God Leading Us Quotes & Sayings

Life is not a straight line leading from one blessing to the next and then finally to heaven. Life is a winding and troubled road. Switchback after switchback. And the point of biblical stories like Joseph and Job and Esther and Ruth is to help us feel in our bones (not just know in our heads) that God is for us in all these strange turns. God is not just showing up after the trouble and cleaning it up. He is plotting the course and managing the troubles with far-reaching purposes for our good and for the glory of Jesus Christ. — John Piper

In a recent dream, God revealed to me a door leading us into four new hopes that will prepare us to be like those who were healed and strengthened in hope and able to stand when the lightning bolt hit. We deal with these fissures of hopelessness by stepping into these new hopes. The four new hopes that I saw the Lord giving us in this time are: Hope for the Unseen, Hope Against Hope, Carefree Hope, and Childlike Hope. — Bob Hartley

Our own intuition of what we're called to is reality speaking to us individually and perfectly. We have to listen to how the Infinite talks to us and leads us. Reality, Life the Infinite, God, has a way of leading us in just the perfect way, if we will only just listen to it. — Adyashanti

It is easy to use the phrase 'God's will for my life' as an excuse for inaction or even disobedience ... My hope is that instead of searching for 'God's will for my life' each of us would learn to seek hard after 'the Spirit's leading in my life today.' May we learn to pray for an open and willing heart, to surrender to the Spirit's leading with that friend, child, spouse, circumstance, or decision in our lives right now. — Francis Chan

I believe in signs ... what we need to learn is always there before us, we just have to look around us with respect & attention to discover where God is leading us and which step we should take. When we are on the right path, we follow the signs, and if we occasionally stumble, the Divine comes to our aid, preventing us from making mistakes. — Paulo Coelho

As women, we were immensely powerful, Sister Aziza explained. The way Allah had created us, our hair, our nails, our heels, our neck, and ankles - every little curve in our body was arousing. If a woman aroused a man who was not her husband, she was sinning doubly in God's eyes, by leading the man into temptation and evil thoughts to match her own. Only the robe worn by the wives of the Prophet could prevent us from arousing men and leading society into fitna, uncontrollable confusion and social chaos. She — Ayaan Hirsi Ali

For some reason foreign to our modern ears, God tells us that celebration is central to pleasing Him; it is central to leading a good life. Modern American life has no time for serious celebrations as did life in centuries past. We've got work to do; projects and deadlines press us. And yet for all our industrial-strength pragmatism, few if any truly important things get accomplished. We have forgotten that celebration isn't just an option; it's a call to full Christian living.
Celebration is worshiping God with our bodies, with the material creation He has set up around us. Celebrating-whether in feasts, ceremonies, holidays, formal worship, or lovemaking-are all part of obeying God's command to "love the Lord thy God with all thine heart,
with all thy soul, and with all thy strength" (Deut. 6:5; Mk. 12:30). We are to show our love for God not just with one portion of our being (the spiritual aspect); we are to love God with our whole body, heart and strength and legs and lips. — Douglas Wilson

Worship matters. It matters to God because he is the one ultimately worthy of all worship. It matters to us because worshiping God is the reason for which we were created. And it matters to every worship leader, because we have no greater privilege than leading others to encounter the greatness of God. That's why it's so important to think carefully about what we do and why we do it. — Bob Kauflin

Satan represents God's law of love as a law of selfishness. He declares that it is impossible for us to obey its precepts. The fall of our first parents, with all the woe that has resulted, he charges upon the Creator, leading men to look upon God as the author of sin, and suffering, and death. Jesus was to unveil this deception. As one of us He was to give an example of obedience. For this He took upon Himself our nature, and passed through our experiences. "In all things it behooved Him to be made like unto His brethren." Hebrews 2:17. If we had to bear anything which Jesus did not endure, then upon this point Satan would represent the power of God as insufficient for us. Therefore Jesus was "in all points tempted like as we are." Hebrews 4:15. — Ellen G. White

The white-haired wonder leading what had to, by now, be a blocks-long parade must've finally turned on her hearing aid. Because she finally pulled into the United Methodist Church parking lot, praise God, leaving the rest of us free to party until some other octogenarian found it necessary to take to the streets after dark. In Ohio, old folks know better than to drive at night. Yet another reason Cleveland rocks. — Jennifer Rardin

As God's representative on the earth, He has given us the authority to speak for Him. When we speak under the leading of the Holy Spirit, we speak as His voice on the earth. During strategic times, the Lord will prompt us to pray prayers that will bring breakthrough. — Barbara Wentroble

