Part of the chapter that I'd like to focus on is beginning in verse number 6 where the Bible reads,
But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering.
For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea, driven with the wind and cost.
For let not that man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord.
A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways.
Now, this morning I want to preach a message about how to make the right decisions,
about making good decisions, because our life is really just a series of decisions that we make.
And the decisions that we make in our life can have great consequences.
A decision that you make in one day can literally affect your life for decades to come.
And even until you die, you could still be living with consequences from that decision.
So it's very important that we know how to make the right decision.
But before we get to that part of the message, I want to explain to you something.
First of all, you've got to learn to make decisions.
Now, this sermon is about how to make decisions.
But if you're the type of person who doesn't make decisions, then this isn't going to do you any good.
First of all, you need to understand the importance of making a decision.
Here in James, he tells us that a double-minded man is unstable in all his ways.
He said, Let him ask in faith, nothing wavering.
For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea, driven with the wind and tossed.
And we see people float through life just tossed about in the waves of this life,
not in control of their life, not making decisions to govern the direction of their life,
but rather just letting circumstances toss them to and fro,
and then they just do what comes naturally at any given moment.
No, you need to learn to make decisions in your life, especially the man.
This is a male attribute, my friend, that a man ought to be able to be decisive
because the man is the leader.
And if the leader is indecisive, then the follower will be as a sheep having no shepherd.
So we as men especially, all men and women need to make decisions,
but men especially as the leaders need to be able to make a decision, to be decisive,
not to be a wave of the sea, driven with the wind and tossed, not to be double-minded,
but to decide which way you're going to go.
Look at Joshua 24.
Joshua chapter 24.
Those who are double-minded are going two different directions.
They have two different sets of priorities.
They have two different agendas.
They're not going to go far in life, and they're not going to receive anything from the Lord.
That's what the Bible says, and they're going to be unstable.
God told Reuben when he was blessing the twelve sons of Israel.
He said, unstable as water, thou shalt not excel.
He said, you're not going to excel.
You're not going to succeed in life if you're unstable like water.
The same thing as a wave, water being tossed about.
There's no solidity there.
But it says in Joshua 24, a very famous verse, it says in verse 15,
And if it seemed evil unto you to serve the Lord, choose you this day whom you will serve,
whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the flood,
or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell.
But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.
He's saying, make a decision today which way you're going in life.
Will you serve God, or will you live the way of the heathen?
Go to Matthew 6, and we'll get into the first point on how to make a good decision.
First of all, make a decision.
But secondly, make a decision based upon priorities.
You've got to have the right priorities in your life when you make a decision,
because of the simple fact that you can't have it all in this life.
Something's got to give sometimes.
Now ideally, you can have everything, right?
You can give 100% to work, and 100% to family, and 100% to church,
and 100% to having fun, and 100% to your hobbies,
and 100% to the wife, and 100% to the children, and 100% to your relatives.
But let's face it.
Two things often happen on the same day, don't they?
You've got to decide which one's going to go.
You can only be in one place at a time.
They're only 24 hours in a day. They're only 168 hours a week.
Something's got to give.
People have often asked me, how do you balance
just all the years of working more than a full-time job, an overtime job,
pastoring at church, having several children,
just memorizing the Bible, trying to balance all these things, soul winning.
And I said it's called planned neglect.
I said I just pick certain things in life that I just have to let go.
And that's how I focus on the things that really matter.
But let's get this from a biblical principle.
Look at Matthew 6.24.
This kind of reminds me of Joshua 24.15 where we just worked.
Matthew 6.24.
No man can serve two masters,
for either he will hate the one and love the other,
or else he will hold to the one and despise the other.
He cannot serve God and mammon.
So right there he's saying you're going to have to make a choice
what's more important to your life, God or money?
Right there.
But let's keep reading.
He says in verse 25,
Therefore I say unto you, take no thought for your life,
what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink,
nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on.
Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment?
Jump down if you would for sake of time to verse number 31.
He says, Therefore take no thought, saying,
What shall we eat, or what shall we drink,
or wherewithal shall we be clothed?
For after all these things do the Gentiles seek
for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things,
but seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness,
and all these things shall be added unto you.
Take therefore no thought for the morrow,
for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself.
Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.
Turn to Deuteronomy 11, 5th book of the Bible.
You see, the word priorities, the first three letters are priority,
which is a prefix meaning first.
