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Today's message is for the people that feel like they don't have a good sense of direction in life.

And at some point in time you might have tried to start reading the bible and get deeper into God's word so you can improve your life, but for whatever reason, it just didn't work out.

My whole mission today is to show you that God's word actually can help you make noticeable improvements in your life.

And even if you've lost faith in the bible and started to feel like it doesn't work, by the end of today's message you'll have a better understanding of how to actually use the bible to get clarity in your life, and your faith in God's word will be restored.

Why hasn't God's word been working for you?

1. You haven't actually been doing what God's word is telling you to do.

Sometimes we like to read the bible to feel like we're doing a good thing.

Not realizing that the bible is not just a bedtime story.

It's a real life instruction manual on how to live life.

The bible actually tells us that in James 1:25 —

So yes, it is important to read the bible.

And I actually recommend you get some flashcards and write your favorite verses on them, so you can practice memorizing the ones that stand out to you the most.

But most importantly, you gotta make sure you actually do what God's word is telling you to do.

And you can't do what God's word is telling you to do if you don't spend enough time reading God's word.

Now let's get into the second reason God's word hasn't been working for you.

2. You like to figure everything out yourself.

And it's not even like you have negative intentions when you do it.

You just naturally like to solve problems.

And your full intention is just to solve the problem in the best way possible.

But when you can't figure out the solution, you get stuck.

But God's word does have something to say about that as well—

This is where the bible can start to overlap with common life advice we hear all the time.

Because I'm sure at some point in your life, somebody has told you to follow your heart.

But people also say keep God first.

So how can you do both?

I believe the answer is very simple.

You might feel deep down that you have a certain purpose for being in this world.

And you are 100% correct about that.

But where you mess up is constantly overthinking about how to actually fulfill that purpose.

That's where God comes in at.

Once you know your purpose and you know you wanna accomplish what you feel in your heart, that's when you stop and pray to God and ask him what you need to do to make it happen.

But that can be easier said than done because God’s plans might completely go against what you thought you wanna do and the way you wanna do it.

• You might have to risk being laughed at
• You might have to risk people mocking you
• You might think it doesn’t sense to do something knowing people will talk bad about it

But when you start thinking like that, just know that you’re blocking your blessings.

Cause God’s word never told you to direct your own steps.

He said he will.

The third reason God's word hasn't been working for you is...

3. You're always comparing yourself to other people.

A lot of times we look at what somebody else is doing or what somebody else is accomplishing, and if we ain't doing the same thing, we think we’re behind.

We try to decide what we need to do to get better by looking at what somebody else is doing.

And that's cool sometimes.

Cause we do learn from each other.

And the bible does say iron sharpens iron.

And if somebody is doing something better than you, of course you should try to learn from them.

But the downside is that if you can't do what that other person is doing, or even if you just don't pick it up as fast as they did, then you'll feel like you're worse than them.

But of course the bible does have something to say about that too:

The real secret for getting better at anything is to compare yourself to yourself.

If you get 24 reps on bench press today, then next time, try to get 25.

Keep tryna be better than you was yesterday. And eventually you’ll be comfortably in your own lane.

The fourth reason God's word hasn't been working for you is...

4. You don't like being told what to do.

A lot of people think being told what to do is like being disciplined.

And if you didn't like being disciplined as a kid, then as an adult you will still have the same problem.

But what does God's word say about that?

For whatever reason, a lot us see discipline as pain.

You’ll get mad at people that try to tell you what’s right, cause it’s hard to deal with in that moment.

Also we think we know it all.

But just like a dog or a kid, adults gotta be trained too.

In other words, we have to be disciplined.

The only difference is that once you reach a certain age, instead of your parents disciplining you, you have to discipline yourself.

The good thing is you don't have to think about what to do.

Cause God already gave a whole training manual.

And when you let the training work on you, the results you get on the other end is well worth it.

The fifth reason God's word hasn't been working for you is...

5. You are too lazy.

The work that God has done in the world, and will continue to do, is very mighty.

And humans were made in the image of God.

So that means the work we do cannot be lackluster.

We can't do what God can do, but if we wanna claim the blessings he has in store for us, we gotta put some work in.

After we reach a certain point in life, we get comfortable.

And we stop learning new stuff, and building new skills.

But we actually have to work harder cause of that.

It would be way easier in the long run to build new skills now, so we can be better later.

How to Start Trusting God More

If you wanna start trusting God more so you can start taking action on his word and make noticeable improvements in your life, the first thing you need to do is step out on faith.

What that means is…

No matter how hard it is for you to believe that God's word will work for you, at some point you just gotta give it a chance.