Divine Guidance
Categories: Church of Christ Bulletin ArticlesIn Psalm 23:1-2, the Psalmist states,
“The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.”
From these passages, we are comforted by the thought of divine guidance. What expectations are awakened by such a magnificent passage! Many of us have grown weary of finding our own way. For too long we have blundered through the darkness and stumbled over every obstacle. We have learned the hard way that it is not in man that walks to direct his steps (Jeremiah 10:23). Maybe that is why we love to sing: “He leadeth me: O blessed thought! O words with heav’nly comfort fraught! What-e’er I do. Where-e’er I be. Still ’tis God’s hand that leadeth me.”
Despite the scriptures we read, and the songs we sing, we are still often disappointed. We turn to the Bible to discover that is not a syllabus of all possible emergencies with clear directions as to what should be done in every case. There’s not a library in the world that could house that large a volume. I seriously doubt that it could even hold the index. God is certainly willing to lead us through His holy word, but this doesn’t mean that we will be saved from every puzzling perplexity and every unsure decision.
God lays down the great principles of life in the Bible, but it’s up to each one of us to know what they are and how to apply them. Divine guidance doesn’t mean that we have gone on “automatic pilot,” and the plane will now “fly itself.” There will always be the need for study, discernment and prayer (2 Timothy 2:15; cf. Romans 12:2; Ephesians 1:15-18; Ephesians 5:17; Ephesians 6:17-18; Colossians 1:9; Hebrews 5:14; James 1:5-6; Proverbs 2:1-9).