You think of pre-calculus, you take that first before you take calculus.
Priorities, putting certain things first, putting other things on the back burner.
God said, Look, I know that you need food.
Your heavenly Father knows that you need clothing,
that you need a place to live, that you need food,
that you need these different things.
But he said, Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness,
and all these things shall be added unto you.
The food, the clothing, the financial needs will be added to you if you put God first.
That tells me right there that God is the priority.
The kingdom of God comes first.
Look at the same concept in Deuteronomy 11, verse 10.
I think of this as the Old Testament, seek ye first.
The Old Testament version of Matthew 6, 33.
Deuteronomy 11, 10.
For the land whither thou goest in to possess it
is not as the land of Egypt from whence ye came out,
where thou sowest thy seed,
and waterest it with thy foot as a garden of herbs.
But the land whither you go to possess it is a land of hills and valleys,
and drinketh water of the rain of heaven,
a land which the Lord thy God careth for.
The eyes of the Lord thy God are always upon it
from the beginning of the year, even unto the end of the year.
Look at this next verse.
And it shall come to pass if ye shall hearken diligently
unto my commandments, which I command you this day,
to love the Lord your God, and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul,
that I will give you the rain of your land in his due season,
the first rain and the latter rain,
that thou mayest gather in thy corn and thy wine and thy oil,
and I will send grass in thy fields for thy cattle,
that thou mayest eat and be full.
He said, look, the land where you came from
is a land where you worked, you made things happen,
you tilled the ground, you made things grow.
But he said, the land where you go in to possess it is not like it.
He said, I'm the one that's going to give the former and the latter rain.
I'm the one that's going to give you what you need to survive,
if you hearken diligently to keep on thy commandments.
Seek first the kingdom of God, he said,
and I'll add unto you these things that you need.
So in my list of priorities, I'll give you my list of priorities here.
And this is a list that I've operated on for a long time,
and it's guided me through decision-making through the years,
through the last decade.
First thing has to be obedience to God's word is my number one priority.
I mean, if I have to die to obey God's word, right?
Think of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.
Think of Daniel.
Think of these men who refused to disobey God's word,
even at the point of death.
Number one, it's got to be obedience to God's word.
That's the most important thing.
Nothing can ever be compromised.
God never gives us license to sin
in order to help some other area or something else.
So that's got to be the number one priority.
My third priority is church, the house of God.
I mean, church is the second priority in my life.
My third priority is family.
I'm talking about my wife and children.
You know, they come...
Now, wait a minute, Pastor Andrew.
I think family should be above church.
I think family should be at the very top.
But hold on a second.
Jesus said this.
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me,
and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me,
and he that taketh not his cross and fall attached to me is not worthy of me.
See, family is extremely important.
Family is right under obeying God and going to church.
Family comes right in.
It's extremely important.
But let me tell you something.
I love Jesus Christ more than I love my wife,
and I love Jesus Christ more than I love my children.
Now, you can find fault with that,
but you just don't know the Bible.
I mean, I'm supposed to love God supremely,
and I love my wife more than any other human being on this world.
But that doesn't mean that I love her more than Jesus Christ.
So we've got to get the priority right here.
We've got God at the top.
Then the next person that I want to please after I please God,
after I go to church, is to take care of my family, my wife and children.
I want to do what's best for them.
But then my fourth priority on my list is my job,
because that's part of why God created me is to work.
If you look at the Bible, it's a big part of a man's life is to work, to provide.
So my job takes a high priority in my life,
because that's how I feed my family.
That's what I do day in, day out. I work.
My fifth priority is additional service to God,
because, you see, there's what God commands me to do,
to be in church, to go soloing.
But sometimes family has to come first
before I go out and do some kind of additional extra service for God.
Sometimes work has to take priority from doing a bunch of extra things for God,
because I have to have my job.
But after obedience to God's work...
Now, look, if you're not going soloing, you're not in obedience to God's work.
You're not coming to church, you're not in obedience to God's work.
But I'm talking about, for this fifth priority, additional service to God.
You know, going an extra night out soloing.
Doing extracurricular service for God, extra things.
Doing more for God. That's important too.
Obviously, I can't just quit my job necessarily
just to go to a church camping trip or something like that.
Does that make sense?
Number six is to please others.
You know, there are other people that want a piece of your life, don't they?
You know, it could be your brothers, your sisters,
your uncles, your aunts, your grandparents.
