God Has Purpose for You: Allowing the Spirit to Lead You to Divine Destiny

God Has

Purpose

for You

Allowing the Spirit to Lead You to Divine Destiny

Kerwin D. Tucker

iUniverse, Inc.

Bloomington

God Has Purpose for You

Allowing the Spirit to Lead You to Divine Destiny

Copyright © 2011 Kerwin D. Tucker

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ISBN: 978-1-4502-8920-7 (pbk)

ISBN: 978-1-4502-8919-1 (cloth)

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iUniverse rev. date: 1/27/11

Dedication

I dedicate this book to the life and legacy of Bria Poo Gregory. Words can’t even express how much I miss you and love you. Through your death you spoke to more people than you ever could have in your life. It’s clear now that God truly had a purpose for you. May you find eternal rest in the arms of the Father.

December 31, 1991—November 28, 2010

Contents

Introduction

1 The Prerequisites for living a Spirit Led Life

2 Maintain Your Position

3 What does it mean to be Spirit Led?

4 How Does the Spirit Lead?

5 Before I step out…is it you, Lord, who called?

6 Which Voice will you follow?

7 Ready For Purpose

8 The Common Purposes

9 Define Your Vision

10 The Pathway to your Destiny

11 Change your mind, and be Set Free

12 Access Granted

13 It’s Your Season

Acknowledgements

God Has Purpose for YOU

Allowing the Spirit to Lead You to Divine Destiny

Introduction

What is my purpose? Why am I here on this earth? When God created me, what did He have in mind? These and more questions are on the minds of everyone as they attempt to pinpoint their purpose in life. Often times this question goes unanswered even unto one’s demise. The fear of never obtaining anything substantial in life, the despondency of ultimately feeling like a failure, and the inevitability of not being able to do anything about it, lingers on the minds of countless people each day, and worst yet, it’s becoming a worsening epidemic in the church. Romans 8:14 states, …those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.

One of the greatest advantages of being a child of God is having the benefit of being led by God. What a privilege? What an honor? To know that in the midst of so much chaos and so much improbability, God is there to lead his children just like a father would lead his child. How much better life would be if we made decisions based on the leading and guidance of the Spirit of God, rather than by the frequent changes in our desires and emotions?

At one point in my life, and I’m sure everyone who is reading this book, emotions and feelings were the fuel that drove you. When we are led by feelings and emotions, mistakes become inevitable. This was the story of my life. At one point I was void of drive, void of direction, and ultimately void of purpose. I was living life based on what felt right to me, rather than what God wanted me to do and constantly found myself trying to pull myself out of situations that I had put myself in. I had grown up in the church all of my life; however I had never developed a true relationship with God.

In fact, I spent most of my teenage years up to early adulthood acting in direct opposition to the teaching that had been instilled in me. I drank alcohol, I smoked marijuana, I was routinely put out of school for behavior problems, and I was rebellious against any level of authority, including my parents. I was headed down a road which would surely lead to destruction if I didn’t turn my life around. I knew, however, that I couldn’t turn my life around by my own will or strength. The only person who could turn my life around was Jesus Christ.

One day I did accept Jesus Christ into my life and he changed my entire life around. Although I had given my life to God, I had yet to truly walk in complete obedience to his will. I was content with being the keyboard player for the choir but God had so much more for me to do. From my youth I sensed that God was calling me into the ministry, but what did I know I was just a kid? I thought that this was the product of me being a preacher’s kid, and I was convinced that as I got older this feeling would go away. Boy was I wrong.

As I begin to truly gain an understanding of Christ by reading his word and praying, the more the call to preach the gospel weighed on me. Afraid to accept the call I continued to work in the church, operating in my position as the keyboard player for the choir, however I had yet to truly be obedient to God and fulfill my true purpose which was to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Are you operating in a position right now that is contrary to what God had shown you that you were going to operate in all because you fear stepping out? Are you content with just staying in that position and never truly seeking and embracing God’s purpose for your life? Worst yet, are you looking to something or someone else to define your purpose because you don’t feel as though you are capable of fulfilling the purpose that God has for you, you really don’t know for sure what that purpose is, or you really don’t want to fulfill that purpose because it requires you to do more than what you are comfortable with doing?

