This morning we're going to look at one verse. It's the 17th verse of Ephesians chapter 5. If you'll open your Bible there, I want to read a few verses before and a few verses after. So we'll begin reading in Ephesians chapter 5 verse 15 and read through verse 21. See then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise. redeeming the time because the days are evil. Therefore, do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is. And do not be drunk with wine in which is dissipation, but be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord, giving thanks always for all things to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting to one another in the fear of God. Would you pray with me? Father, we thank you for the scriptures. We thank you for your revealed will to us. Lord, we pray this morning as we see this command of scripture that we as your people are to understand or discern the will of the Lord. We pray that you would help us, give us wisdom, help us to see Christ and his will for our lives. We pray in his name. Amen. So the difficulty this morning that I'm going to have is to keep this one verse, verse 17, tethered to the rest of the paragraph and what's around it. But that's my first attempt. And secondly, I want to use this 17th verse and try to glean from it the larger principle to be found in scripture about discerning the will of the Lord. Now, I'm assuming that every Christian has a desire to know the will of God. There is for each of us a life that we are to live unto the pleasure and the glory of God. And the scriptures here say that we are to understand it or to discern it. That's our hope this morning is that we will discern the will of God. Notice that this is applicable to the corporate body of the church, and it's applicable to you as an individual. Now we can speak about the specifics and the general will of God, and I want to cover both this morning. I want to speak to you about what is the general will of God that is applicable to every Christian in the room. And then how do you go about finding the particular will of God for your life that will be different than the Lord's will for my life? And this is where I hope we can be really practical and hope that each of you, myself included, will find help from the scripture as to how to pursue these things and answer questions like this. Questions like, whom should I marry? Where should we live once we are married? Where should we go to church? Where should I work? And that list goes on and on and on and there's no end. Now, I realize that we have all seasons of life represented here this morning. But this is still applicable to every season. Every believer of any age needs to know the will of God both generally and then particularly. And while that's true, I suspect that for the young Christian with a sincere heart and mind, that some of the things we'll talk about this morning hopefully will be very helpful to you. People ask you these questions, don't they, as a young person? What are you going to do with your life? What kind of occupation are you going to pursue, young man? Young lady, do you hope to be a homemaker or whatever it is that you have in mind? Then how are you going to go about discerning what that is? Well, this simple verse Do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is. Immersed into this paragraph, chapter, larger book of Ephesians, into the entirety of the scriptures, Lord willing, will be a help to us. I want you to notice, first of all, that I'm going to speak about this interchangeably between the will of the Lord and the will of Christ. Because when we read this verse, therefore, do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is. The word that is used here for Lord is the same word that's used throughout the New Testament, heavily in the Gospels, to refer to the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. So it would not be wrong for us to read this verse in this way. Do not be unwise, but understand what the will of Christ is. What is the will of Christ for us as a church? What is the will of Christ for you as an individual? And notice we are tasked with discerning with understanding. I'm going to speak more to that a little bit later, but because there is real work for us to do in this. We have a responsibility here to discern, to understand. We have a responsibility to put forth the effort to know what the will of Christ for us is. And so, again, in two large categories, I want to first try to address the verse in its context and then broaden up to the entirety of the scriptures what it means to discern or understand the will of the Lord. So to that first attempt, the verse in its context, notice that the first part of the verse says, therefore do not be unwise. The implication is here that to not understand or to discern the will of the Lord is to be foolish. to live as a fool. This ties us right back into the verses immediately preceding that we looked at last week when we're told, see then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise. The first fruit of that is to redeem the time because the days are evil. So the first thing that we gather from this is as Christians, we do not want to live foolish. Now it doesn't really come across in this verse, but this word unwise is a very strong word that Christ used to address two groups of people. I want you to look at those with me, both of them are in the Gospel of Luke, the first one being in the 11th chapter. So if you'll find Mark, excuse me, Luke chapter 11, Remembering that