You know, people outside your immediate family.
And then there's just friends. I mean, just other people.
Friends that you know, people that you love, that you want to spend time with.
Number seven, my seventh on the list would be pleasing myself,
which would just be going out and having fun for me.
Now, these priorities are important in life to keep these straight.
And I've kept these in this order.
Number one, God. Number two, church.
Number three, my family. Number four, my work.
Number five, additional service to God.
Number six, what I can do to please other people in my life.
And number seven, to please myself.
But let me tell you something.
Usually you don't end up getting very far down this list in life.
Because by the time you've pleased God,
by the time you've gone to church,
by the time I've done everything that my wife and children need,
and by the time I've gone to work,
there's usually not that much room for everything else.
Now, I definitely want to get some additional service to God
if I've got something left.
I want to do extra soul-willing. I want to do more for God.
I want to do extra.
And then after that, pleasing other people,
there's just a little bit of the pie left, okay?
Making other people up.
And by the time I get to pleasing myself,
well, I hope I just had fun doing something on lists one through six.
You know what I mean?
Every once in a while you get to do something that's just for yourself.
But let's face it.
These priorities are important.
Now, let me give you some examples of how I've implemented
some of these priorities.
Just to bring it down home.
You know, I mentioned some people had to miss the church camping trip
because of getting a new job.
To me, that's in line with this.
You've got to get a job. You've got to work. That's important.
You don't want to go through life idle and lazy
and not doing anything.
So having a job, having a place to work is important.
Now, if you can get the time off because you're established at your job,
so much the better.
And I don't want you to think that I'm downplaying any of these priorities.
They're all important.
Everything on that list is important.
But which one is more important?
Which one is going to give?
I'm not going to sacrifice my family to go out and do a whole bunch of work for God
because what good is it if I go out and work for God
and win everybody else to Christ and my own children go astray?
Because my children can grow up and get all kinds of people saved.
If my family is right, in the long run I'm going to do more for God.
They're going to do more for God.
And so I'm not going to sacrifice family to go out and just do even more for God.
It's not right.
But I'm not going to sacrifice the church for work.
You know, if you get these priorities lined out in your life,
I'm not going to miss church to go to work.
Now, I'll miss an extra activity to go to work if I have to.
I might miss a family gathering to go to work.
But I'm not going to miss church to go to work because church is higher up on my list.
You say, well, I don't have the same priorities.
You know what, your priorities might not be my exact priorities.
But what I'm telling you, you need to sit down and decide what your priorities are.
You need to decide what's important to you and make decisions based on priority,
not just feeling, not just emotional decisions.
You see, I remember when I moved out to the Chicago area,
you know, I got there and I had to find a job and I was going to church there.
And to me, church is Sunday morning, Sunday night, and Wednesday night.
I wanted to be at all the services.
That was a decision that I made when I first got married,
that I was going to be at every service.
Sunday morning, Sunday night, I made that decision one time.
I want to be there at all the services.
Now, when I got there, there was a lot of pressure for me to be involved
in a certain soul winning ministry that met on a Saturday morning
when I first got there.
And they said, this is the priority, this thing on Saturday morning.
But I would have had to sacrifice church on Wednesday night
to go to this certain soul.
Now, according to my list of priorities here, you know,
I had to put church first and I had to put family and work, okay,
before I went to a certain specific extra soul winning thing.
And so, therefore, I made a decision that I would not work on Wednesday night,
but if I had to work on Saturday morning, I would just go soul winning a different time.
Right? Because there's seven days to go soul winning, right?
And I was doing a ton of soul winning.
But I just said, you know what, I got my priorities here.
This is how it works.
And I remember I was looking for a job and having a terrible time finding a job.
Couldn't find a job.
So there was a guy that I was told, go to this guy, he will get you a job.
He'll set you up with a job.
So I went to that guy, he set me up in a job that was going to work me
Monday through Friday, second shift, through Wednesday night church.
And I told him, I said, no, I'm not going to work on Wednesday night church.
I go to church Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday.
The whole rest of the week is open, but this is the one time, there's 168 hours,
and just Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night, it's important to me to be in church.
And I said, if you just want to give me less than 40 hours, I just can't do it.
And they didn't give me the job.
And I was in a position where I really needed the job.
But you know what, two days went by and I got a job where I was making $6 more per hour
than what that job would have given me.
And I worked through Saturday mornings and I just went soul winning other days of the week
until I got established in that job.
