Being a Christian is not a part-time occupation. Our faith is not an add-on to our schedule, a hobby we do in our spare time. It’s not something we can leave in a drug cabinet, only to take it out every time we need a bit of spiri­tual medicine.

Being a Christian is something that makes claims on all of our time, all of our resources, all of our being.

What career you’re going to have, where you’re going to live, who your life partner is going to be, even whether or not you get married in the first place. How you work on your job, what you do with your recreation time, what you do on the weekend, how you spend your money. Your faith must influence the decisions you make in all these areas, and more.

Will this be easy? No.

Praying for Guidance⤒🔗

We need a guide. We need help. We need someone to show us the way.

There is only one who can really show us the way: God him­self.

God is the one who calls us to lead the Christian life, and he gives us new life by his mercy and grace. But we’re going to continue to need his help if we are going to live as Christians.

Knowing that we are com­pletely lost without Him, the Chris­tian prays to God what the Psalm­ist prays in Psalm 25:4-5, “Show me your ways, O LORD, teach me your paths. Lead me in Your truth and teach me, for You are the God of my salvation; On You I wait all the day.”

“Lead me, O Lord, for I hope in you. Lead me in your truth. Guide me. Teach me. Help me to know the way. Help me to know how to live. Help me to know how to serve you. When life’s difficulties face me, when my sinful heart tempts me to go astray, help me to live the way you would have me to live. For, dear Lord, without your help, I cannot go on. Without you guid­ing me, I am lost.”

This must be the prayer of every Christian. No matter how mature in the faith, no matter how smart, no matter how influential in the church, every Christian must constantly call upon God, “guide me in your truth and teach me.”

Finding Guidance←⤒🔗

So, we need God to guide us, to teach us. But how does He do this?

Well, it’s pretty straightforward: if we want to be led in the truth, then we turn to God’s truth, and God’s Word is his truth. We look to the Bible for guidance, seeking in holy Scripture the answers we need if we are to live the Christian life.

This doesn’t mean that in every situation we can look up a Bible verse that will give us a di­rect answer to any questions we may have. The Bible does not say, “John Smith must become a mechanic.” Nor does it show him how to service a vehicle. But it does help him to understand what it means to use our gifts, and it lays out the principles of honesty and hard work and service, principles that can help him to be the best mechanic he can be.

Biblical teachings must guide our thinking in all areas, including matters that we might not think it addresses directly.

To illustrate this further, con­sider abortion. You will not find the word abortion in the Bible. You will not find a specific verse saying: abortion is wrong. Still, the Bible speaks out against abortion loud and clear.

When you take the biblical principles of how we are not to murder, and how God is the giver of life, and how human beings are created in his image, and how he forms us even as we are in the womb, and how justice requires us to protect the helpless, you take all these and other teachings together, and it becomes very, very clear that abortion is something we need to fight against.

That doesn’t mean it’s an easy thing to deal with this is­sue. Being involved with a cri­sis pregnancy organisation, this author and his wife have some sense of how difficult a matter this can be. But that doesn’t change the fundamental biblical truth that makes it clear that abortion is one of the most dev­astating manifestations of wick­edness in our society.

Whenever we face this issue, or any issue, we need to turn to the Bible, rather than worldly thinking, or our own biases and preconceptions. Having the Bi­ble shape our thinking, the Holy Spirit guides us with its teach­ings, and he helps us to see the way that God wants us to go. God will use his Word to lead his people.

Humbly Seeking Guidance←⤒🔗

Something else we need to re­member: when we pray, “Show me your ways, O Lord; teach me your paths”, we need to do this with the proper attitude.

It is possible to approach God for guidance with a meas­ure of pride in our hearts. We feel very sure of ourselves. We know what’s going on. So when we ask God for help, we’re sim­ply asking him to confirm what we already know. When we turn to God’s Word, we do not do so in order to submit to it, but rather, we want Scripture to submit to our thinking.

Psalm 25 makes it very clear that we can’t have this attitude when asking God for guidance.

As verse 9 says, “The humble He guides in justice, and the hum­ble He teaches His way.” Humility is what we need if we are to be guided by God.

