Living life inspired requires living life on purpose and with a purpose. If we are seeking purpose, life will ask us to take a hard look at the question we dealt with in last weeks DoAhead Devo.

“God, how do you want to use me?”

Hopefully, we all spent a moment or two on such reflection. And yet, personal experience has taught me, all the self-reflection in the world does little good if it doesn’t take me straight to the lap of my Father.

“The heart is deceitful above all things, and it is exceedingly perverse and corrupt and severely,mortally sick! Who can know it [perceive, understand, be acquainted with his own heart and mind]? Jer. 17:9 Amplified

Self-reflection has a place, but when left alone it is not only unwise it is dangerous.

Lysa Terkeurst wrote a wonderful book that adresses being used by God. In What Happens When Women Say Yes to God she maps out 5 key questions we can ask ourselves when we want to know if what we are hearing is from God.

Her five-question filter is as follows:

1. Does what I’m hearing line up with Scripture?

2. Is it consistent with God’s character?

3. Is it being confirmed through messages I’m hearing at church or studying in my quiet times?

4. Is it beyond me?

5. Would it please God?

I need all the assistance I can get when it comes to remembering, so below is an acronym for recalling these pointers.

S-scripture

C-character

A-affirmation

R-reach

Y-yearn

Scripture is crucial to many decisions we make in life. The bigger the question, the more imperative it is we consult His “living and active” word.

Character marks the essence of who a person is. God’s character is good and it is consistent. He will not guide or lead us in a manner that is inconsistent with His character. If we think He’s giving us permission to tell off our best friend we’d better ask ourselves again if that would be consistent with who He is.

Affirmation regarding what we hear from God can take many forms. It can be tempting to attribute these affirmations to coincidence. But too many heroes of the faith will testify that God speaks and that He will do it as He sees fit. It may be through a song on the radio, a note received in the mail, or something Pastor said.The list is endless.

Reach is a ruler for measuring ability. Sometimes we use it to measure what we are incapable of doing on our own. Terkeurst acknowledges this in her book. It’s important to note another line of thinking. In Bill Hybels, The Power of a Whisper, he lists five filters for how to know when we’re hearing from God. One of his filters looks at the question, “Is it in tune with your own character?” One could ask if Hybels and Terkeurst are contradicting one another. I don’t think so.

We all have natural bents in life. I could never be an electrical engineer. But if God called me to use drama to share the gospel in Haiti, such a whisper would meet the “reach criteria”. Drama is my natural bent but there is no way I could perform skits in the streets of Port-au Prince with out his help.

Yearning hearts. His heart yearns for the best for us. Does our heart yearn to please him? Would living out this purpose make him SMILE?

So much for a clever acronym. I tried! Word searches. Chicken scratches on paper. Surely there’s a better acronym for hearing from God other than S-C-A-R-Y. And yet,

It is.

Scary.

Any journey I’ve taken that involved asking God, “What do you want?” always resulted in a part of me being scared.