Then I got the Saturday morning off and I did the additional soul win.
But you see, God will bless you when you put him first.
When you put the kingdom of God first, he'll bless that.
God is the one who takes care of you and provides your needs.
And you know, it's hard when you've been at a job a long time and all of a sudden,
you know, all of a sudden I can't work on something.
But whenever I'm just looking for a job, I just put that down as my availability.
I just put down. On Sundays I'm in church, morning, evening, and Wednesday night.
That's what I do.
And there's 168 other hours in the week for them to work with.
Because everything else can take a back seat.
Because I can take other time with my family.
I can take other time to go soul winning.
And this church gives all kinds of soul winning opportunities.
I'm going to be out soul winning every day this week.
What day do you want to go?
Give me a call. Let's go.
And then we have three times listed in the bulletin.
There's plenty of soul winning opportunities available.
You've got to make your priorities right.
Make decisions based on priority.
When you have a decision in front of you.
Let's say you're looking at a job transfer.
And there's no good church where you're being transferred to to raise your family in.
What are you going to put first?
The raise that you're going to get by transferring?
Or the fact that you're leaving a soul winning, righteous, godly church
and going to a mediocre or worse church?
These are the decisions that you should make in your life
based upon the right priorities.
But not only priorities.
Number three, I want to say this. Look at Proverbs 28 and 26.
So number one, make a decision.
Number two, make a decision based on priorities.
Putting God first. Putting church first.
Putting your family right up there important.
Because I can't even pastor this church if my family's not right.
That's what the Bible says, right?
If a man know not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the church of God?
If my children are not right, if my wife is not right, I can't even pastor this church.
And church is a priority, so family's got to come right to me.
And work's a priority because I've got to feed my family.
Because if I don't provide for those of my own house,
the Bible says I'm worse than an infidel.
If any man provide not for his own, and especially for those of his own house,
we have denied the faith and it's worse than an infidel.
Get to work and pay your bills.
God commands us as men to provide for our family.
I don't want to be called worse than an infidel.
So that better be a priority, shouldn't it?
That better be pretty high on my list.
Going to work and working by the sweat of my face all the days of my life is a priority.
That's what God told me to do in Genesis chapter 3 and elsewhere.
After that comes additional service to God.
Before I want to please everybody else, I want to do more for God.
Before I go out and have fun, I want to do more for God.
I want to win more souls to Christ.
You see, by the time I please God, my wife, my children, and my boss at work,
there aren't really that many people left to please, you know what I mean?
And so priorities become very important when you look at it that way.
But number three, I want to say this.
Make a one-time big decision in advance instead of spur-of-the-moment emotional decisions.
So first of all, make a decision. Number two, make it on priorities.
Number three, make one big decision instead of a bunch of little spur-of-the-moment decisions.
You see, I didn't decide this morning whether I was going to come to church today.
I didn't wake up and say, what should I do today?
Because I made that decision to be in church today on July 25, 2010.
I made that decision 10 years ago.
Ten years ago, I decided that on July 25, 2010, Sunday morning, I would be in church.
I just made that decision in advance.
Make a decision to keep yourself pure.
You know, not when you're on a date, not when you're alone with the opposite gender.
All of a sudden, hmm, let me make a decision here about how I'm going to treat the opposite gender,
how I'm going to take care of myself and keep myself clean and holy and righteous and separated before God.
Don't make decisions at the spur-of-the-moment.
Make decisions in advance.
Decide how you're going to rear your children before you have children.
Don't wait until you have children and then, oh, what do I do?
Don't wait until you get married to decide what kind of a home you're going to have.
Now is the time, children, single young men, single young ladies, and even little children,
to decide how you're going to be married, to decide how you're going to rear your children,
so that emotion does not step in because the Bible says in Proverbs 28, 26,
he that trusteth in his own heart is a fool.
If you go by feeling, if you just, you know, and this is what the world will tell you, right?
Just follow your heart.
It'll never screw you up.
He said, no, you're a fool.
You follow your heart.
The heart is deceitful above all things and desperate wicked.
Who can know it?
Out of the heart of man proceed adulteries.
Murder, theft, Jesus said.
These are the things which defile a man that come out of the heart of man.
The Bible says here, he that trusteth in his own heart is a fool,
but who so walketh wisely he shall be delivered.
We ought to make decisions that are wise, well thought out, biblical decisions,
not heartfelt, emotional, go with your gut decisions.
