Surely the Lord GOD does nothing unless He reveals His secret counsel to His servants the prophets (Amos 3:7).

 

This Scripture is amazing. Why would the Creator of the universe obligate Himself not to do anything without first revealing it to the prophets? The reason for this is understood in His purpose for creating man. He created man for fellowship.

In John 7:17, the Lord gives us a most basic principle for understanding truth, "If any man is willing to do His will, he shall know of the teaching, whether it is of God, or whether I speak from Myself." If we are going to know the truth, we must be committed to living that truth. It is not those who just know the truth about the cross who are saved, but those who have had the truth of the cross applied to their lives. When this truth is applied to our lives, we are born again into a life of union and obedience to God.

       Therefore, let everyone who is godly pray to Thee in a time when Thou mayest be found;

       surely in a flood of great waters they shall not reach him (Psalm 32:6).

 

There is often a tendency in Christians not to really seek the Lord until we get into a crisis situation. Then we seek Him earnestly. We see this same pattern with Israel in the Old Testament. This is a primary reason why many stay in a seemingly perpetual state of crisis.

       Good and upright is the LORD; therefore He instructs sinners in the way.

       He leads the humble in justice, and He teaches the humble His way (Psalm 25:8-9).

 

It takes humility to know God's ways. The Lord teaches the humble His ways because one must be willing to learn in order to be taught, and as we covered previously, one definition of humility could be teachableness.

Hebrews 10:35 states, "Therefore, do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward." In every sphere of life, confidence can be a primary factor that makes the difference between victory or defeat. Successful sports teams will quickly tell what a significant part confidence played in their victories. Successful generals will often point to the confidence they had in their troops as a reason for military victory. Victorious troops will usually point to the confidence they had in their generals.

The basic purpose of every Christian is to become like the Lord, and to do the works that He did. We do this by loving Him and our neighbors. Everything that we are called to do will fit in one of those categories: loving God or people. We may distinguish the path God has called us to walk by determining the path that compels us to walk in love. 

 

If we truly love the Lord we will love what He loves and hate what He hates.

Wisdom is the ability to apply knowledge properly. In Proverbs 24:3-4 we are told, "By wisdom a house is built, and by understanding it is established; And by knowledge the rooms are filled with all precious and pleasant riches." It is true that sermons filled with knowledge will tend to draw people. The gift of a word of knowledge will also draw crowds. This is good, but our purpose in the Lord is not just to draw crowds, but also to see people built together into the house of the Lord. To do this we need wisdom.

Robin McMillan once told me that he could "smell a breakthrough." I thought that was a funny way to put it, but I had to admit that I could too. It was as if there was a special energy in the air, and you could actually smell a coming release in the Spirit.

If we are going to be successful in a major endeavor we must learn one of the most powerful skills that anyone can have—team building. One of the Lord's highest priorities when He walked the earth was to build His team. He gathered a core of future leaders who had to be joined to Him, and to one another. That is still one of His highest priorities in building His church, and therefore must be ours.

 

There are few truly great teams that can be built quickly. Certainly the Lord was the best at this than who ever was or will be.