One “system” says we are born to our destiny. If you are born in the right place of the world, you will have far more opportunities than being from other places. If your parents are wealthy, your better opportunities will guide the paths your life takes. Another system says, we make our destiny. If we work hard enough, if we focus on specific goals, if we are honest and put ourselves in the right places, we will succeed and find real meaning and purpose in our lives. One other rather controversial system says that we are stuck with whatever lot life has given us and that the only way to make everyone equal is for those who have less to be given what they need to be equal, preferably from those who have more.

Even doctrine of our Christian faith tends to portray a contrast in ideas about what determines our destiny. Predestination states that God determines our paths and we have very little input to those paths. Some suggest that God chooses who will be saved, who will follow God and enjoy the benefits of His grace. In contrast, the doctrine of free will suggests that everything in our lives is a result of our choices and we are free to choose whatever paths we want, and everything that happens to us is a result of our choices. Choose well, choose to follow God and all things will work together and we will live wonderful lives.

If there is a “system” in the world that tells us “we have to do this, live this way, say these things and live a certain way in order to be happy”, then it might be a good idea to be a System Breaker if we really want to find God’s will for our lives. What we tend to do, even as Christians, is “do our best” to just manage the opportunities and choices we make and just hope for the best outcome. We all want to be happy, we want to live meaningful and fulfilling lives and hopefully make a lot of money along the way. God has far more for us than this. And He did not leave us “clueless” about how we can find our way.

Certainly, opportunity plays a big part in the paths that are open to our lives. Whether we were born in America or Africa can drastically affect what opportunities we have and how the paths of our lives will go. However, as Christians, there are some basic Scriptural principles which can guide every one of us to the lives God really wants us to live. Here are a few.

1. God knows you, He knows your circumstances and He is interested in you having the best life you possibly can. “I know your ways.” He says this many times in Scripture.

2. He is interested in you discovering that this world is not your home. The most important aspect of your destiny is in learning that every person can be a child of God and have eternal life. Despite the outward circumstances of how things in your life seem to be, the invisible God is in total control of everything that goes on.

3. God has given us everything we need to follow His will for our lives. He even puts the instructions in three points that make it easy for us to know what paths our lives should take. Proverbs 3:5-6 tell us we should:

a. Trust Him with all of our hearts. God cannot direct our lives in ways that always honor him and bring about His will for us if we do not learn how to trust Him completely. We must know him...salvation. Living daily, getting to know Him, we can learn to trust Him. When we get into trouble, beyond ourselves, knowing only He can rescue us, we learn to trust Him, eventually with all of our heart.

b. Lean not to your own understanding. That doesn’t mean become a robot. It doesn’t mean to walk blindly....God wants us to see where He is leading us. He does want us to realize that His ways are not always our ways and that His ways are ALWAYS best. We should be able to say, “I don’t know where the Lord is leading me here, but I don’t have to understand it completely to follow Him.” It means, I will trust Your leading, Lord, no matter where you take us.

c. In all your ways, acknowledge Him. This is usually pretty easy to judge. Looking at questionable pictures is usually easy to judge as not acknowledging Him. Lying to my boss so it makes me look better is not acknowledging Him. Experiencing loss in my life because I am faithful to God may seem detrimental to my future, but He is ALWAYS faithful to us when we are faithful to Him. I may need to guard my words more to honestly acknowledge His lordship in my life, but I must. Living a life committed to honesty, fidelity and integrity, always acknowledging Him will always lead to a God-directed life.

Jesus promises, that if we trust in Him with all of our heart, if we “lean” on His direction instead of trying to make life fit into our understanding, and if we acknowledge Him in every aspect of our lives, He Will Direct our Paths. Guaranteed.

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