And we've got to do it in advance.
When you're single, think about how your marriage is going to be according to the scriptures.
When you're a child, think about what you're going to be like when you're an adult.
Make it in advance.
I decided to spank my children before I was even married.
I didn't decide after they were born I'm going to spank my children.
I decided to spank my children before I'd even been married.
Before we even had our first child, I'd already made that.
I already made the decision that I was going to be the ruler of my home before I even got married.
Because the Bible said it in Genesis 3.16 that the husband should rule over the wife.
Genesis 3.16.
Because it said the husband's the head of the wife is Christ the head of the church.
Because it said the wife would be obedient.
I already knew I was going to be the head of the home before I even got married.
I already made that decision.
I didn't make it after I got married.
What format is my marriage going to follow?
The one that 90% ended in divorce or the one that the Bible said?
I don't make spur of the moment decisions.
Sometimes you've got to make a split decision.
But hopefully your principles and your priorities are so ingrained that even just on autopilot you'll make the right decision.
Because you've got so many Bible verses in you and so much.
But it's better to always be able to think about things in advance and not make it at the spur of the moment.
To decide.
Things hit me all the time.
Life is constant throwing things at you, isn't it?
The wind and waves that you'll be taught, they hit me too.
But if I'm founded upon a rock of biblical principles and priorities, then when the wind and the waves come, my house will still be standing.
But if you're founded upon the shifting sands of your feelings and your opinion and how you feel today, you're going to come crashing down.
And great will be the fall of it, the Bible says.
But number four, look at 1 Corinthians chapter 6.
So we saw, make a decision.
Number two, make it based on priorities.
Number three, make big decisions in advance, a one-time decision just to be in church.
Not every Sunday deciding whether or not I'm going to be in church.
But number four, make a decision based upon God's will.
God's will.
We need to do what God wants us to do.
We need to make our decisions based upon God's will.
Now look at 1 Corinthians 6.19.
The Bible says what?
Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in you, which ye have of God?
And ye are not your own.
You see why God's will has to govern our decisions?
Because we don't belong to ourselves.
He said, for you are bought with a price.
Therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's.
Go to Romans 12.
Just go back a few pages from 1 Corinthians.
Go back to Romans chapter 12.
We've been bought with a price.
God owns us.
We belong to Him.
You see, if I went down to my job and clocked in at my job, my time belongs to my boss and I'm not my own.
I don't just clock in.
Imagine just going down, clocking in, and then just, I think I'm going to go kayaking.
That's what I want to do.
Or I think I'm going to go take my wife out to eat while I'm on the clock.
No.
When I'm on the clock, my time belongs to him.
Well guess what?
Your time belongs to God all the time.
Because you've been bought with a price.
Because you say that boss is paying you, you better do what he's paying you to do.
Look, if God has bought you with a price, and he says you're not your own, and so therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's.
That's what we ought to be doing with our time or else we're really stealing from God.
If it belongs to God and we use it and abuse it, then we're stealing from God.
Look at Romans 12.1.
It says, I beseech you therefore brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.
So we should be making our decisions about what to do and what not to do based upon the will of God.
Turn, if you would, to Hebrews 10.
You say, well Pastor Anderson, how do I find the will of God?
That's easy, just flip a coin.
Anyway, how do I know what God wants me to do?
And so many people are confused on this subject.
They say, you know, I'm trying to find God's will in my life.
You know, I've been praying.
And some of the people say, God's will is just to ask the pastor, he'll tell you.
You know, I don't want that responsibility.
And this is why I hate giving people advice.
Because then you're responsible for when they mess up their life or something.
I did what he told me to do and look how it turned out.
So I try to just preach the Bible and hopefully people can make their own decisions.
And hopefully through a sermon like this you'll learn how to make your own decisions.
Instead of always asking, what do I do?
I don't want to tell you what to do.
I have enough to say grace over.
I have enough decisions in my life without making your decisions for you.
I have plenty of my own decisions.
So how are we going to find the will of God?
Is it through praying and praying and then we'll have like a revelation?
An epiphany, a light bulb, come on.
Do we go ask a human being and that's where we'll get God's will.
You know what, the truth of the matter is that a lot of people don't necessarily want to face
is that the will of God is found right in this book right here.
I mean, it's that simple.
And we make it complicated.
What is God's will?
We don't know what to do.
