What does it really mean to know and follow God’s plan? We can learn from a father of the faith, Abraham, who heard and followed God’s voice into the unknown. In this excerpt from Pursuing the Will of God, Pastor Jack Hayford explores pivotal moments that shaped Abraham’s faith. When the patriarch stumbled, the Lord always picked him up and dusted him off. Our heavenly Father does the same for us.

Abraham landed himself in quite a mess in Egypt. He asked his beautiful wife, Sarai, to pretend she was his sister so the Egyptians wouldn’t kill him. If they liked her, he might even get some royal treatment. And he did. After Pharaoh took Sarai into his palace, he gave Abraham livestock and servants.

But the Lord sent terrible plagues upon Pharaoh and his household because of Sarai, Abram’s wife. So Pharaoh summoned Abram and accused him sharply. “What have you done to me?” he demanded. “Why didn’t you tell me she was your wife? Why did you say, ‘She is my sister,’ and allow me to take her as my wife? Now then, here is your wife. Take her and get out of here!”  Pharaoh ordered some of his men to escort them, and he sent Abram out of the country, along with his wife and all his possessions (Genesis 12:17–20 NLT).

In His grace, the Lord preserved Abraham even in the middle of his folly.

Why should the Lord be so patient with us? Blessed be His name, loved ones, He is patient. Notice that the Lord did not come thundering down on Abraham in anger and judgment for being dishonest, but He moved in the situation to draw His servant out of the mess he got himself into and put his feet back on the right path—the path home!

Notice where Abraham wound up:

From the Negev, they continued traveling by stages toward Bethel, and they pitched their tents between Bethel and Ai, where they had camped before. This was the same place where Abram had built the altar, and there he worshiped the Lord again (Genesis 13:3–4 NLT).

He ended up right back where he was at the beginning when the Lord had said, “This is the place.”

I don’t know where you may be in your life right now. You may be just beginning to discover that there’s such a thing as living life in the will of God. You may have been living such a life for a long time, and, like me, you are ready to admit you have more to learn. You may even be facing very difficult, possibly heartbreaking, circumstances.

Sometimes we simply can’t discern or understand why the Lord allows certain things to happen. You may be facing difficulty because it’s a test—something designed to profit you and to build your faith. Your trouble may be from the hand of Satan, your enemy, who would love to wring the joy out of your life. Your stressed situation may be the bitter fruit of your own muddling. But whatever our circumstances, we won’t find the answer we seek by running here and there and trying this, that, and the other. We will only find it by standing still and seeing the salvation of the Lord.

Don’t run to Egypt when you’ve got problems.

Don’t cook up your own defensive schemes to face your fears.

Get on your knees before the Lord.

“Yes,” you may say, “but what if it’s the Lord’s will for me to run to Egypt?” Listen, if you’re on your knees before the Lord and He wants you in Egypt, He’ll put wheels on those knees and move you there! When you wait on the Lord, He’ll see that you get where He wants you to be. One of the beautiful truths about the Lord’s way with us is this: as long as we are fully committed to His will and purpose for our lives, He will never permit us to remain in confusion.

The first few words of Genesis chapter 13 tell us, “Then Abram went up from Egypt.” That sentence has even more weight when we note how often Egypt is used in the Bible as a symbol of sin and the world spirit. “Then Abram went up from Egypt, he and his wife and all that he had, and Lot with him, to the South [the Negev]. Abram was very rich in livestock, in silver, and in gold” (vv. 1–2).

There is a divinely gracious paradox in this story’s ending. Abraham got to keep the wealth he acquired in Egypt and brought it out with him.

Can you believe it?

He fumbled, stumbled, and fell—yet got up again, smelling like a rose! Oh, my! What a gloriously merciful Lord we have! Even in our foolishness, even in our defeats, even in our blindness and disobedience, He showers His love and grace. This is particularly true when our muddling disobedience is the result of sheep-like ignorance. Calculated rebellion and willful disobedience are one thing, but, apparently, in God’s eyes, the muddling child can find mercy.

Did Abraham know better? Was he in a rebellious frame of mind? I don’t see that in Scripture. What I do see is a man who could have saved himself a great deal of embarrassment, grief, and wasted time if he had listened more carefully and waited more attentively on the Lord. But he didn’t listen or wait, just as, so very often, you and I don’t, either. Even so, the Lord graciously led him out of Egypt and back to the Promised Land.

Praise God, there’s hope for us all!

If we set our paths to pursue God’s will, even amid our muddling failures, the Lord can somehow bring about a net gain of profit, perception, and understanding. In the case of so many of the foolish, ill-advised, blindly, or hastily pursued things I’ve done in my life, not only did God bring me out of the pit of sorrow and despair, but He also brought me through with something in my hand that made me stronger and wiser than I was before I stumbled.

Only an Almighty God, a living Redeemer, can do that.

Copyright © 2024 by Jack Hayford