we are called not to be living lives that are defined and described as foolish. If you're in Luke chapter 11, look at verse 37. As he spoke, a certain Pharisee asked him to dine with him, so he went in and sat down to eat. When the Pharisee saw it, he marveled that he did not first, that he had not first washed before dinner. Then the Lord said to him, Now you Pharisees make the outside of the cup and dish clean, but your inward part is full of greed and wickedness, referring there to the heart. Foolish ones. did not he who made the outside make the inside also but rather give alms of such things as you have and indeed all things are clean to you. So Jesus here uses this word in a little bit of a different form to address the Pharisees that made accusation against him for not following their man-made command of incessant hand-washing before they partook of a meal. Jesus said your heart is full of greed and wickedness and he uses this term to address them literally you fool or you fools The second place that we find it is in Luke chapter 12 and verse 20. So just Turn the page or you may be on the same page Luke chapter 12 and verse 20 This usage is found in the midst of the parable of the rich fool. I want to read beginning in verse 13. One of the crowds said to him, teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me. But Jesus said to him, man, who made me a judge or an arbitrator over you? And he said, take heed and beware of covetousness for one's life does not consist in the abundance of the things he possesses. Then he spoke a parable to them. And he said, the ground of a certain rich man yielded plentifully. And he thought within himself saying, what shall I do since I have no room to store my crops? So he said, I will do this. I will pull down my barns and build greater. And there I will store all my crops and my goods. And I will say to my soul, Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years. Take your ease, eat, drink, and be merry. But God said to him, Fool, this night your soul will be required of you. Then whose will those things be which you have provided? So is he who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God. We go back and look at those two usages of Christ of this Word to make the point. The implications here of Paul, I think, are clear when he says, do not be unwise. The two usages that we saw out of Luke point to these two things. Those who live for self, With no eternal perspective as represented by the fool there in the parable of tearing down barns to build bigger barns and storing up things for himself who had no eternal perspective to live unto the glory of God, Jesus looked at him and said, you fool. That is to be unwise, not discerning the will of the Lord. To live for self and to use the things of this world for greed and gain. The King James in one place calls that lifestyle a lifestyle of filthy lucre. Foolish. The second use was to address those who had no spiritual understanding. who could not discern the things of God. The Pharisees, Jesus said of them, your heart is all inward greed and wickedness and hypocrisy. In another place, he said, you are full of dead men's bones. So if we take that, that definition and bring it back to the 17th verse of Ephesians chapter five, to be unwise. Not only is it to live for self, but it is to live with no spiritual sense, to not be able to discern the things of God. Notice that verse 17 begins with the word that points us backward. Therefore, since we have been given the light of Christ, he has awakened us from the sleep of death. and called us to live circumspectly, to walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise. Therefore, we have great reason to not be foolish in the way that we live, but rather we are to understand. I want to talk about this word for just a minute. Some of your translations may use the word here, discern. The word literally means to put something together, to comprehend, to perceive. This is where the responsibility of the individual Christian comes in. And really, this is in the form of a command. Understand what the will of the Lord is. And yet so many Christians throw their hands up in the air and say, how am I to know? How am I to understand? How am I to discern what the will of the Lord is? So often we live like the Lord is playing a high stakes game of hide and seek with us concerning what his will is. And that if we misstep one place in life, then our whole life is going to go awry because we missed, quote, missed the will of the Lord in this decision or in this direction. You ever had those kind of conversations? Or someone would say to you, well, I missed the will of the Lord in that decision or this other decision, and it has affected my life. How do you get around that way of thinking and wrap your mind around the responsibility of discerning, perceiving, comprehending, understanding what the will of the Lord is? I think the first part of it is understanding that it is a responsibility. that you do have to do the work. The work of discerning comes through the Word, and we're going to find that to a greater degree in just a moment, but listen to what Ian Hamilton says about this work. He says, this is part of the process of sanctification, which engages the Christian's determined resolve Not often do we use this kind of language when we talk about discovering or finding out the will of the Lord, that we must have a determined resolve to understand what the will of the Lord is. He goes on to say, the grace of God in Christ does not remove