Real Life Radio

David J: Today, on Real Life Radio. He's got a plan.

Jack Hibbs: Embrace it. See it. Find it out. Embrace it. See what it is. Understand and determine that God's personal interest is the best for your life.

David J: This is Real Life. Welcome to Real Life Radio with Pastor Jack Hibbs. I'm David J, thanking you for joining us today as we listen, learn, and are challenged by God's Word, the Bible.

David J: In a world growing darker by the day, will you stand firm or be swept away? Pastor Jack Hibbs' new book, "Called to Take a Bold Stand," is a wake-up call for every believer. With biblical clarity and real-life conviction, Jack Hibbs shows you how to overcome fear, hold fast to truth, and make every moment count. That's "Called to Take a Bold Stand" by Pastor Jack Hibbs. Get your copy for a gift of any amount at jackhibbs.com/realradio.

David J: On today's edition of Real Life Radio. Pastor Jack continues his series now called "First Samuel," and a message titled "The Will of God in Your Life, Part One." Samuel of the Old Testament was the last judge of Israel and the first of its prophets. So, here in chapter 9, Samuel tells us how God is personally interested in us and has a very specific plan for our lives. You see, like the people of Israel, we often struggle with finding direction and purpose. More importantly, what we want in our impatience may not be the right thing for us. The people wanted a king, but it wasn't what God had originally planned for them. So today, Pastor Jack teaches that we need to let go of the fear that keeps us paralyzed with uncertainty. We often overcomplicate what's right there in front of us to do, while God wants us to live with confidence and follow His path. Now with his message called "The Will of God in Your Life, Part One," here's pastor and Bible teacher, Jack Hibbs.

Jack Hibbs: How precious also are your thoughts toward me, oh God? How great is the sum of them, and if I should count them, they would be more than the sands. That's Psalm 139:17. Wow, God, your thoughts are precious toward me and they're a lot.

When's the last time you took a field trip to the beach? Maybe you need to go. Take Psalm 139, read it, and pick up some sand. And here's the deal, this is cool, ready? Take the sand in your hand, and then go like this with your hands, and I challenge you to count all the remaining sand that's left in your hands after you go like this!

It's like all over your little cracks in your fingers and stuff, they're everywhere, sand. You can't even count all of them. And the psalmist says, "Hey, God's wonderful precious thoughts towards me are more than the sands, more than the sand that's on the seashore."

Here's the deal. Some of you with that wonderful verse will just go, "Yeah, man, I needed to hear that," and some of you are just going to go, "Ooh," and tune that right out because it's too great. And that's not good. You need to say, "Lord, I know that You're not a liar. I know that You're holy and true. Your Bible says that Your thoughts are precious towards me and more than the sand." Then, Lord, I want to know what those thoughts are. And I want You to take those thoughts, and here I am, Lord, and you do it in my life.

Help me to see what You want to do regarding the plan that You have for my life, and Lord, don't let me be a donkey about it, let me embrace it. Don't let me resist it and be stubborn and be foolish, let me embrace it. Let me know it. The Lord wants to do great things in our lives.

He has ordained a specific plan for our life. Look at verses 4 through 6, God is performing His specific plan for you. He is performing it, even right now in your life. Now, as we sit here, He's doing it. Verses 4 through 6.

Scripture says here, "So he passed through the mountains of Ephraim. Listen, through the land of Shalishah, but they did not find them. Then they passed through the land of Shaalim, and they were not there. Then he passed through the land of the Benjamites, but they did not find them." In other words, he's really putting down the territory, and they're not finding any donkeys. And that's all he's looking for is donkeys. Little does he know that God's specific plan is about ready to hit him right in the head.

"And when they had come to the land of Zuph, Saul said to his servant who was with him, 'Come, let us return, lest my father cease caring about the donkeys and become more worried about me or about us.'" "And he said to him, 'Look now, there is in this city a man of God, and he is an honorable man. All that he says surely comes to pass. So let us go there, perhaps he can show us the way that we should go.'"