Whether we like to admit it or not, we have all found ourselves in one of the above situations before. So much so, that many of us have become satisfied in life with just existing, and never looking to make a difference in our families, our community, and our world. It’s my belief that a lack of defined purpose is the catalyst for the lackadaisical society that we now find ourselves living in. A society that no longer wants to wait on God to define their purpose, rather they attempt to identify their purpose by other means. Psychic hotlines, the lottery monopoly, and even false prophets are all lynching on the hopes and dreams of countless people. This uncertainty has left the doors of manipulation wide open for the world and for the church alike.

In a world of uncertainty, there is only one thing that is assured; God is still in control. No matter what your current position is in life, God has the power to take you from where you are, to where He has purposed you to be. How do I know? I know because he did it for me. For the last five years I have served as the youth pastor at Gospel Tabernacle Outreach Center located in Gretna VA. Along with that, I have had the opportunity to proclaim the gospel at many different churches and unto many people in the streets who had never even been to church. God truly did have a purpose for my life, but it was up to me to develop a deeper relationship with God in order to discover what purposes God had for my life, and then to begin working towards them.

I truly believe that God has so graciously chosen me to write this Biblical guide to assist people in discovering their God given purposes in life. I would like to forewarn you that God’s purposes for your life are not always what you had envisioned or planned. One thing is for sure however, God has a plan for each and every one of us. Paul states in Ephesians 2:10 (NIV), For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. Think about that. Each one of us was designed by God to fulfill specific tasks and to accomplish specific purposes in life. Come along with me as we journey through the word of God, in order to discover exactly what those purposes are.

Chapter 1

The Prerequisites for living a Spirit Led Life

Accept Christ into Your Life

It’s important to note that it’s not until you accept Christ into your life that you prepare the way for the Spirit to begin to lead. 1 Corinthians 2:14 states, The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned (NIV). The natural man is the man devoid of the Holy Spirit. Because he does not have the Holy Spirit he relies totally and completely on the wisdom of the world for guidance, seeing as though he doesn’t have access to divine revelation which is only provided through the Spirit. Therefore this man will not be able to receive the secret things of the Spirit of God, neither can he know all of the wonderful truths that God wants to reveal to him because they are spiritually discerned from him.

This person will never be able to truly discover their God given purpose in life. Not only does the person void of the Spirit lack the capacity to know the things that God has freely given them, but this person will also forever walk in bondage. This is because it’s not until a person allows the Spirit to lead them that they begin to walk in the freedom that Christ promises. Galatians 5:1 states "Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage (KJV)." You might be trying to figure out what bondage Paul is referring to. Paul was referring to the bondage that the Christians at Galatia were experiencing still trying to live under the Law. They had already been freed from the burden of trying to live without breaking any of the Law of Moses when they accepted Christ into their life. However, because they were so deeply routed in their Judaism traditions, they found themselves constantly feeling pressured to adhere to the Law, rather than walking in the freedom of the Spirit.

The Law of Moses

The Law of Moses was instituted to provide a divine standard to which the sinner could evaluate themselves and their actions compared to what was morally right. The ultimate goal of the Law was to help people recognize that they were sinners and were in need of a savior. While the Law served as a type and shadow for what was to come, in and of itself it fell short in a lot of areas. For instance, observing the Law couldn’t provide justification for groups or individuals. The Law wasn’t able to give life. By observing the Law one could not receive the Holy Spirit. The Law also couldn’t solve the problem of the sin nature. While there were levels of punishment for breaking the Law, the Law didn’t provide victory over sin. Without victory over sin one would remain in bondage to the custom of trying to observe the Law, which would ultimately end in failure. Paul understood that Christians who continued to live by the Law would never be able to walk in the freedom that Christ had given them through His Spirit.

Paul states in Galatians 5:18, But if ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law (KJV). Are you tired of trying to live right by your own strength only to fail over and over again? If you are then the only way to overcome this is to accept Christ into your life and to receive the Spirit of God who gives you the power needed to sustain in such a sinful world. Therefore, the prerequisite for living a Spirit led life is to have a Spirit filled life. The only way to have a Spirit filled life is to first experience salvation.

What is Salvation?