the need of this determined resolve in the pursuit of holiness. We must determine in our hearts and minds that we will understand or discern what the will of the Lord is, and then use the means that have been given us to discern His will, primarily in and through the Word of God. So that leads to this question. How do I discern and understand the will of God? Dealing honestly with the verse, I see it's a responsibility of mine. I see it's an expectation. I understand I'm not going to go to the mailbox and receive a letter from God telling me what his will is for my life. I'm not going to have his will delivered to me in the form of some vision or extraordinary event. That's an important point to make because so many live, so many Christians live with that mindset or thinking that God is going to do some extraordinary thing to reveal his will in my life. Now, obviously, I'm not going to be so foolish as to handcuff God and tell you how he's always going to act. But I think if we stay inside the bounds of scripture, The ordinary, everyday way that the Lord shows you and helps you discern what His will is for your life is going to be through your interaction with the Scriptures. Now, understand, and I understand, nowhere in the Scriptures are you going to find a verse that says, so and so, you need to marry this person and live here and do this kind of work. That would be nice, but that's not the way the Scriptures work. You might remember that lengthy quote I gave you last week from John Newton. And if I were to summarize what he said, it is, over time as we treasure up and store the principles of the word of God in our heart, when we come to that moment in time where a decision has to be made, then we can rest and trust knowing that this decision is being made according to biblical principle. For instance, Let's just use this first question of whom shall I marry? For a believer, the will of God for you is that you marry another believer. So if that person that interests you is not a Christian, you can immediately know because of that principle in your heart that this person is not for me. And that's just a very simple or base example of how the principles of scripture are brought to the table to help us understand the will of God. Now, obviously, with that one situation, that's just the beginning. And then the rest of scripture would have to be brought to the table to find out whether or not this is Mr. Right or Mrs. Right or not. But know this. As you and I go about the work of discerning the will of God, I don't know whose words these are, but I like them. The will of God for the people of God is revealed in the Word of God. It's the only place you're going to find it. Now, we live in a day and time when we are greatly exposed to the Word of God. through various persuasions, right? One of the great forms that comes to us, that the Word of God comes to us through the media available to us in this day and time, is in some form of what I'll call charismania. where there is a heavy emphasis upon dream or vision or a word from heaven or one of those types of things. Outside the ministry of a sound local church and a sound family pouring into the word of God, so many people are led astray by seeking and being taught to seek the extraordinary. completely missing the ordinary means that the Lord uses to help us understand what His will is. So this applies to young people, old people, middle-aged people, all people. If we desire to know the will of God, then we must know the word of God. So if we go back to the context of verse 17, and we ask the question, and seek to use the words around it to answer the question, what is the will of God? Then we'll see the will of God for his people is to walk circumspectly, to redeem the time because the days are evil, to walk as children of light, to expose the unfruitful works of darkness, to imitate God by walking in love and not to let the sins that define humanity, fallen humanity, even be named among you. to be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another. And you can continue to run through the epistle backwards and find the will of God for you and the will of God for his church. Or you can move from this point forward. And what you'll find there is the will of God is to not be drunk with wine, but to be filled with the Spirit. For wives to submit to their husbands, husbands to love their wives, children obey their parents, that all Christians be strong in the Lord and the power of his might, that all Christians put on the whole armor of God. All of these represent the will of Christ for those for whom he suffered, bled and died to redeem. That's the general will of God. For every Christian. And yet we can expand upon that just a little bit. If we look at the larger principle in scripture, we can expand upon it in this way. To understand the will of the Lord, to not be foolish, but to live as wise, to discern the will of the Lord. Listen to verses like this that you know. Again, the starting place is always the scripture. Second Timothy chapter three, verse 16. All scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, reproof, correction, instruction, and righteousness so that, do you remember how the verse finishes? So that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped, complete for every good work. Then there's also a verse like Romans chapter 8 verse 29 that tells us the end of this great link in the chain of predestination is that we would be conformed to the image of Christ. That's the will of God for you, that you be conformed to the image of his son. But then the scriptures can get very explicit. 