Seeking God’s Direction in Your Life

Seeking God’s Direction in Your Life

1 Samuel 23:1-14

Proverbs 16:9 (MSG)
We can make our plans, but the LORD determines our steps.

Proverbs 19:21 (NIV)
Many are the plans in a man's heart, but it is the LORD'S purpose that prevails.

Proverbs 19:21 (MSG)
We humans keep brainstorming options and plans, but God's purpose prevails.

Ephesians 5:15–17 (NIV)
Be very careful, then, how you live — not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord's will is.

Psalm 37:23 (NLT)
The LORD directs the steps of the godly. He delights in every detail of their lives.

1 Samuel 23:1 (NIV)
When David was told, "Look, the Philistines are fighting against Keilah and are looting the threshing floors,"

1 Samuel 18:30 (NIV)
The Philistine commanders continued to go out to battle, and as often as they did, David met with more success than the rest of Saul's officers, and his name became well known.

1 Samuel 23:2 (NIV)
He inquired of the LORD, saying, "Shall I go and attack these Philistines?" And the LORD answered him, "Go down to Keilah, for I am going to give the Philistines into your hand."

1 Samuel 23:3 (NIV)
But David's men said to him, "Here in Judah we are afraid. How much more, then, if we go to Keilah against the Philistine forces!"

1 Samuel 23:4 (NIV)
Once again David inquired of the LORD, and the LORD answered him, "Go down to Keilah, for I am going to give the Philistines into your hand."

1 Samuel 23:5 (NIV)
So David and his men went to Keilah, fought the Philistines and carried off their livestock. He inflicted heavy losses on the Philistines and saved the people of Keilah.

1 Samuel 23:7–9 (NIV)
Saul was told that David had gone to Keilah, and he said, "God has handed him over to me, for David has imprisoned himself by entering a town with gates and bars." And Saul called up all his forces for battle, to go down to Keilah to besiege David and his men. When David learned that Saul was plotting against him, he said to Abiathar the priest, "Bring the ephod.

Urim = lights
Thummin = perfections

Exodus 28:30 (NIV)
Also put the Urim and the Thummim in the breastpiece, so they may be over Aaron's heart whenever he enters the presence of the LORD. Thus Aaron will always bear the means of making decisions for the Israelites over his heart before the LORD.

Numbers 27:21 (NIV)
He [Joshua] is to stand before Eleazar the priest, who will obtain decisions for him by inquiring of the Urim before the LORD.

1 Samuel 28:5–6 (NIV)
When Saul saw the Philistine army, he was afraid; terror filled his heart. He inquired of the LORD, but the LORD did not answer him by dreams or Urim or prophets.

1 Samuel 22:5 (NIV)
But the prophet Gad said to David, "Do not stay in the stronghold. Go into the land of Judah."

Job 33:14–20, 23 (NLT)
For God speaks again and again, though people do not recognize it. He speaks in dreams, in visions of the night, when deep sleep falls on people as they lie in their beds. He whispers in their ears and terrifies them with warnings. He makes them turn from doing wrong; he keeps them from pride. He protects them from the grave, from crossing over the river of death. "Or God disciplines people with pain on their sickbeds, with ceaseless aching in their bones. They lose their appetite for even the most delicious food..."But if an angel from heaven appears— a special messenger to intercede for a person and declare that he is upright—

1 Samuel 23:9–11 (NIV)
When David learned that Saul was plotting against him, he said to Abiathar the priest, "Bring the ephod." David said, "O LORD, God of Israel, your servant has heard definitely that Saul plans to come to Keilah and destroy the town on account of me. Will the citizens of Keilah surrender me to him? Will Saul come down, as your servant has heard? O LORD, God of Israel, tell your servant." And the LORD said, "He will."

1 Samuel 23:12–14 (NIV)
Again David asked, "Will the citizens of Keilah surrender me and my men to Saul?" And the LORD said, "They will." So David and his men, about six hundred in number, left Keilah and kept moving from place to place. When Saul was told that David had escaped from Keilah, he did not go there. David stayed in the desert strongholds and in the hills of the Desert of Ziph. Day after day Saul searched for him, but God did not give David into his hands.

1st Scripture

Psalm 119:105 (NIV)
Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path.

2nd Holy Spirit
- Speaks to our heart or puts a desire in us
- Speaks through a prophetic word
- Dreams or visions
- Physical manifestations
- Desire in your heart
- Inner knowing – divine intuition

3rd Church

Psalm 27:4 (NKJV)
One thing I have desired of the LORD, That will I seek: That I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, To behold the beauty of the LORD, And to inquire in His temple.

Psalm 92:12–13 (NLT)
But the godly will flourish like palm trees and grow strong like the cedars of Lebanon. For they are transplanted to the LORD’S own house. They flourish in the courts of our God.

4th Common Sense

5th Godly Counsel

6th Circumstances
Grace is a confluence of: people, resource, opportunity, timing, creativity, and anointing