presence. Let us pray through all our trials and listen closely to the Holy Spirit in our secret time of communion. 

Most Christians do not listen to God. They go to Him to talk! Yet the Scriptures reveal that any person who was ever used of God learned to remain in His presence until he heard from Him.

Scripture makes it clear that the Lord wants to talk to every one of us. “And thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, This is the way, walk ye in it, when ye turn to the right hand, and when ye turn to the left” (Isaiah 30:21).

As a little girl with leukemia neared death’s door, she struggled with the thought of dying. Yet, one morning when her mother came into her room, the girl was aglow and happy.

“What happened to you?” her mother asked.

“An angel came to me and said I was going to take a trip,” the girl answered. “And then God came and took my hand and walked with me through a beautiful garden. He told me I was going to go there tomorrow to be with Him.”

God spoke to that little child and took all the fear from her heart! When she left to be with Him the next day, she had total peace.

Tell me, when you are communing with Jesus, do you receive such clear direction from Him? Does He tell you what to do, and when and how to do it? Some Christians don’t believe God does this but Jesus says, “My sheep hear my voice . . . and they follow me” (John 10:27).

The only way through your trial is by getting alone with Jesus and crying, “Lord, You’re the only One on this earth who can help me. I’m not going anywhere until I hear You speak to my heart.”

The kind of prayer that pleases God stops everything, all activity, until His voice is heard. You will hear Him speak clearly to your heart such things as, “You’ve got to make things right with this person.” Or, “Don’t be in such a hurry! Sit in My presence and trust Me.”

If you will seek Him and wait, He will give you clear direction!   

“Praying through,” a term coined by the early Pentecostals, to some meant staying on your knees until you were assured that you had received an answer from God. To others it meant continually coming back to the Lord until you had the answer in hand. (This was also called “persevering in prayer.”)

As a young boy in early camp meetings, I heard people testify, “I’m going to lay hold of the horns of the altar and I won’t let go until God answers.” Yet, I don’t believe this is the truest meaning of “praying through.”

You can be shut in with the Lord, delighting in His presence; you can spend quality hours, even days, with Him, glorying in sweet communion. You can have all your needs met, your heart totally satisfied, but what happens when you leave that hallowed place of intimate fellowship?

You may rise up from your knees only to go back to a crushing situation that has not changed. You can see the devil waiting there for you, ready to throw the same problems and emptiness at you. I ask you: What good is it to receive the glory on the mountain if it won’t see you through the battle?

Let me explain what I believe about “praying through.” It simply means that the strength, power and encouragement you receive from the Lord while shut in with Him must see you through the trials ahead. The victory you attain in the secret closet has to give you victory on the battlefield.

Think about it: Was yours a “completed prayer”? You see, “praying through” means waiting for the total completion of your prayer. Many Christians see only half-answered prayers because they don’t allow what they received from the Lord in prayer to carry them through their trial. Indeed, many sincere prayers have been wasted, aborted, lost — because they were not “carried through” in this way.

Dearly beloved, prayer is not finished — it is not a “completed prayer” — until it sees you through to the other side of your trial. We have not “prayed it through” until we have “lived it through” our trials by the strength we received in God’s presence.  

The Lord led me to read chapter two of Nehemiah and I saw something I had never seen before. This chapter contains an encouraging story for all who come to the Lord with a heavy heart.

Nehemiah was a cupbearer to King Artaxerxes of Persia. This meant he tasted the wines before they were brought to the king’s table to be sure they weren’t poisoned. Over time, Nehemiah became a trusted servant to the king.

Nehemiah received a report from his brother that Jerusalem was in ruins. The population had been decimated, the people were in terrible shape, and conditions were worsening daily. This tore at Nehemiah’s heart. He loved Judah and Jerusalem and a sorrow began to grip him.

“And it came to pass . . . I took up the wine, and gave it unto the king. Now I had not been beforetime sad in his presence. Wherefore the king said unto me, Why is thy countenance sad, seeing thou art not sick? This is nothing else but sorrow of heart. Then I was very sore afraid” (Nehemiah 2:1-2).

Understand, people were forbidden to come into the king’s presence with sadness, especially the court employees. Nehemiah knew this could cost him his life and he was very fearful.  But the king was filled with compassion when he saw Nehemiah’s grief. Scripture tells us he gave his downcast servant a letter of credit, opening the royal treasury to him. And then the king granted Nehemiah the desire of his heart: permission to go to Jerusalem to rebuild the temple and the city walls.

Here is the point the Lord made real to me: If it were possible for Nehemiah to enter the presence of a pagan king with a sad, heavy countenance and yet find favour, compassion and blessings beyond imagination, how much more will King Jesus show compassion and bestow blessings on each of us, His children, in our sadness? Would a pagan king show more mercy to a downcast servant than our all-merciful King? Certainly not! The Father’s heart is always moved with compassion toward His children.