We are forced to fight a duel. We are forced by honour and an internal intellectual need. Do not, for your own sake, attempt to stop us. I know all the excellent and ethical things that you will want to say to us. I know all about the essential requirements of civil order: I have written leading articles about them all my life. I know all about the sacredness of human life; I have bored all my friends with it. Try and understand our position. This man and I are alone in the modern world in that we think that God is essentially important. I think He does not exist; that is where the importance comes in for me. But this man thinks that He does exist, and thinking that very properly thinks Him more important than anything else. Now we wish to make a great demonstration and assertion - something that will set the world on fire like the first Christian persecutions. If — G.K. Chesterton

God offers us counsel not just for our own safety, but for the safety of His other children, whom we should love. There are few comforts so sweet as to know that we have been an instrument in the hands of God in leading someone else to safety. That blessing generally requires the faith to follow counsel when it is hard to do. — Henry B. Eyring

Divine impassibility is not some arbitrary invention, due to the quirkiness of theologians, but it points instead to the intensely mysterious character of God. Understanding even a little of such grandeur taxes our minds, and stretches our thinking, leading us to use language that Scripture itself uses- negative language, to say what God is not, and metaphorical language to portray the ways that God deals with us in creation and redemption, and stretched language to attempt to do justice to God's supreme eminence".

Confessing the Impassible God, pg. 23-24 — Richard Barcellos

Divine aids and supports are furnished us under our afflictions (Rom 8:26,27) ... 'Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities' (Rom 8:26). Not only does hope (a sure expectation of God's making good His promises) support and cheer the suffering saint, leading him to patiently wait for deliverance from his afflictions, but the blessed Comforter has also been given to him in order to supply help to this very end. By His gracious aid, the believer is preserved from being totally submerged by his doubts and fears. By His renewing operations, the spark of faith is maintained, despite all the fierce winds of Satan which assail. By His mighty enabling, the sorely harassed and groaning Christian is kept from sinking into complete skepticism, abject despair, and infidelity. By His quickening power, hope is still kept alive, and the voice of prayer is still faintly heard. — Arthur W. Pink

Hearing God is not all that difficult. If we know the Lord, we have already heard His voice - after all it was the inner leading that brought us to Him in the first place. But we can hear His voice and still miss His best if we don't keep on listening. After the what of guidance comes the when and how. (11) — Loren Cunningham

These were all simple acts of obedience I missed. But not missed because I was unaware. They were missed because I was busy - caught in the rush of endless demands. And the rush makes us rebellious. I knew what to do and blatantly ignored it.
Ignoring God's leading doesn't seem like such a big deal in these cases. In the grand scheme of the world, how big a thing is it that I didn't pick up that cup? After all, how can I be sure it was really God?
I think a better question would be, How can I be sure it wasn't God? — Lysa TerKeurst

It is Deism which depicts God as the passive onlooker rather than the active governor of His world, and which assures us that the guarantee of human freedom lies in the fact that men's actions are not under God's control. But the Bible teaches rather that the freedom of God, who works in and through His creatures, leading them to act according to their nature, is itself the foundation and guarantee of the freedom of their action. — J.I. Packer

God is light and God is love, and when you put those two together you get fire. Fire is both light and warmth. As someone has well pointed out, fire will destroy what it cannot purify, but it purifies what it cannot destroy. That is the whole explanation of life in this present hour. We are passing through fire which is designed either to destroy that which can be destroyed, or to purify that which can never be destroyed. God is leading us through these trials and through the difficulties of our day, in order that we may learn to cry with old Job, back there in the oldest book of the Bible, He knoweth the way that I take: when he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold (Job 23:10). — Ray C. Stedman

It's an exciting life. I don't know where God is leading us. I just know that He opens doors and He closes the doors, and it is always the best for us. — Barbara Mandrell

Spiritual mentors or peers who are mature in their relationship with God and whose present walk with God we trust can seek God with us and provide us with a sort of "safety net." If we feel the Spirit is leading us to do something but recognize that much is at stake if we are wrong, we may do well to talk the matter over with other mature Christians. Proverbs advised rulers that wisdom rests in a multitude of counselors, and that advice remains valid for us as well. In the end, we may not always settle on the counsel others give us - like us, they too are fallible - but if they are diligent students of the Scriptures and persons of prayer, we should humbly consider their counsel. — Craig Keener