I love this. Verses 4 to 6 teaches that God is performing a specific plan in our lives. He did it to Saul, He's doing it for us. How so? This way. God will always be exact. He's going to be exact about what He does. Verses or regarding these verses here, teaching us our lives. Watch what he says to this. I love it. He goes in verse 4 throughout all of this region, seems endless, seems silly. But verse 6 tells us that they get, listen, desperate, "We need to go." Saul says, "Listen, my dad's going to start worrying about me instead of the donkeys. We better get back."

And so the idea comes, "Let's consult the man of God." He lives nearby here. Well, guess who that is. That's our man Samuel.

But what I love about this is the fact that the situation now has brought them to the point to consider consulting God. Did you hear that? Some people will say, and there may be a mixed multitude around them. Maybe there's some friends that don't know the Lord, or maybe Christians that are not too committed to the Lord. But your friend will say in that group, "You know what? We're praying about the situation," or, "We're praying about what's cool," or, "We're praying about." And sometimes in Christian circles, it's kind of bizarre. Some people will say, "Well, we're praying about it," and somebody will say in the group, "Oh my goodness, oh, did you hear that? They're praying about it. Must be really bad." They've resorted to prayer. Some people who don't know God, they consider that like a crisis. "You're what? We're praying about it. Ay-yi-yi, they're praying about it. It must be horrible." It's better to pray first.

I tell you, it's much better, especially at this vacation time of the season. Are you going to pray before you pull your car away from the driveway? Or are you going to pray after it blows up? I'm serious, let me tell you, pray before you back out of the driveway. You want to know why? If it blows up, you already prayed. "Hey God, we prayed before we left. You," and you're reminded, not like He needs to be reminded, "Lord, we prayed before we left and the car still blew up." "This must be Your specific plan. This must be Your will." "So Lord, I guess You want us to minister to a tow truck driver or to an auto repairman." I'm serious. See, the thing is, the horrible thing is trying to catch up. "Come on, get in the car! Get in the car! Shut the door! Put your seatbelt on! Let's go! Shut up! Not that kind of music, this kind of music! Man, let's have fun! Everybody have fun! Come on!" And you're driving. "Aren't we having fun? This is great!" "We're on vacation!" Boom! The car blows up. "What's going on? What's going on?" "Oh my gosh!" And then the wife goes, "Honey, we should pray." And then it's catch-up. "Lord, help us, the car blew up! Oh my, it's smoking! God, it's melting! The engine's melting!" You know what? You might as well, that's not a prayer of faith. It's over by that time. It's pathetic. Give it to Him first. "Lord, we're backing out of the driveway any moment. Take this vacation, do with it as You please. We're Yours. Bless the car, the transmission, the hoses, the kids, keep them healthy. Give us some great sunrises and sunsets, and just, here we go, God!" Better to do that. Much better to do that than to play catch-up. It's a terrible feeling. It's kind of a lonely feeling.

The will of God in our lives, very, very important. I want you to consider the third point, skipping down to verses 15 to 20, and that is, God will be controlling the specific plan. I love this. God will be controlling the specific plan in our lives. He's always going to be doing that. Look at verses 15 to 16. "Now the Lord had told Samuel, I love it, in his ear, the day before Saul came, saying." "Tomorrow about this time, I will send you a man from the land of Benjamin." Don't you love it? Saul's out looking for donkeys. The day earlier, God speaks to Samuel and says, "Hey, a guy's going to be looking for donkeys. He's going to come into town here." The Bible says that God said it to Samuel's ear. That's pretty exact, don't you think?

I love it. What was Samuel doing? I don't know. He's just being God's man. He could have been cooking a pot roast or, we don't know, mowing the lawn, we don't know. God says, "Samuel, about this time tomorrow, so check your sundial on your wrist, I'm going to send a man your way about this time tomorrow." Isn't that exact? I love it. I'm going to tell you what to do about him. God is always exact. Why? He's always in control of His specific plan for your life. Always. Now, listen carefully, you guys, when we walk in sin, it's equal to taking your finger on a cassette player and pressing pause. The moment we depart from God, either in sin or rebellion, or we're disobedient to His will, His Word, He puts it on pause. And it's kind of a tragic, but in some way funny thing. Because your life is going along, then this thing takes place or the decision you make is off the wall. God puts His controlling power of that specific plan on pause, and you're going all around town, all the way out from underneath His perfect umbrella, and you're bumping into things, you're getting all beat up and scarred and and weathered and tattered, and you don't know why your life stinks, and all this stuff's going wrong, and and you're frustrated, and you're tense, and you're stressed out, your heart rate's up, and you're a mess, and then God in His patience gets your attention.

