You Can Be Guided By God

God sometimes lets us come to great problems that we may come to Him. Of course, He is glad to have us come with little things, too. Let us read something here from Steps to Christ. I think this is wonderful:

“Keep your wants, your joys, your sorrows, your cares, and your fears, before God. You cannot burden Him; you cannot weary Him…. Take to Him everything that perplexes the mind” Steps to Christ, page 100

If you have a problem in math, can you take it to the Lord? Can you? Yes. Some of us older ones, our problem in math is knowing how to spread the income over the expenses. Can we take that to God? Oh, yes: “Take to Him everything that perplexes the mind. Nothing is too great for Him to bear, for He holds up worlds, He rules over all the affairs of the universe. Nothing that in any way concerns our peace is too small for Him to notice” Steps to Christ, page 100.

And remember, it isn’t just that He wants to help us; He wants to get us in there with Him where He can enjoy fellowship. He just delights to have us come in to visit Him. And if the only way He can get us to visit is for us to have a problem, He will let us have a problem. Not just so we can get the solution, but so He can get us in there with Him. Do you see what I am trying to say, friends? He hungers, for our love, for our sympathy, our understanding. Oh, let’s come to Him and make Him happy by looking to Him for advice, and then doing what we think will please Him. What do you say, friends?

Now I will tell you one problem we run into when we do this. Moses ran into this problem. Let’s turn to Acts 7:25, and you will see what the problem is. We suppose that if we get the right guidance from God, and try to do it, that everybody, at least all the good people, will pat us on the back and cheer us on. But, friends, it doesn’t always work that way. Sometimes, when sincerely we go to God and try to get His wisdom and advice for us on education, on diet, on dress, on music, on reading, on anything, and the best we know, the thing for us to do is this and we start to do it, somebody comes along and says, “What, don’t do that! I wouldn’t do that! Why are you doing it?”

All right, now let’s see what happened to Moses: “For he supposed his brethren would have understood how that God by his hand would deliver them: but they understood not” Acts 7:25.

What did Moses suppose? That his brethren would understand. Had God called Moses to deliver Israel? And he supposed what? That his brethren would understand. Did they understand? It says, they understood not. Well, poor Moses? No. Not poor Moses. You know what that made it necessary for Moses to do? To look to God. Did God understand? Yes, God understood. And so Moses had to look to God.

Go over to Hebrews 11, and you will see what I mean: “By faith he forsook Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king: for he endured as seeing him who is invisible” Hebrews 11:27. Who is that? God. And Moses endured as seeing Him who is invisible. In other words, as human beings misunderstood him, Moses turned to the One that did understand him; and that gave him a wonderful fellowship with God.

Turn to Exodus 33:11. Oh, I think this is one of the most wonderful verses in all the Bible. What did God call Moses, according to the third line of this verse? His friend. Wouldn’t you be happy to know that God called you His friend? You know that God is your Friend. But, did you know you are God’s friend? He wants you to be. And notice the experience Moses had:

“And the LORD spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend” Exodus 33:11.

Would God do that for you? Oh, yes. He wants to. He wants to speak to you through His Word, by His providences, and by His Holy Spirit. As you kneel down in simple faith, and commit your way to the Lord, He wants to guide you; He wants to talk to you. Notice this stupendous statement in Desire of Ages:

“We are not to place the responsibility of our duty upon others, and wait for them to tell us what to do. We cannot depend for counsel upon humanity. The Lord will teach us our duty just as willingly as He will teach somebody else. If we come to Him in faith, He will speak His mysteries to us personally. Our hearts will often burn within us as One draws nigh to commune with us as He did with Enoch. Those who decide to do nothing in any line that will displease God, will know, after presenting their case before Him, just what course to pursue” The Desire of Ages, page 668.

“Well,” somebody says, “I am glad you read that. My problem is, so many other people are telling me what to do.” There are some things, dear friends, that no amount of getting guidance from God is going to take the place of. No matter how much guidance I get from God, the policeman down at the corner can stop me and ask to see my operator’s license. Is that right? And I can’t go whizzing by and say, “I’ve got guidance from God. You have no business interfering with me.” Can I? That wouldn’t be faith. That would be what? Presumption. And we all have duties and obligations to civil government, to church government, the home government, and school government.

We don’t have to look to God for guidance for the things that other people decide. We can pray God will help the policeman not to stop us, if we haven’t time to stop. We can do that. But if the policeman stops us, we accept that as God’s guidance. And so in the home and in the school. We can pray, if our parents have a decision to make for us, that they will make a wise decision. If the faculty has a decision to make, that involves us, we can pray that God will help them. And so in the church.

But friends, there are 10 thousand things that you have to decide. You, young people, every day, are making decisions. You say, “I don’t know. There doesn’t seem much left for us to decide.” Let me ask you something: Do you decide when you get up in the morning? Well, you can. Of course, if you wait long enough, somebody else may decide it for you. But you can make a decision as to when you will get up, can’t you?