A man without god is a lost man. Every man believe in something. We CANT live by ourselves thinking only in money and possesions. We HAVE to live WITH others and love each other, and NEVER hate, because when you hate someone, you destroy your soul a little bit every day, and when the last day of our live come, we dont have the energy or the strenght to forgive, and repent of our sins, and thats whats kill us FOREVER, leading us to a eternal prision inside us, called "Hell". Hope you understand my perspective of life, that I assume is right. — Cesar

Repentance is not just the beginner course; repentance is lifetime learning. The goal of Christian living is not to get past the point of needing to repent, but to realize that God has made us capable through Christ of doing repentance well - repentance that the Bible calls "godly" in nature - what the apostle Paul described as "repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth" (2 Tim. 2:25) - repentance that leads to real change. At the root level. Where it can grow us up into character and consistency and confidence in Jesus' power and strength, fully at work in our pitiful weakness. That's not shame and loss. Bad Christian. That's mercy and grace. From a good, redeeming God. — Matt Chandler

We have all cherished our life purposes. We have forecast our futures as likely to lie in a certain direction and have dearly desired that it should be so. When hindrances have been put in our way and when we have met with strong opposition and rebuff, we have still clung to our hope. Only very slowly have we yielded and accepted the inevitable. To renounce it has been like tearing out our heart. Not till long years have passed have we realized that the Lord's plan was much wiser and grander that our own. Then suddenly we have awakened to discover that while we were desiring to do one thing, God was leading us to do another and that what we have counted secondary was primary, for His glory, and for the lasting satisfaction of our own heart. — F.B. Meyer

True humility is a Christian grace and one of the fruits of the Spirit, originating in a deep consciousness of sin past and present, and leading us to discover our nothingness in the view of God, our insufficiency for any thing that is good, and prompting us, as we feel our infirmities, to strive after higher and yet higher attainments. — James McCosh

Maybe God doesn't care if we get all dressed up and sit in the pew every Sunday, as Diana believes. Instead, maybe God comes to us through men like Sloth, watching over us as we make our own decisions. Maybe God has always been with me. Opening doors, leading me to opportunities, letting me choose my own path, and loving me even when I chose the wrong one. Never giving up on me. Knowing all along that I am on a journey. That I must find my own way to Him. Maybe River was rights. Maybe God does still believe in me. — Julie Cantrell

Our Bible reveals to us the character of our god with minute and remorseless exactness ... It is perhaps the most damnatory biography that exists in print anywhere. It makes Nero an angel of light and leading by contrast. — Mark Twain

There are two kinds of prosperity gospels. One promises personal health, wealth, and happiness. Another promises social transformation. In both versions, the results are up to us. We bring God's kingdom to earth, either to ourselves or to society, by following certain spiritual laws or moral and political agendas. Both forget that salvation comes from above, as a gift of God. Both forget that because we are baptized into Christ, the pattern of our lives is suffering leading to glory in that cataclysmic revolution that Christ will bring when he returns. Both miss the point that our lives and the world as they are now are not as good as it gets. We do not have our best life or world now. — Michael S. Horton

If there were twelve roads leading to the one goal, would it matter which you took? Since God has distinctly said that He wishes us to take one particular road - the Catholic road - it does matter. Any doctrine which begins with the fundamental notion that one religion is as good as another soon ends in the conclusion that one religion is as useless as another. And the children of those who insist upon proclaiming that principle end up, as a rule, with no religion at all. — Charles Mortimer Carty

We have an idea that God is leading us to a particular end, a desired goal; He is not ... What we call the process God calls the end. His purpose is that I depend on Him and His power NOW. It is the process, not the end that is glorifying to God. — Oswald Chambers

No text can be understood out of its entire context. The most "entire" context is Jesus. Every biblical text must be read in the living presence of Jesus. Every word of the scriptural text is a window or door leading us out of the tarpaper shacks of self into this great outdoors of God's revelation. — Eugene H. Peterson

God does not permit persecution to arise without sufficient reason...He was leading us by a way that we knew not; but it was none the less His way. — Hudson Taylor

Grace equals ability. God gives us grace to match our call. When we do our own thing, we do it on our own. When we follow His leading, He always supplies the grace and the energy to do what He's calling us to do. — Joyce Meyer

Sad, indeed, would the whole matter be if the Bible had told us everything God meant us to believe. But herein is the Bible greatly wronged. It nowhere lays claim to be regarded as the Word, the Way, the Truth. The Bible leads us to Jesus, the inexhaustible, the ever-unfolding Revelation of God. It is Christ "in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge," not the Bible, save as leading to Him. — George MacDonald

God does not change, but He uses change - to change us. He sends us on journeys that bring us to the end of ourselves. We often feel out of control, yet if we embrace His leading, we may find ourselves on the ride of our lives. — Jen Hatmaker