David J: You're listening to Real Life with Pastor Jack Hibbs. To learn more about this ministry or to catch up on some previous episodes, go to jackhibbs.com. That's jackhibbs.com. And now, let's get back to today's message. Once again, here's Pastor Jack.

Jack Hibbs: You're bumping into things, you get all beat up and scarred and and weathered and tattered, and you don't know why your life stinks, and all this stuff's going wrong, and and you're frustrated, and you're tense, and you're stressed out, your heart rate's up, and you're a mess, and then God in His patience gets your attention. And then you come right back to underneath the umbrella of the Lord, and he starts with play again.

And if you wander out from underneath that umbrella, He puts it on pause again. That's why, listen, is that not exactly what the children of Israel did for 40 years in the wilderness? God goes, "All right, we're leaving Egypt! In fact, watch this!" "I'm going to lay it on Pharaoh's heart and all of the people to take all of their gold, silver, and gems, and all of their goodies." "And load it up on the camels and donkeys and stuff, and you're not only leaving Egypt, you're leaving Egypt rich!" And they do it.

And one day out of camp, I mean, one day out of Egypt, they go to pitch camp and they start whining about. "Do anybody pack any leeks or onions?" "I didn't. I didn't either." "Anybody pack any leeks or onions?" Silence. Two and a half million people, nobody packed any leeks or onions. "We want to go back." "Moses, we want the leeks and the onions!" They start whining. 40 years they whine. I love it. I mean, I'm sad, but Moses, he's looking at them.

And Moses goes, "God, kill them." "Every one of them, kill them." And God says, "Moses, if I kill them, then My name will be cursed because I will have brought them out of Egypt and have them die in the wilderness." "I can't kill them, Moses." "I have to show them mercy and provide for them." "All right," Moses says. Then the next day. "Where's the onions? And we don't have any meat! We want meat now too!" And God says, "Moses, get out of the way, I'm going to kill them!" "I am going to kill every one of them! Not one of them will enter into the promised land!" And Moses says, "Now, God, wait a minute! If You do that, Your name will be cursed among the people of the earth!" "You need to be merciful to them and kind to them!" Isn't it awesome, if you read Exodus, Moses and God never agreed on that issue on the same day? Never, not once. It's amazing. Never not once do they agree. It's absolutely amazing.

God's will, He's controlling in your life. He's exact about it. Don't settle for some foggy, mystical, wondering. Will of God for your life. God wants you to know specifically. God is speaking to Samuel and through Samuel. Regarding His will, and God's very specific. Listen, there are specific exceptions. And let me give it to you, a specific exception. And that's found in Hebrews 11:8. This is the verse of my life, by the way. It means a lot to me. It's how God has worked in my life.

"By faith, Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place which he would receive as an inheritance." "And he went out, not knowing where he was going." That's great! Is that not our Christian experience? God says, "Hey, you choose, My son." God convicted me of sin. I knew that I was a sinner. I needed to come to Christ and be forgiven. I gave my heart to Him, and then God says, "Listen, you follow me by faith." "Yes, sir!" "All right, you ready?" "I'm ready!" "Okay, go!" "Okay." "Where?" "Just go!" "All right." "Where are we going?" "God, yes, I'm here!" "Where are we going?" "I'm here!" "Okay." "All right." "But where are we going?" "I'm taking you to a place that you don't know of." "Follow me." "Even though you don't know where you're going."

