“So you, by the help of your God, return, hold fast to love and justice, and wait continually for your God.” … Hosea 12:6 (ESV)
What is God’s will for you? God’s will expresses itself in many particulars; they differ in every case. But fundamentally God’s will is that you might be like Jesus Christ and serve him. That is what this verse says. Furthermore, lest we think that this will is something hard, difficult, abstract, or irrational, Paul gives three adjectives to tell us what the will of God is. It is “good,” he says. God is the master of the understatement. So if God says his will is good, it is good with a capital G. Furthermore, it is “pleasing,” that is, pleasing even to us. Do not say that God’s will is hard. You do not understand what God is doing if you think in those terms. God’s will is the most acceptable thing there is. Finally, it is “perfect.” When Paul says perfect, what he is really saying is that it cannot be improved upon. Our ways are not God’s ways. There are always going to be circumstances in which we do not understand what God is doing. But God says, “Know this, believe it, accept it as a fact: My will is good, my will is pleasing, my will is perfect. You find that will in my service.”
Additionally, our faithful service makes sense because God is worthy of our efforts. We read in the fourth chapter of Revelation: “You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they were created and have their being” (v. 11). Or in the fifth chapter of Revelation: “Worthy is the Lamb, who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and praise!” (v. 12). Again in the next verse: “To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be praise and honor and glory and power, for ever and ever!” We read those words; we sing those words; we even talk about those words. But do we believe them? Do we believe that God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit are really worthy of all praise, honor, and service? If we do, then it makes sense to serve God.
When we come to church or service God in some avenue of life, then we are saying, “God you are worthy of honor.” But if we go out into this world and do not live any differently, then our actions deny our profession. On the other hand, if our life has changed—if it has changed in such a way that we have given ourselves to God first and we have given our body and all aspects of our activity to him to use as he desires, and then have given sacrificially—we are testifying that our God is worthy to be praised by everyone.[1]
[1] Boice, J. M. (2002). The Minor Prophets: an expositional commentary (pp. 99–100). Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books.
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