But after about a year praying, there was just this clear direction. The leadership team believed that God was leading us to focus on fatherhood. If God is leading, then God will provide. So we begin to get storyline ideas that lined up with the subject of fatherhood that we're working on and fitting, and we were thinking, okay this is good. At the same time, as we are studying scriptures and we're on our journey as fathers, we are learning about fatherhood every day. — Stephen Kendrick

Our slower pace of life, our thoughtfulness, our spiritual and intellectual depth, and our listening abilities are prophetic qualities for the evangelical community, calling us to a renewed understanding of God and a fresh reading on the abundant life Jesus came to give us. Yet because of the extroverted bias in many of our churches, introverts are leading double lives. We are masquerading as extroverts in order to find acceptance, yet we feel displaced and confused. We are weary of fighting our introversion, and we long to live faithfully as the people we were created to be. — Adam S. McHugh

The band and I were leading at a Youth Specialties convention. We were asked to back up Matt Maher for one of the sessions. Matt handed us the chord charts and, with less than 5 minutes of practice, we were playing it live. I fell in love with this song immediately. You can't hear the message of God's sufficient grace too many times. Matt is a great lead worshiper and is a part of Life Teen, a growing worship movement in the Catholic Church. — Chris Tomlin

What we need to learn is always there before us, we just have to look around us with respect and attention in order to discover where God is leading us and which step we should take next. — Paulo Coelho

Move from an earthly mindset that makes us bristle at the thought of submission to a joyful expectation of good, we must focus on the One who is leading. We must look at the full spectrum of His love, grace, and wisdom. — Amy Layne Litzelman

When bridges seem to give way, we fall into Christ's safe arms, true bridge, and not into hopelessness. It is safe to trust! We can be too weak to go on because His strength is made perfect in utter brokenness and nail-pierced hands help up. It is safe to trust! We can give thanks in everything because there's a good God leading, working all things into good. It is safe to trust! The million bridges behind us may seem flattened to the earthly eye, but all bridges ultimately hold, fastened by nails. It is safe to trust. — Ann Voskamp

We must mark God's providence leading us; and if providence tarries, tarry till providence comes — Charles Spurgeon

If ... God highly exalted Christ because He humbled Himself, suffered dishonour, was tempted and endured a shameful cross and death for our sake, how will He save, glorify and raise us up if we neither choose humility, nor show love to our fellows, nor gain our souls by enduring temptation (cf. Lk. 21:19), nor follow the saving Guide through the 'strait gate' and along the 'narrow way' leading to eternal life (Mt. 7:14)? To this end we were called, says Peter, the chief Apostle, ' Because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example that we should follow His steps' (I Pet. 2:21). — Gregory Palamas

What is the right time [to discuss theology]? Whenever we are free from the mire and noise without, and our commanding faculty is not confused by illusory, wandering images, leading us, as it were, to mix fine script with ugly scrawling, or sweet-smelling scent with slime. We need actually 'to be still' (Ps. 46:10) in order to know God, and when we receive the opportunity, 'to judge uprightly' (Ps. 75:2) in theology. — Gregory Of Nazianzus

The status of our relationship with God has moved from conflict to reconciliation, ensuring peace and communion with God. Our very being is transferred from the impending death of this world to the promised life of God's new creational order, leading us to an increased appetite for that which pleases God and a growing distaste for that which does not please him. Finally, our perspective is altered so that we no longer focus on outward appearances but on a radical interior radiance (vv. 12, 16). — Anonymous

For Jesus, the correct interpretation of Scripture all comes down to how we love. The Bible was never intended to be our master, placing a burden on our back; it was intended to act as a servant, leading us to love God, others, and ourselves. — Derek Flood

There are only two possible explanations as to how life arose: Spontaneous generation arising to evolution or a supernatural creative act of God ... There is no other possibility. Spontaneous generation was scientifically disproved 120 years ago by Louis Pasteur and others, but that just leaves us with only one other possibility ... that life came as a supernatural act of creation by God, but I can't accept that philosophy because I do not want to believe in God. Therefore I choose to believe in that which I know is scientifically impossible, spontaneous generation leading to evolution. — George Wald

Why would god allow the Holocaust to happen? If god made everything, why did he invent sin to trick us and then hold our sins against us? Why are there so many religions in the world if god created the world and wants us to be Christian? Why does god allow people to fight wars over him? What if you were born in a different culture and never even heard of Jesus Christ - would god send you to hell for not being Christian? And if so, do you believe that's fair? Why are men always the leaders in your church? Aren't women capable of leading too? Isn't such a patriarchal system sexist in this day and age? Why do so many babies die? Why are there so many poor people in the world? Did Jesus visit any other planets in distant unknown universes? — Matthew Quick

