‘God, what do You want today?’

“Those who have turned back from following the Lord, and have not sought the Lord, nor inquired of Him.”

– Zephaniah 1:6

In the book of Zephaniah, a judgment is proclaimed on those who fall into idolatry, those who turn back from following God, and those who have not sought the Lord, nor inquired of Him.

It’s ultimately followed by a call to repentance – seek the Lord, seek righteousness, seek humility – and it may be that you will be hidden when that judgment comes – which in itself is a tremendous picture of the guaranteed promise of deliverance from sin for the follower of Jesus Christ, forgiven of their sins by the power of His blood.

But an uncomfortable truth arises through those verses in Zephaniah: If you are not seeking the Lord in your life, nor inquiring of Him, you are not actually following Him.

It’s a big deal when God’s will takes a back seat in our hearts.

How can one truly follow God if they never take the time to ask Him, “where are we going?” “Lord, what do you want to do in this?” “What do you want to say?”

We have this tendency to start seeing the paths we’ve traveled before – we make another lap around the sun, another trip through scripture, another devotion, another study through books we’ve been through before – and the territory looks familiar, so we get comfortable.

We’ve seen the functional way through, we put things into cruise control and we speed down the same paths we’ve gone before and assume all is well.

The tremendous danger there is that we don’t seek the Lord for how He desires to lead us through this time around. And in that, we start to follow a past version of His will – like old manna – instead of seeking His provision afresh.

You can be in the exact same spot you’ve been before: You can feel like you know what to do, and where to go – but the way God would have you travel – what He would have you do – can be entirely different.

After the people of Israel experienced a miraculous victory over Jericho – following God’s detailed instruction to the letter – there is then an account in Joshua 7 where the people advance against the city of Ai.

The problem that befell Joshua there – and the thing that so often plagues our own walk with Jesus – is that we take for granted what is unquestionably true: The favor of God; and we begin to overlay that truth over things God has not actually led us into, or provided any direction as far as making a way through.

We presume. And in that, there is great danger.

Joshua assesses Ai, makes a determination based on outward appearances, and sends only a limited number of troops against the city. And his forces wind up fleeing from Ai – utterly defeated.

In all the lead up to that battle, Joshua didn’t seek the Lord for direction. Once he finally did, it’s revealed that there had been grievous sin within the camp of Israel, hence the base reason for their defeat.

We inevitably set ourselves up for shipwreck when we won’t seek God. To call Jesus Lord is to say He leads your life.

If you aren’t inquiring of Him, you are not actually following Him. You’re just following yourself.

It’s a sobering thought: Is God guiding your day-to-day life? Is He guiding your every moment? Is that who He is and is that who you are?

Or are you following His direction from a month ago? A year ago? A decade ago? Have you ever followed Him?

Make a practice of asking Him, “God, what do You want today?”

Give Him the opportunity on a regular basis to lead perhaps differently than He did before. But above all, give Him the opportunity to lead you.

God will always lead you perfectly. And He will always lead you into His presence by the sacrificial blood of Jesus Christ, which is exactly where we need to be.

 Joey Crandall is the pastor of Calvary Chapel Carson Valley.