While this book is mostly geared towards pre-existing Christians, I don’t want to go any further until I take out time to offer salvation to those who have yet to accept Christ as their savior. The reason being is apart from Christ you will never be able to fully understand your purpose in life. Not only will you not be able to understand God’s purposes for your life, but apart from Christ you’re separated from God and risk eternal damnation in hell. Hell is a scary topic to talk about, but it’s a very important reality that everyone needs to be made aware of.

For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but sent them to hell, putting them in chains of darkness to be held for judgment; if he did not spare the ancient world when he brought the flood on its ungodly people, but protected Noah, a preacher of righteousness, and seven others; if he condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah by burning them to ashes, and made them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly; and if he rescued Lot, a righteous man, who was distressed by the depraved conduct of the lawless (for that righteous man, living among them day after day, was tormented in his righteous soul by the lawless deeds he saw and heard)—if this is so, then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to hold the unrighteous for punishment on the day of judgment (2 Peter 2:4-9 NIV).

God doesn’t want anyone to be eternally separated from him because of sin. To prove this, he sent his only begotten son to die on the cross in order to save all those who would accept him as savior. Therefore, salvation is an act whereby God delivers one from eternal punishment (Hell) by erasing his sins from the legal record and imputing the perfection of Jesus Christ[1]. Contrary to popular belief, salvation isn’t something that’s unattainable. It’s not something that is only reserved for those who have never made a mistake or for those who don’t have issues. The Bible says that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. However, if you would confess your sins then Christ is faithful and just to forgive you of all sins, and cleanse you of all unrighteousness. Why? Because God loves you! John 3:16 declares, For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life (KJV).

No matter what you have done, what you are doing, or what you were thinking about doing, God still loves you and He died for you. Many of you feel as though it’s no way Christ could possibly love you because you feel as though you have made too many mistakes. You say things like, It’s no way God can use me, and I didn’t grow up in the church. It’s no way Christ could have died for me I’m not a good person. We place too much attention on what we have or haven’t done, however if salvation were based on human merit then none of us would be saved. The scriptures let us know that when Christ died, He died for everyone who would accept Him as their savior as we are all sinners in need of a savior. That means whether you are a drug addict, drug dealer, alcoholic, prostitute, liar, murderer, or even an adulterer Christ died for you and has a purpose for your life. You may say well I didn’t fall into any of those categories. Maybe you say I’m a good person without Christ. Maybe you volunteer your services at your local soup kitchen or nursing home. Maybe you give to the poor and help support local widows in the community financially. Maybe you always buy toys for the kids on the angel tree at Christmas time and you always, always give money to the Salvation Army to help them in their endeavors. As gracious as all this may be and as good as it may make you feel about yourself, if you have yet to make Christ Lord of your life then you are still classified as a sinner since we were all born into sin due to the transgression of our ancestors Adam and Eve.

Repent and Believe

My friend it would be virtually impossible to make an exhaustive list of all the possible sins. The point is, if you are living in this world, you are a sinner in need of a savior. The good part about this is that Christ died for you in order to cover your sins. Christ said come to me all you who are burden and heavy laden and I will give you rest. If you are tired of doing things your own way, and have a sincere mind and heart to give your heart to Christ, then He is waiting there to welcome you into His family and to identify you as a child of God. The apostle Paul declares, If you declare with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved (Romans 10:9-10 NIV).

Essentially the only thing you have to do is believe that Christ died for you and accept him into your life. Christ has already did all of the hard work when He died on Calvary. He paid the debt for the sin of the world by offering his life as a ransom. The blood that he shed on Calvary over 2000 years ago was sufficient enough to cover all of our sins for all time. Wow who wouldn’t serve a God like that? Just repent of your sins, turn away from your old lifestyle and turn towards the Lord. Salvation isn’t based on human merit, it’s based on faith. Keep in mind that repentance is a way of thinking. You have to be willing to completely realign your thinking to be in accordance with the word of God. When you realign your thinking, your lifestyle will follow. The Bible says that he who is in Christ is a new creature (2 Cor. 5:17). The reason why you are a new creature is because you have been crucified with Christ and therefore you have died to the old man. Once you truly accepted Christ from the heart then he filled you with His Spirit and gave you victory over sin.

When at one time you were a slave to sin and even a slave to the Law, now the Law has been written in your hearts and transcribed in your mind by the Spirit of God. You are now walking in the liberty of the Spirit. Not a liberty that gives you a license to sin, but a liberty that frees you from the oppression of sin. You no longer have to allow sin to rule your life. Contrarily, you can now exercise control over sin in your life. As you begin to read the Bible, which is the written word of God, the Spirit will give you a new mind, a new heart, and a new purpose for living.