2nd Thessalonians chapter 4 verse 3 says for this is the will of God your sanctification That you should abstain from sexual immorality Then there's another verse, 1 Thessalonians 5, verse 18. In everything give thanks, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. Again, this is the general will of God for every Christian. that you be sanctified and that your life be an expression of thanksgiving to God. Now, I want to recommend a helpful booklet. This is not something that's going to take you forever to read. You can sit down and read it in one sitting. It's a little booklet by John MacArthur that the title is Found, colon, God's Will. And in that booklet, he goes through five things. Those five things that he biblically uncovers for us is the will of God generally is that you be saved. All of these are true John MacArthur style alliterated beginning with the letter S. The will of God is that you be saved. That your sins be covered, that you be redeemed. The will of God is that you be sanctified. growing in likeness to Christ. The will of God is that you be spirit filled. That's what we're going to deal with next week. Ephesians 5 verse 18. The will of God is that you be submissive to him. The will of God is that you suffer in some degree, and this is what furthers your sanctification, your growth in holiness. And then he makes a very bold claim at the end of this booklet. I think he's right. He says, if you're saved, if you're justified in the sight of God, if you are in the process of being sanctified and you are not kicking against whatever the Lord would use to sanctify you, and therefore you are submissive to him, You are filled with the Spirit, and you embrace the suffering that He brings in your life, then do whatever you want. It's the will of God for you, within the bounds of Scripture. Obviously, He's not given license to sin, but do you see how freeing that is? If you're right before God, through the shed blood of Jesus Christ, If you're being sanctified, submissive, Spirit-filled in suffering, and you have a desire in your heart that is not going to lead you out of any of these things, it's not going to lead you out of the way of sanctification, it's not going to lead you in disobedience, it's not going to lead you in not being filled with the Spirit, then trust that the Lord is going to give you the desire of your heart. But then we have to get down to the more particular aspects of the Lord's will. So far we've been speaking of the Lord's will in general and trying to be responsible to this command of verse 17. Therefore, do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is. I think there is a principle that we should apply right here before we move on. Until we are in this general will of God, saved, sanctified, Spirit-filled, submissive, and embracing suffering, Until we are in this general revealed will of God, we cannot with any degree of certainty begin to discern His particular will for us. So what do I mean by that? Until you find yourself squarely in the general will of God for every Christian, then it's not yet time for you to try to discern His particular will. because it's futile at that point. An unbeliever cannot say that they are trying to discern Christ's will for their life in the particular matters of whom will I marry, where will I work, where will I live, or any other question related. You cannot try to discern Christ's will for your life until you are in Christ. If you are to understand what the will of the Lord is, then you must first be the Lord's. So young people, older people, middle-aged people, wherever you find yourself, male, female, until you find yourself squarely in this revealed general will of God. Remember those two verses that are expressly simple to understand. This is the will of God for you, your sanctification in everything. Give thanks for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. That verse points to the fact that you are seeing everything in life as being ordained and given to you by the good hand of your father. and therefore you are expressing thanksgiving to him. Once you find yourself in this, then through much prayer, and through giving yourself to the study of the Word that is going to give you principles by which to make decisions, then you begin to try to discern that more particular will of God, trusting that He will lead you in it, and that He will hedge up your way when it needs to be hedged up, or He will open a door when it needs to be opened. So please hear that. Especially, I'm not trying to just point this at one group of people, but especially younger people. Recognize your responsibility to discern the will of God. And in the discerning of it, Find yourself immersed in the general will of God for every Christian. And then move from that starting point, that solid ground, that firm foundation, and begin to seek the Lord in the particular things in life. And proceed with this assumption. The assumption is that Christ will reveal His will to you. I don't know how many conversations I've had through the years with people trying to discover the will of God, like God is hiding it from them. And He doesn't want them to find it. And they're looking under rocks and behind trees, and not literally, but figuratively. I relay this conversation sometimes just to prove a point and to illustrate the vanity at which some people, Christian people, professing Christians, how they try to make decisions. The conversation