But by the time we obeyed everything that this book says,
we wouldn't hardly have a decision left.
And none of us is perfect.
But if we obeyed every precept, theoretically,
if we obeyed everything this book told us to do and not to do,
there wouldn't be much left to decide.
You see, we end up not knowing God's will because we don't know the Bible.
Because every time if you just study the term God's will or will of God in the Bible,
usually He's telling you what it is.
He's not telling you you have to go figure out what it is.
It's usually spelling out what it is or telling you that it's in the Bible.
Look at Hebrews 10-7, it says this,
Then said I, lo I come, in the volume of the book it is written of me,
to do thy will, O God.
So Jesus Christ's will, He said, God's will for His life was written in the Bible.
God's will was in the book, written.
Look if you would at 1 Thessalonians 4, a few pages to the left of your Bible.
1 Thessalonians 4, verse 3.
And you see, so often we worry too much about what we don't know
and we ignore that which we do know.
You know, we worry about the unknown.
And young people will worry about the unknown.
You know, where am I going to live?
What am I going to do for a living?
What's my job going to be?
Who am I going to marry?
What kind of car am I going to drive?
And they worry about the unknown things of the future that are out in the future
instead of just worrying about figuring out what God has already told us
and just doing it today.
Doing today what we know is right to do today.
And let tomorrow take care for the things of itself.
God's Word will be a light unto our feet.
It will be a lamp unto our feet and a light unto our path.
It's not necessarily going to light up the next decade for us.
But it tells us always what the next step is.
And so the Bible says here in 1 Thessalonians 4 and 3,
For this is the will of God.
This is the will of God.
Even your sanctification that you should abstain from fornication.
That's way more important than who you marry.
That's more important than where you live.
That's more important than what job you have.
That you keep yourself clean and holy and pure and righteous and don't fornicate.
It's much more important than who you're going to marry,
where you're going to live, what your job is.
You see, God will direct your paths if you acknowledge Him.
In all my ways acknowledge Him and He shall direct thy paths.
But He can't keep you from committing fornication.
And that's your job.
Because you are the one that is the sinner that has the sinful heart.
If you choose to walk after the flesh, you will commit fornication.
Or you will get drunk.
Or you will look at pornography.
Or you will watch TV, same thing.
Or you will listen to rock and roll and fill your mind with the world's philosophy
and the world's system of ideas and thinking and blasphemy of the name of Jesus Christ.
Look, God is not the one that's going to keep you pure.
God said in verse 2,
Keep thyself pure.
But He did promise to direct your path.
He did promise to lead you and direct you in the path of your life.
You ought to worry about what you know.
And let God take care of the unknown.
The unknown belongs with God.
But that which is revealed belongs unto us in God's Word.
Paraphrasing from Deuteronomy, I don't have it memorized.
But the point is, we ought to worry more about keeping ourself pure, righteous, and godly
than who we're going to marry.
You know, you can sit there and figure out who you're going to marry
and then be impure and be a whore and a whoremonger, as the Bible calls it.
You know what? That doesn't please God.
What would please God more is to be pure.
That would please God more.
God gives us choices in our life.
He gives us decisions.
The first thing He said to mankind on this earth was,
of all the trees in the garden, thou mayest freely eat.
He let Adam decide what he would name the animals.
God gives us decisions. He gives us choices that we make.
Some of it's just based upon preference.
Some of it's just, what do I want to have for lunch today?
I don't think that God really has a specific will for where I eat lunch today.
I don't think that He has a preference whether I go to Whole Foods
or whether I go to Chipotle
or whether I eat at home with my family
or whether I go somewhere else.
I don't think He cares whether I drink a glass of orange juice
or cranberry juice or grapefruit juice
or a glass of milk or soda pop.
But I do think that He cares if I drink a beer.
Because, of course, He said,
Look not on the line when it's red, but give it a skull and a cup when it moves itself.
He said, Thine eyes shall behold strange women
and thy mouth shall utter perverse things.
But God gives us a certain area to walk within.
He'll guide us in the major decisions.
He'll guide us into His will.
You say, How did you know?
How did you make the decision to start a church in Phoenix, Arizona?
You know, I followed Godly principles.
I went with what I did know, what the Bible did tell me.
The Bible told me that God wanted a church in every city.
Titus 1.5.
God did tell me the qualifications for who that man was
that could pastor that church.
I got those qualifications.