That's my life. I told you before, last year when the bank says, "Well, where are you, where's the church going to be in the 15-year plan?" 15-year plan? Look, I'm following God. I'm not knowing where I'm going. Boy, that, that looks great on a, on a resume. Senior Pastor, Calvary Chapel, and I'm applying for this job and I don't know where I'm going. But that's the Christian life, is it not? We want to fool ourselves and think that we've got it all nailed down. God says, "That's pretty funny." "I'm leading you places you don't even know where you're going." Why? He has a specific plan. He's exact about it, and He's controlling it. That's why again the Bible says that we devise our plans, but God directs our steps. Isn't that funny? We got the slide rule out there, we got the compass, we got it all laid out, "All right, here we go, we're going to go now. We're really going to go!" And God says, "Watch this." And then we go, "Oh no!" And we throw the map out the window and we've got to say, "God, lead me." And He says, "All right." That's what it's all about.

God has blessed us as a church. God has blessed us in so many ways. And He's going to bless more. You know, listen, and we're going to have to end here. We'll have to pick this up next time. But God is, God blesses, and He's blessing. You know what's fun is, and I agree with you, you're going to come to me because if you haven't, you will, because your number's probably coming up. People do all the time, "Pastor Jack, I wish we would do this." "I wish we wouldn't do that." "And we need to do this more, and we should never do that again." I hear it all the time and I really appreciate it. Honestly, I do. And the cool thing is this, I agree with you. That's the fun thing about church. It's not perfect. It's being completed as it goes. It's a house of grace. When you say, "You know what? We need to do this thing." Yeah, you're right. Somebody came up to me last Sunday, "Pastor Jack, we need to do this thing!" And I looked at the guy, and I wondered what he was thinking, because I looked at him and I just got this starry gaze in my eyes. Like I was falling in love with a guy or something. I was just going, "Thank you, God! Thank you, God, that You've shown this to him." "Because I thought, because I thought I was the only one who saw this." "But you've shown it to him." And I was so blessed by that. And I said, "You know what? I couldn't agree with you more." "You pray, please, with me, that God does that." Because, you know what? I could run in here. I mean, I work out. I could grab you by the head and put you in a headlock. I could poke your eyes. Pull your hair. Grab you by the nose. What's that going to do? But see, when I see something, I can't put you in a headlock. I've got to say, "Lord, will You do this in our lives, starting with me and us as a church?" And you know what? It hasn't meant my approval, but sometimes it takes some years to do it, and I don't like that.

Would to God that this was more of a praying church. Do we pray? Yeah. But, you know what? We don't pray enough. Our prayer meetings on Wednesday should be more crowded than the teaching service, in my opinion. But if we have nothing to pray about then why go to a prayer meeting? Our lives are just perfect. Why pray if it's so sweet, you know? But for some of us, we need to pray. But I look around and it's just, there's so much that needs to be done. We have brought on staff a children's ministry coordinator. And she is going to revolutionize our children's ministry. Well, that's great. We've needed that. And we need it. Here's the thing. Today I'm concerned that she's going to quit. She's overwhelmed. "I can't believe how messed up this church is." "What?" "We've got to do this and we've got to do that." "I need about 4,000 hours to do this. I need about 35 people to help me in this." "And we've got to have that." "And, okay, calm down, sit down. Sit down." "Somebody get a cold pack." "Get, get some smelling salts." But here's the thing, here a little, there a little. You start. "Well, how come we're not?" "I don't know, but I agree with you." I bet God's going to do it. But what we need to do is see that for every one of us, God has a specific plan for our lives, and if you attend this church. Then you, I pray, are asking God. "Lord, what difference am I to make in the lives of my brothers and sisters around me?" Please, if you're not praying that prayer, will you not remember anything tonight but that? "Dear God in heaven, what effect am I to have in the church that I attend?" The alternative is unspeakable. That you would take what God has given you and dig a hole and put it in the ground? No way. No way. God, reveal Your specific plan for my life. Because I know You've got one. And I don't want to miss it. I fear dying in this life having missed His specific plan for my life. I will not do that.

Father, we thank You for Your Word. We look forward, Father, to what's going to happen in Saul's life. Because, Lord, we know that so much, and of course, what is being taught applies to our lives today. So, Lord, we ask in Jesus' name, that if there's anyone in here tonight that does not know.