Guidance: Its source

Most husbands have had the experience of being in the company of others and suddenly discovering by the most imperceptive look on the face of their wives that specific actions are required. It is astonishing how much information is conveyed in such a look. Perhaps that's why we have 40-plus muscles in our faces to enable us to express the most prominent emotions and those hidden from everyone else except those closest to us. These signals so often involve our eyes. Psalm 32, a Psalm of David, begins with the blessing of forgiveness and ends with the joy of trusting the Lord. Central to this spiritual journey is God's desire to instruct and teach us the way we should go. In educational terms, instruction has been described as telling or showing how something is done. It is a step-by-step process involving dependence on the instructor and developing skills. Teaching facilitates learning and the overall development of a student. Instruction is about telling. Teaching is about explaining.

God guides us in both ways on the pathway of faith. There are those aspects of guidance which are common to all believers. The complete trust of the word of God, prayerfulness, obedience, witness, and fellowship. But then there is also God's specific guidance in our personal circumstances. In the words of the apostle Paul, "Lord, what do You want me to do?" Central to this process is the will of God, the example of Christ, and the guidance of the Holy Spirit. These are all conveyed through the living word of God. There we find the will of God explained, the life of Christ displayed, as the Holy Spirit guides us into all truth. These are not things learned at a distance but in fellowship with God and conveyed in the sentence, "I will guide you with my eye". To look into someone's face, you need to be close to them. The disciples of Christ learned the pathway of faith by living daily in the presence of Christ. But they only fully understood everything Christ wanted them to know, experience and share when He rose from the dead and the Holy Spirit indwelt their hearts.

True Christianity is not a manual of behavioural instruction. It is life in Christ. God does not put "bit and bridle" in our mouths to make us "come near". He expects His children to come close to Him naturally. He looks on us in all the grace He manifested in the Person of His Son. We see the Father in the Son, "He who has seen Me has seen the Father" (John 14:9). My father was a baker. I never understood what my father did to support his large family until he took me at 5 o’clock one morning to the bakery where he worked every day. He didn't teach me to bake. He taught me who he was. Guidance is not simply knowing the way God wants us to go. It is knowing God is the way. Guidance begins by looking into the face of Jesus Christ. We are instructed, taught and guided by God "who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ" (2 Corinthians 4:6). Guidance begins by turning our eyes upon Jesus.