God did tell me, He said, that it would be a church in every city,
that it would be these qualifications,
that it would be done through preaching the gospel and so on.
And then He told me, If a man desires the office of a bishop,
he desireth a good work.
God said, If this is something that you desire to do,
here's the criteria, here's the qualifications,
here's what I want.
You say, Yeah, but Pastor Anderson, I know all that.
But what about, How did you know where?
How did you know Phoenix? Why Tempe?
I'll be perfectly honest with you.
I chose Tempe because I love the weather.
I'm not kidding right now. Not a joke at all.
I like palm trees. I like warm weather.
I like the climate. I hate being cold.
And so I chose Tempe.
Oh, that's a carnal way. Look.
Is Tempe mentioned in the Bible?
Can somebody help me out?
Is Phoenix mentioned in the Bible?
Is Arizona mentioned?
Are any of the 50 states of the United States
specifically mentioned in the Bible?
Arkansas?
You know, the bottom line is,
If God cared,
If God really wanted to just command me
to go start a church in a certain town,
a certain city, a certain place,
wouldn't he have told me that?
Or was I just supposed to get some kind of a feeling?
Or be like Joseph Smith and take my hat off
and throw some stones in and jiggle them around.
It's going to guide me around to find buried treasure.
You know, is that how we find God's will?
No. We do what God told us to do.
But hold on a second.
I chose to come to Phoenix,
but that's not what was important.
What was important was that I was going to knock doors every day
and win people to Christ.
What was important was that I was going to preach God's Word.
What was important was what I was going to do,
not necessarily where I was going to do it.
But you see, once I got here,
I do believe that God led me here
because so many people that lived in my exact subdivision,
even Amanda, just lived a block away.
And that's where I started knocking doors.
So many were one to Christ, so many in the church.
God used that group to get it going,
of people that lived right near them.
And so was I in God's will?
Hold on a second.
God's the one who created me.
Who do you think made me who I am?
Who gave me my unique personality and my soul
that doesn't like being cold, you know,
that likes palm trees and hot weather,
that loves Arizona and to live in the desert?
God is the one who created me.
And so if I acknowledge Him
and don't lean under my own understanding
and do everything that God told me to do,
follow these rules the best that I can,
work hard to do right according to God's will,
He'll fill in the rest.
He'll guide you to Phoenix if you need to be to Phoenix.
He'll guide you to Sacramento.
He'll guide you to Texas.
He'll guide you to Oklahoma or Arkansas, wherever.
He'll guide you if you do what He told you to do.
But don't worry so much about what He didn't tell you to do.
Just worry with it.
Because you know what?
You've got enough to worry about right here
doing everything that this book told you to do
than to sit around with your little magic eight ball
trying to figure out, you know, ripping flowers off,
ripping petals off a flower, you know,
Phoenix, you know, New Mexico, Arizona, New Mexico,
Arizona, New Mexico, you know, Texas, California.
Where do I start a church?
What do I do?
Just do everything God told you to do
and just believe that God is leading you.
The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord.
I can honestly look back on my life
and look at decisions that I made seemingly at random.
And I can sing the song we just sang,
Jesus led me all the way.
I mean, I can look back and just see it,
how Jesus led me all the way.
You say, how did you know when you married your wife?
I married the woman that I wanted to marry.
That's the one that I liked.
Now, when you say, well, what about God's will?
Hey, God told me what his will is,
that she better be saved.
He gave me what to look for.
He gave me the criteria of what the virtuous woman is.
But I believe that God allowed me to choose the woman
that I'm going to spend the rest of my life with
who I chose.
But I believe I was led also by God.
But that's not even the point
because what God does is what God does.
I'm not worried about what God does
because I know everything he does is right.
So I don't have to sit there and worry about what God's doing.
God will do what he's doing
and I don't need anything to do with it.
I'm worried about what I'm doing.
And that's what we need to worry about, what we do know.
Look at 1 Thessalonians 5, 18.
You're in 1 Thessalonians 4, 3.
He said, for this is the will of God,
even your sanctification that you should abstain from fornication.
Chapter 5, verse 18.
It says, in everything give thanks,
for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.
So there he's telling us,
it's my will that you're thankful no matter what situation you're in.
Be thankful to me, that's my will.
But how do I get out of this situation?
You know what, if you obey the Bible,
God will take you through it.
He'll lead you.
Last place we're going to turn, 1 Timothy 5, 14.