When we go to God for guid­ance, we must realise that he is very great, he is very powerful, and we are very weak. We must realise that he is very big, and we are very small. We must remem­ber that he is infinite, he is all-knowing, he is everywhere, he is unlimited, whereas we are very limited. We must remem­ber that he is holy, and we are sinful.

We need to approach God with a sense of awe, a sense of his majesty and power, a sense of his great­ness. As verse 12 of Psalm 25 says, “Who is the man that fears the Lord? Him shall He teach in the way He chooses.” The man who fears the Lord, he is the one who will be led by the Lord. The one who stands in awe of the Lord, the one who knows some­thing of the greatness of the Lord, he is the one whom the Lord will guide.

We need to realise that Jesus is not a friend with whom we can bounce around a few ideas, and then go off and do what we like. Jesus is the Lord of creation who will be coming back to judge the living and the dead. And God is not an advisor who can be ignored if we don’t like what he has to say to us. God is the fearsome, holy God who hates sin and who will not be ignored or shoved aside.

Having a sense of God’s holi­ness also means we have to have a sense of our unholiness. As verse 7 of Psalm 25 says, “Do not remember the sins of my youth, nor my transgressions.” And verse 11, “For Your name’s sake, O Lord, Pardon my iniquity, for it is great.”

“O Lord, look upon us, and free us from our misery. Redeem us. Save us from our sins.” This has to be our prayer if we are to look to God for guidance in living the Christian life.

This should be obvious. After all, how can you learn from God unless you know that you are sin­ful, and therefore need to learn from God? An ignorant person is not going to seek to be taught unless he is somewhat aware of his ignorance. This really is simply common sense.

And yet, the fact of our sinful­ness needs to be stressed over and over again. One of the favourite strategies of the devil is to make us think, even if it’s just sub­consciously, that we really are not that sinful. Therefore, when it comes right down to it, we really do not need God’s help.

But the simple fact of the matter is, if you do not approach God as one who is a sinner, if you do not approach God as someone who needs to be forgiven by the precious blood of Jesus Christ, if you do not throw yourself upon God’s mercy, if you do not ap­proach God as someone who is completely and totally dependent on God for redemption and sal­vation, then you will not truly know what it means to ask, “Make me to know your ways, O Lord, teach me your paths.”

You may have a knowledge of the Bible. You may be able to fool a lot of people into thinking that you are a Christian. But you will not be looking to God for help. You will only be looking to yourself, you will be looking to your own human reason and in­tellect. You will be relying on your own strength, unless you know how futile your own strength is, unless you know how futile your thinking is, unless you truly know how great your sinfulness really is.

Assurance of Guidance←⤒🔗

The wonderful thing is, those who truly go to God in all humility, those truly seeking to be taught the ways of the Lord, God has already in a very real way lifted them up. He has not left them in the depths of their sins. And he does not leave them so that all they think about is how bad they are. The wonderful news of the gospel is that because of Jesus Christ, God has forgiven his people. He has shown them his mercy.

Verses 5 and 6 of Psalm 25,

Lead me in Your truth and teach me, For You are the God of my salvation; On You I wait all the day. Remember, O Lord, Your tender mercies and Your loving-kindnesses, For they are from of old.

And verse 20,

Keep my soul, and deliver me; Let me not be ashamed, for I put my trust in You.

“I put my trust in you. You are the God of my salvation. You are the steadfast loving God. You are the merciful God. You are the God who takes his people and holds them and keeps them. You are the God who lifts up his peo­ple. You are the God who has sent his Son Jesus Christ to save your people from their sins. And because of this, your people are raised to new life. Your people are enabled to do the things you re­quire of them. Your people can live according to your word. Your people have the Holy Spirit living in them, giving them the guidance and the strength that they need to walk in your ways.”

This can give us confidence. Not in ourselves. Not in our own wisdom. But it can give us confidence to know that God is a faith­ful covenant God who will guide his people and who will lead them on the right path.

Does that mean it will be a smooth road? No. God does not promise that we will have an easy go of it. There will be trials and tribulations. There will be many temptations to live as children of darkness rather than as children of light. But God does promise to keep His chosen children on the right road that leads to eter­nal life. God will preserve his people.

We are sure in God. We have our confidence in God. On him do we rely. He guides us. He keeps us. He teaches us. He teaches the humble.