Six Principles – Seed of Ideas by John MacArthur Jr.
 
One of the most popular conferences attended at various Christian meetings is on the topic: “How to find God’s will.”  And people most often leave disappointed, primarily because they expected some quick, ready-made solution to all their life’s searching.
 
Our problem begins with the very title of the conference because, I have a news flash for you:
God’s will isn’t lost!  It is not something to be found but rather something to be experienced. The very idea presents a God who is somehow hiding His will from us, and perhaps giving us clues along the way as if we were involved in some type of spiritual scavenger hunt!
 
How, then, do we “find” (experience) God’s will?
 
There are SIX PRINCIPLES to experiencing God’s will. 
 
But, first I want to share with you an overriding principle regarding God’s will: we must be living in tune with the clearly revealed general will of God in Scripture before God will reveal the specific will for our personal life. If we aren’t doing what we know to do (based on Scripture), why would God reveal more to us?
 
Today we look at the first principle:
1. You Must Be S A V E D
 
The word “saved” carries the idea of being rescued or delivered. What are we saved from?
 
Matthew 1:21  “She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.”                                         
Not hell, but our sins. If we have dealt with our sins, then heaven or hell are no longer issues.
 
What then is the sin that we must be saved from?
 
Romans 2:23 “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”
 
Sin is falling short of God’s glory.
Sin is breaking God’s laws.
 
John 3:4  “Everyone who sins breaks the law; in fact, sin is lawlessness”  
 
How many laws must we break to have sinned?
 
James 2:10. “For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it.” 
 
Sin also means we live in a state of sin.  We are sinners by nature.
 
Romans 5:12. “…Just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this  way death came to all men, because all sinned.”     
 
We were born with a natural propensity (leaning) toward sin: to seek our own will over anyone else’s, including God.
 
Because of sin, the Bible says we are in bondage. Jesus described it best when He first commissioned Paul to go to the Gentiles with these words,
 
Acts 26:17–18 (NIV) “I am sending you to them 18 to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to  light, and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.”
 
What else does saved mean?   
 
It means brought to freedom, unrestricted, free to be all God meant for us to be.
 
Romans 12:2 (NIV84)  “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.”
 
How can we become saved?
 
Romans 10:9-10  “That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved.”
 
Confess Jesus as Lord (agree with God).
       
Believe in the Resurrected Lord.