Found: God's Will (Find the Direction and Purpose God Wants for Your Life)

First sentence: As I travel around, one of the questions I am asked most often is "How can a Christian know the will of God for his or her life?" Most of us acknowledge that God has a plan for the life of every believer, but often we have trouble in finding just which way this play goes at a particular juncture.

Found: God's Will may be a short book, but it's a relevant book with substance. The premise is a simple one,
"Let's begin with a simple assumption. Since God has a will for us, He must want us to know it. If so, then we could expect Him to communicate it to us in the most obvious way. And how would that be? Through the Bible, His revelation. Therefore, I believe that what anyone needs to know about the will of God is clearly show more revealed in the pages of His Word. God's will is, in fact, very explicit in Scripture."
The chapter titles: "Is God a Cosmic Killjoy?", "The Crucial First Step," "The Fizzies Principle," "The Priority of Purity," "Silencing the Critics," "Facing the Flak," and "You're It."

MacArthur argues that God's will is simple and easy to understand. There are five things that are God's will for every one. First, God wills everyone to be saved. If you are saved, if you are trusting in Jesus Christ for salvation, you are in God's will. Second, God wills everyone to be filled with the Spirit and to live in the Spirit. Third, God wills everyone to be sanctified. It isn't enough to profess your belief, one must live by it. Fourth, God wills everyone to be submissive. Every one has to submit to someone--authority is God-given authority unless submitting means violating God's direct commandments. Fifth, God wills everyone to suffer. To suffer?! Is suffering really God's will for believers?! Surely we're misreading this last one, right?! Nope. Read the Bible. It's there in black and white. (And perhaps red.) If you're saved, spirit-filled, sanctified, submissive, and suffering...then you are living in accordance with God's will and the rest is up to you.

Quotes:
The doctrine of salvation is unpopular because it includes the recognition of sin. Nobody likes to admit sin. And many people resist the idea that they need to be saved.
There is a world out there that needs Jesus Christ. God wants them to be saved, and you and I are the vehicles for the transportation of the gospel. That is God’s will.
When you were saved, the moment you received Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit came to live within you. There is no Christian who does not possess the Holy Spirit.
So many times we ask for what we already have! We pray for the Holy Spirit, and He is already here.
Let me share how I study the Bible and how the Bible has come alive to me. I began in 1 John. One day I sat down and read all five chapters straight through. It took me twenty minutes. Reading one book straight through was terrific. (The books of the Bible weren’t written as an assortment of good little individual verses. They were written with flow and context.) The next day, I sat down and read 1 John straight through again. The third day, I sat down and read 1 John straight through. The fourth day, straight through again. The fifth day, I sat down and read it again. I did this for thirty days. Do you know what happened at the end of the thirty days? I knew what was in 1 John. You might say, “My, are you smart!” No, I am not smart. I read it thirty times. Even I can get it then!
The more you study the Word of God, the more it saturates your mind and life. Someone is reported to have asked a concert violinist in New York’s Carnegie Hall how she became so skilled. She said that it was by “planned neglect.” She planned to neglect everything that was not related to her goal.
Some less important things in your life could stand some planned neglect so that you might give yourself to studying the Word of God.
The more you would study the Word of God, the more your mind would be saturated with it. It will be no problem then for you to think of Christ. You won’t be able to stop thinking of Him.
The only way you can be saturated with the thoughts of Christ is to saturate yourself with the Book that is all about Him.
Evangelism involves living a godly life in the face of an ungodly world.
And that will bring persecution, because the world does not like Jesus.
The Bible never sees a Christian at any time who doesn’t suffer—because anybody who lives a godly life in the world will get the flak that the world throws back.
One of the problems of evangelism today is that Christians are not willing to stand nose to nose with the world and tell it like it is concerning Jesus Christ. show less

First sentence: As I travel around, one of the questions I am asked most often is "How can a Christian know the will of God for his or her life?" Most of us acknowledge that God has a plan for the life of every believer, but often we have trouble in finding just which way this play goes at a particular juncture.

Found: God's Will may be a short book, but it's a relevant book with substance. The premise is a simple one,
"Let's begin with a simple assumption. Since God has a will for us, He must want us to know it. If so, then we could expect Him to communicate it to us in the most obvious way. And how would that be? Through the Bible, His revelation. Therefore, I believe that what anyone needs to know about the will of God is clearly show more revealed in the pages of His Word. God's will is, in fact, very explicit in Scripture."
The chapter titles: "Is God a Cosmic Killjoy?", "The Crucial First Step," "The Fizzies Principle," "The Priority of Purity," "Silencing the Critics," "Facing the Flak," and "You're It."

MacArthur argues that God's will is simple and easy to understand. There are five things that are God's will for every one. First, God wills everyone to be saved. If you are saved, if you are trusting in Jesus Christ for salvation, you are in God's will. Second, God wills everyone to be filled with the Spirit and to live in the Spirit. Third, God wills everyone to be sanctified. It isn't enough to profess your belief, one must live by it. Fourth, God wills everyone to be submissive. Every one has to submit to someone--authority is God-given authority unless submitting means violating God's direct commandments. Fifth, God wills everyone to suffer. To suffer?! Is suffering really God's will for believers?! Surely we're misreading this last one, right?! Nope. Read the Bible. It's there in black and white. (And perhaps red.) If you're saved, spirit-filled, sanctified, submissive, and suffering...then you are living in accordance with God's will and the rest is up to you.