was something like this with an old friend, trying to make a big decision, one of the big ones in life. He was sitting in his garage, and it must have been the fall because leaves were blowing about, and he had determined in his mind, he picked out a leaf in the yard and says, if that leaf blows in the garage, I'm going to take it as a sign from God that I should pursue this course of action. Now, that just shows you how we can become so deceived by the world around us, and really it points to the want of ease in discerning the will of God. And the lack of faithful, repetitive, Use of the means that God has given us to discern again that word Means to perceive it means to put together. It's to comprehend It's to put in the work to reach the desired end goal That's the responsibility that we need to see is ours and all the while we are being helped along by the Spirit of God. So don't fall prey to any line of thought that would tell you that discerning the Lord's will is going to necessarily be easy or it's going to come to you out of nowhere. You don't want to base the decisions in life upon things that are so flippant. Now going back to that friend, I think in that conversation that leaf that he had singled out did blow in the garage and he did choose that course of action. I don't remember exactly how it turned out. I just remember thinking at the time, what shifting sand is the basis of that decision? when there is so much more substance and reality to what the Lord would have us to do. Here is something that I wanted to read you. Curtis Vaughan, you know my affinity for Curtis Vaughan. He says, the primary consideration for the Christian must never be what is most profitable financially or most pleasurable. or what brings greatest personal advantage or honor. The Christian's first concern is to discern what the will of God is for him both to be and to do. Sometimes the will of God may not be what is most profitable financially, may not be what is most pleasurable, may not be what brings the most personal advantage or honor. And following up that thought, Charles Hodge, the old Princeton theologian, he says, the will of Christ or the will of the Lord is to see things as he sees them, making his will or judgment our standard and the rule of our conduct. So to go back to this verse and to see it in its immediate surroundings, therefore, do not be unwise, but understand what the will of Christ is to see things as he sees them. To make his judgment our standard and the rule of our conduct, when our minds are informed by the scriptures and we're operating from biblical principle, some decisions are easy to make. I've already alluded to that one. The Lord's will is for a Christian to marry a Christian believer. You can go to 1 Corinthians 6 and read and study that out for yourself. And that's just probably the greatest example to be given. Aren't you thankful we're not left to try to discern or discover the will of the Lord? apart from any real substance. How would we ever make any decision? Every decision would be just up in the air and pick it out of the air and go with it. But once we are, again to run through that list, once we are right in the sight of God, Once we are in the process of being sanctified by the Spirit, being filled with the Spirit, submissive to the Word, submissive to the Lord, embracing the suffering, whatever it may be that the Lord brings into our life, then trust that he will give you the desire of your heart, so long as it doesn't lead you to transgress any of those things. And this takes us back to where we were a few weeks ago in verses eight and nine. It says, you once were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light for the fruit of the spirit is in all goodness, righteousness, In truth, or that could be read, the fruit of the light is goodness, righteousness, and truth. So one very practical thing you can do when you're discerning the will of the Lord, ask the question based upon verse 9, is it good? Is it right? Is it true? The answer to all of those things are yes. Walk in it. It is a fruit of the light. So next week, Lord willing, we're going to get into what it means to be filled with the spirit and to not be given to drunkenness and what it means to speak to one another in Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs. So looking forward, pray for the Lord to give us help and understanding those things as we ought. Let's pray. Father, we're thankful for this call in the scriptures to discern the will of the Lord. Lord, we all need help. We are all faced from time to time with decisions that will very much alter the course of our lives. So we need your wisdom. We need to see the responsibility that we have to do the work of flooding our hearts and minds with the principles of scripture. Lord, I pray you would give us all great help. in discerning your will, both generally and then more particularly, both corporately and individually, where we want to walk in wisdom. We do not want to walk as unwise or fools. We want to redeem the time and be honoring and glorifying to you with our words and our deeds. Help us as we move forward into the conclusion of this epistle. Lord, give us grace. So many of the things that we will look at and consider are so contrary to the world around us. And so specific to the body of Christ. Lord, help us to see and to glory in these callings that you have given to us. Help us to be strong in the Lord and the power of His might. We pray it under His honor and glory and praise. We ask it in His name. Amen.