Yahweh - a jealous god, who would hold men to himself and who turned mankind away from the Tree of Immortality, instead of leading us to it. Such a god in the Orient would be regarded as a deluding idol. — Joseph Campbell

Again, as stated above, if we recognize that our particular interpretation and application of Scripture is leading to observable harm, this necessarily means that we need to stop and reassess our course. Scripture, as Jesus read it, needs to lead us to love God, others, and ourselves. If we find that it is leading instead to causing harm then we are getting it wrong. — Derek Flood

Our earthly loves are but so many silver steps leading us up to the great golden love of God. — Henry Ward Beecher

I think a lot of us need to forget about God's will for my life. God cares more about our response to His Spirit's leading today, in this moment, than about what we intend to do next year. In fact, the decisions we make next year will be profoundly affected by the degree to which we submit to the Spirit right now, in today's decisions. It is easy to use the phrase "God's will for my life" as an excuse for inaction or even disobedience. It's much less demanding to think about God's will for your future than it is to ask Him what He wants you to do in the next ten minutes. It's safer to commit to following Him someday instead of this day. — Francis Chan

God is the Great Engineer, creating circumstances to bring about moments in our lives of divine importance, leading us to divine appointments — Oswald Chambers

We usually think of law leading us to gospel. And this is true- we see God's standards, see our sin, and then see our need for a Savior. But it's just as true that gospel leads to law ... the good news of the gospel leads to gracious instructions for obeying God. — Kevin DeYoung

Wonderful is the depth of thy words, whose surface is before us, gently leading on the little ones: and yet a wonderful deepness, O my God, a wonderful deepness. It is awe to look into it; even an awfulness of honour, and a trembling of love ... — Saint Augustine

{God's] presence is not contingent upon our feeling it. It simply is. We must learn to remember this and calm ourselves. By His apparent 'absence', He is leading us to a more mature level of consciousness, self-offering, and love. He is leading us from the love of God for the sake of His gifts to love of God for His own sake. — Monks Of New Skete

It is crucial that Jesus is led by the Spirit. There are two wildernesses, two darknesses in the spiritual journey. One you go into by your own stupidity, by your sin, blindness, ignorance and mistakes. We all do that. But there's another darkness. The holy darkness is the darkness that God leads us into, through and beyond. This is a necessary darkness for the journey. In a certain sense, God's darkness is a much better teacher than light. There comes a time when you have to either go deeper into faith or you will turn back, when you have to live without knowing or you lose faith altogether. So we have the Spirit leading Jesus into the wilderness, to face the essential darkness. — Richard Rohr

God makes us ask ourselves questions most often when He intends to resolve them. He gives us needs that He alone can satisfy, and awakens capacities that He means to fulfill. Any perplexity is liable to be a spiritual gestation, leading to a new birth and a mystical regeneration. — Thomas Merton

Jesus does not make claims as a dictator removed from the battlefield but rather goes before us leading the charge as King of the Kingdom of God. — Jonah Books

We all want to be in the center of God's will. That's why we shouldn't pursue a career, move to another place, or make any major life change without knowing that it is the will of God. The way we find out is to regularly ask God to show us what His will is and then ask Him to lead us in it. When you ask Him to speak to your heart, He will do that. He will give you peace about a certain thing and lack of peace about others. What joy to have peace that as we confidently set foot in a certain direction, God is leading us on that particular path. We can be confident that whatever happens along the way, we don't have to worry because we are right where God wants us to be. — Stormie O'martian

But if we abide in Him and He abides in us, we will bear much fruit in oneness with other believers. He will give us the glory to come into unity. And when we receive love from God, we will be able to love others as He loves us. This twofold unity - with the triune God and with each other - is the key to evangelism. Indeed, our intimacy with God has everything to do with His great harvest. Jesus said, "May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me" (John 17:23, emphasis mine). It is through our oneness with God and His people that His glory is revealed through us, leading the world to believe in Him. — Che Ahn

takes. We get off track when we make our walks with Christ about how we are walking versus how God is leading. We need to pay attention to His Spirit to be led by Him on a daily basis. If we are distracted by the things of this life or our weariness and afflictions, we can get off course. When we suffer trials, we can become distracted by the circumstances and wallow in fear or sorrow. But if we refocus on the Lord, He comforts us and gives us a reason for rejoicing again during our trial. — Adam Houge