Quotes:
The doctrine of salvation is unpopular because it includes the recognition of sin. Nobody likes to admit sin. And many people resist the idea that they need to be saved.
There is a world out there that needs Jesus Christ. God wants them to be saved, and you and I are the vehicles for the transportation of the gospel. That is God’s will.
When you were saved, the moment you received Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit came to live within you. There is no Christian who does not possess the Holy Spirit.
So many times we ask for what we already have! We pray for the Holy Spirit, and He is already here.
Let me share how I study the Bible and how the Bible has come alive to me. I began in 1 John. One day I sat down and read all five chapters straight through. It took me twenty minutes. Reading one book straight through was terrific. (The books of the Bible weren’t written as an assortment of good little individual verses. They were written with flow and context.) The next day, I sat down and read 1 John straight through again. The third day, I sat down and read 1 John straight through. The fourth day, straight through again. The fifth day, I sat down and read it again. I did this for thirty days. Do you know what happened at the end of the thirty days? I knew what was in 1 John. You might say, “My, are you smart!” No, I am not smart. I read it thirty times. Even I can get it then!
The more you study the Word of God, the more it saturates your mind and life. Someone is reported to have asked a concert violinist in New York’s Carnegie Hall how she became so skilled. She said that it was by “planned neglect.” She planned to neglect everything that was not related to her goal.
Some less important things in your life could stand some planned neglect so that you might give yourself to studying the Word of God.
The more you would study the Word of God, the more your mind would be saturated with it. It will be no problem then for you to think of Christ. You won’t be able to stop thinking of Him.
The only way you can be saturated with the thoughts of Christ is to saturate yourself with the Book that is all about Him.
Evangelism involves living a godly life in the face of an ungodly world.
And that will bring persecution, because the world does not like Jesus.
The Bible never sees a Christian at any time who doesn’t suffer—because anybody who lives a godly life in the world will get the flak that the world throws back.
One of the problems of evangelism today is that Christians are not willing to stand nose to nose with the world and tell it like it is concerning Jesus Christ. show less

Found: God’s Will by John MacArthur is a small, short 61-page booklet that quickly tackles down the Bible’s answer to the question, “What is God’s will for my life?” This is not primarily an in-depth study of the nuances of God’s will or the difference between his sovereign will and his moral will. It pastorally addresses those who are seeking to know God’s specific will for their life. Many are paralyzed to inactivity because they fear that what they want to do might be outside of God’s will.

We know that God desires that best for His children so we want to make sure that we don’t ruin his plans, and thus we want to know God’s will: Should I go to this school or that one? Which job should I take? Should I marry? show more Whom should I marry/date? While MacArthur’s treatment of the answer to that question is no where near exhaustive his book gets quickly and effectively to the heart of the matter by applying many of the Biblical texts that talk specifically about God’s will.

The premise is that, to know God’s will, you must be living obediently and reading God’s word and praying. When you are close to God, his will is obvious and your choices are his choices. He gives you the desires of your heart meaning the desires that you have when you are close to God are his desires for you. This is an amazing book. It’s a quick read, too. MacArthur has a unique perspective. He starts by establishing the GENERAL will of God for a Christian’s life and shows how this leads to the SPECIFIC will of God. He shows that knowing and following the GENERAL will of God is a prerequisite to knowing his SPECIFIC will. His basic premise is “why would God reveal His specific will to you if you’re ignoring His general will?” Overall this is a very helpful introduction. If you’re trying to learn how to discern God’s will, this shouldn’t necessarily be the only book you read, but it should definitely be one of them. show less

To be honest, I wasn't going to buy this book. But, I will admit, the title seemed intriguing so I caved in. I'm glad I did. The book was well written, clear, to the point, and insightful. The author gleamed the message from many different areas of the Bible without leaving the reader feeling confused or overwhelmed. Great message!

I thought it was a really good study funny it went along with what we are doing in church right now. I thought it was well written and a quick read as well.

From christianaudio.com

GET READY FOR A SURPRISE!

You may want to jump and shout when you read the sixth principle for knowing when you have found God's will.

The sixth principle is "Do whatever you want" as long as the first five principles are operating in your life.

Read about all six principles to better understand what the psalmist means when he urges, "Delight thyself also in the Lord; and He shall give thee the desires of thine heart" (Psalm 37:4).

Dr. John MacArthur, Jr. is pastor of Grace Community Church in Sun Valley, California, and president of The Master's College and Seminary. Known for his dynamic expository preaching. John is heard daily on the "Grace to You" syndicated radio broadcast and has a cassette ministry that has show more distributed more than ten million tapes. His many books include The Body Dynamic, Reckless Faith, The Vanishing Conscience, Different by Design, Anxiety Attacked, The Power of Suffering, and The MacArthur Study Bible.Reviews

My take:

I received a free download of this book from christianaudio.com for purposes of reviewing it. This was a really quick listen at just 1.42 hrs. (the book itself is only 64 pages long). I think that this book would be perfect to give to a new Christian as it answers alot of the questions that people have when they become a Christian. I think it is an excellent book for people who have been Christians for awhile also to just to help them to remember some of the basic fact that are presented in this book.

The main thing I took away from Listening to this book other than the 6 principles presented was the way that MacArthur does his Bible reading. He takes a portion of Scripture and reads that same portion for 30 days. By the time he is finished he really knows that Scripture. Bible reading is an important part of the Christian life and this is a good way to incorporate into yours.

I thought that John Hagg did a good job as the narrator. His voice was pleasant and he kept a good pace and didn't rush. No gimmicks here just a straight forward reading which was appropriate for this book. show less

a great tiny book... handy for easy reminders. great for discipleship and counseling