Slowly but surely you will begin to let go of the old habits that you thought were going to have power over you forever. When your faith is genuine then it will produce genuine change in your life and the works that you do will reflect this. This is what James meant when he stated, Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead (James 2:17). Many believe that the Apostle James’s view of salvation accompanied with works is in stark contrast with the Apostle Paul’s view of salvation solely by faith. On the contrary the two men seem to compliment each other quite well.

The apostle Paul let’s us know that faith is the vehicle that drives us into right standing with God. Notice, however, the type of faith that Paul references. Paul tells us to "follow in the footsteps of the faith that our father Abraham had before he was circumcised (Rom. 4:12 NIV)." I don’t want to venture too far off subject, however I would like to give a brief historical account of the patriarch Abraham to help us better understand the faith of Abraham.

The Faith of Abraham

The Biblical narrative of the patriarch Abraham, then called Abram, begins in the book of Genesis chapter 12. God had instructed Abram to leave his country and his family, and he promised to make Abram a great nation. Just how great? He promised Abram that he would make his descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky. He also promised to make Abram’s name great and assured Abram that through him all of the families of the earth would be blessed. Abram believed God and left his land and family just as God had commanded him to do and thus God’s covenant with Abram was established.

Years passed and Abram and his wife Sarah still didn’t have a child of their own in order to foster any descendants. Yet even in his old age, Abram continued to believe that it would happen and his faith was accredited to him for righteousness. God changed his name from Abram to Abraham, father of nations. To make a long story short God kept his promise to Abraham and today the world recognizes Abraham as the father of the Israelites, the Ishmaelites, Edomites, and the Midianites. He’s most notably known as being the patriarch of the Israelites who were acknowledged by God as being his chosen people.

However, this special honor was only bestowed upon them because of Abraham’s faith in God. To signify the covenant that God had made with Abraham, God instituted circumcision as an outward sign of the covenant that he had made with him. All male Israelites were to be circumcised on the eight day of their life to indicate that they were born into a covenant relationship with God. Circumcision was extremely significant to the Israelites, however in a more broader view God was using this outward sign as the ground work for the inward circumcision of the heart that would be given to all those who would believe in his son Jesus Christ. This circumcision of the heart would be the believer’s stamp of approval that they possessed an eternal covenant with God.

In the New Testament many of the Jews still believed that because they had been given the circumcision of the flesh from their forefather Abraham, that this gave them a special advantage over non-Jews as it related to salvation even after the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. However, Paul is able to demonstrate how Abraham was made righteous before circumcision was even instituted. This would make Abraham not only the father of the Jews who were circumcised, but also for the Gentiles who believed in Jesus Christ as their savior without having the outward sign of circumcision. Paul makes it clear that it’s not by any works that we are made righteous, but by faith in Jesus Christ. That’s why he tells us to walk in the steps of the faith in which Abraham had. The word walk signifies an action. Abraham didn’t just say he believed God, but he acted on his belief by stepping out in faith in response to the word of God.

True faith requires an action. If I truly believe then my actions will reflect my belief. This ties in well with what James said when he stated that faith without works is dead. He then goes on to say, But someone will say, ‘You have faith, and I have works.’ Show me your faith without your works, and I will show you my faith by my works (James 2:18 NIV). James was letting us know that it’s not possible to separate faith and works. You can’t say that you have faith in Christ but your actions say something completely different. Therefore, if one has truly believed from the heart, then his actions will begin to exhibit authentic Christ like qualities.

Do You Believe?

Christ would love to shine through your life. He would love to come into your heart and clean out everything that’s not like him in order to give you a new start. It’s up to you, however, to respond to his love in faith by believing in your heart that Christ died so that you may live. Maybe you are reading this book and you are a sinner. Maybe you are a sinner and didn’t even realize that you were a sinner. Maybe a friend gave you this book and you didn’t think you were going to get anything out of it, but now you realize that without Christ you can never fully identify your purpose in life. Perhaps you initially thought that there were many ways to get to Heaven. However, now you see that there is only one way to get to Heaven and that’s through faith in Jesus Christ. Maybe you thought that your good deeds were enough to get you into Heaven. You may have even thought that because your parents were saved that you had a guaranteed key into the kingdom, but now you understand that the only way to be saved is to develop a personal relationship through faith in Jesus Christ. Are you ready to accept him into your life?