1 Timothy 5, 14 says this.
You say, well, I'm a young lady.
I wonder what's God's will for my life.
Look what it says in 1 Timothy 5, 14.
It says, I will, therefore, that the younger women
go to college, get a career,
make money, put on a business suit,
and give none occasion to the adversary to speak reproachfully.
Oh, whoops, I'm sorry, I've got the NIV hand on.
No, just kidding.
No, that's not what the Bible says.
The Bible says,
I will, therefore, that the younger women marry,
bear children, guide the house,
and give none occasion to the adversary to speak reproachfully.
Now, to me, that's a pretty clear verse.
But it's only clear to me.
It seems like sometimes, you know what I mean?
You know, a lot of people have their own ideas, you know,
and they're going to do it,
and they're leaning upon their own understanding,
and they're begging God.
How many girls, I wonder?
And, you know, don't get mad at me.
I'm just preaching the Bible.
How many girls, I wonder, are on their knees begging God,
oh, God, please reveal to me whether I should be a lawyer
or a doctor.
I just can't decide.
And all the while, their Bible's sitting on the dresser
telling them what they need to be doing with their life.
Isn't that true?
Yes, sir.
Like it, lump it, it's the truth.
All the while, the Bible's sitting there telling them
exactly what they ought to have been doing,
and they're praying to God,
and God's just thinking to himself, like,
no, what do you want me to say?
God's will is revealed in the Bible,
and whatever's not revealed in the Bible,
you don't need to know.
He'll guide you.
He'll take you through the rest.
He'll guide you through the rest.
You see, if you make a decision,
you've got to make decisions.
I mean, the first thing,
what if God would have just told Adam,
of all the trees in the garden I made freely,
what if he just started crying and said,
I can't decide.
I don't know what to eat.
What if him and his wife just sat there just,
where do you want to go out to lunch today?
Well, I don't know, honey.
You know how this is in marriage, you know.
What do you pick, honey?
You know, I don't want to pick which tree to eat.
No, you pick.
Next thing you know, she's talking to Satan,
and, you know.
All right, it's going to look crazy.
But anyway, the bottom line is,
you know, what if you would have sat there,
you know, name the animals, Adam,
whatever you name them, Adam,
that's going to be the name that they're of.
You've got to make a decision.
You know what I mean?
You've got to make choices in life.
Don't float through life
and just let life throw you around.
If you're Adam and you're, you know, name those animals.
Elephant!
You know, whatever.
You know, pick a tree and start eating from it.
But the point is that you've got to make a decision.
You've got to make it on priorities.
You've got to make big decisions
so you don't have to make as many decisions.
Make one big overriding decision.
I'm going to be pure.
I'm going to be in the church.
I'm going to make church a priority.
I'm going to go soloing every week.
I'm going to do this.
I'm going to read my Bible every day.
Not, what should I read right now?
If you haven't read the Bible yet,
you read the Bible.
You don't even have to decide
on that particular day that is.
Number four, make that decision based upon God's will.
And number five, if you follow steps one through four,
God will take care of the rest.
It's true.
Don't sit and sweat and bite your fingernails
and, well, I don't know if I'm doing the right thing.
I don't know if I'm marrying the right person.
I don't know if I'm in the right city.
If you truly have considered points one through four,
and other points that I didn't touch on
because I don't know all, see all, answer all.
But if you're letting God direct you through the park, you know.
And if you do what He has revealed,
He will take care of the park that He didn't tell you.
And you'll be just fine.
And at the end of your life, you'll be like that song said,
Jesus led me all the way.
It's true. Let's bow our heads in that word of prayer.
Father, please just give us wisdom.
You said that if any man lacked wisdom to ask you
and you'd give it to us liberally
and you would upgrade us to not.
And so, God, I'm asking you right now,
I have many decisions before me even right now in my life.
Father, help me to make godly decisions based on the Bible.
And, Father, I pray that you would give me wisdom as you promised.
But, God, help me not to be double-minded
because you said I won't give you wisdom if I'm double-minded.
So help me not to be double-minded.
Help me not to be unstable.
Help me not to be one that wavers, dear God.
Help me to make solid right decisions.
And then, Father, guide and direct.
Guide my path.
And, Father, not just me, but every single member of our church,
every visitor who's here,
every person who's maybe even just passing through,
guide them and direct them as they make godly, righteous decisions in their life.
And, in Jesus' name, we pray. Amen.