Don’t Wait Any Longer

If you are ready to submit your will to God’s will and to accept Him into your life, then don’t wait any longer. Some of you are saying well I still curse. I still have a drinking problem. I still practice premarital sex. Let me get rid of those habits and then I will come to Christ. Don’t wait to get rid of these habits before you come to Christ. Without Christ in your life you will not be able to break the chains of addiction that are holding you. Come to Christ just as you are, with your issues, with your addictions, and with a willing heart to change. Let Christ help you break these destructive patterns of living. You don’t have to go at it alone. If you are ready to accept Christ into your life then before you continue reading, take a moment right now and ask Christ to come into your heart. Grab hold of him with all of your heart, with all of your soul, and with your entire mind. Yes I mean right now.

Now doesn’t that feel so much better? Congratulations, now you have become a part of the family of God. Now your true destiny can begin as you surrender your will, to the will of God. Surrendering your will to God’s will is not an easy thing to do. On the contrary, it will be a tedious gradual process which must be taken with care. Yes, I said process. Don’t expect for everything to change overnight. Although the work of salvation has already been accomplished through the death and resurrection of Jesus, there is a process of salvation which must be completed in us by our faith and obedience to God’s word.

The Process of Salvation

Justification

Before I conclude this section on salvation I want to explain a few terms that will be pivotal to your Christian walk. The first term is justification. Justification is the initial step of salvation. Ephesians 2:8 (NIV) states, For it is by grace you have been saved, though faith… When you accept Christ into your life then you accept his divine grace, or unmerited favor that he died in order for you to receive. Christ’s grace paved the way for the justification of our sins. Justification is God’s act of declaring or making a sinner righteous before God in spite of every sin they have committed. When you truly accepted Christ by believing in him from the heart then you were justified for all the sins you had committed in the past and the sins that you would commit in the future and you were given access to an inheritance in the kingdom that you didn’t deserve. In spite of everything that you were guilty of, when you accepted Christ into your life you were declared not-guilty. The Christian walk doesn’t stop there. After you accept Christ into your life then begins the process of sanctification.

Sanctification

Sanctification means that we as believers are still being saved. This is where you take out time to be intimate with God, in order to deepen your relationship with Him and become more and more like Him. In order to do this you have to spend time reading his word, fasting and praying, and even learning how to serve others in order to better identify with the character of Christ. Philippians 2:12 (NIV) states continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling… The key word there is work. If you are not willing to work then it’s no way you can experience Christ on a deeper level.

There are a lot of Christians who have been in the same spiritual state for years because they are too lazy to work on their relationship with God. The more of God you receive, the more of yourself you lose. This is what Christ meant when he said, For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it (Matthew 16:25 NIV). We call this process dyeing to self. Many feel that this happens at the initial state of salvation so it’s nothing else that they have to do after that. As a result they don’t work on bettering themselves. I believe this belief is the reason our modern day churches have taken on such an apathetic and self-righteous attitude.

Many feel that they have reached the plateau of holiness and there is nothing more that they need to do. Paul refuted this attitude when he said, Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead (Phil. 3:13 NIV). If Paul who is considered by most as being the greatest Apostle of all the apostles didn’t think that he had reached this perfect level of Christ-likeness, what room does that leave for us? Paul understood that he hadn’t reached that level yet, but one thing he would do was continue to press forward toward that mark. As long as he was continuing to press forward, dying daily to his flesh, then he would be becoming more and more like Christ everyday.

Sanctification will require us to work on ourselves everyday for the rest of our life. We should never think that we are so good that we can’t be better. Don’t begin the race and then quit running when you’re halfway to the finish line. You have to keep pressing forward for the ultimate goal which is glorification.

Glorification

Glorification is the believer’s final state of salvation. It refers to a Christian receiving a perfect resurrection body in heaven. We will finally take off this body of mortality and put on our glorified body of immortality. No more sickness. No more pain. No more temptation. The best part about it is that their will be no more sin. Romans 8:30 (NIV) states, And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified. When you accepted Christ into your life, then at that moment you