You know you're supposed to serve God, but how?  Some suggest you should join the church choir, others want you to start a home Bible study.  Someone even suggested you go on a mission trip.  There are so many needs and demands.  Is it the leading of the Spirit you feel, or the just pressure of the saints?  Where is God leading you?

When you received Jesus Christ as your savior, you also received His Spirit, membership in His family, and a mission for your life.  That mission can be expressed in simple terms:  to obey Christ’s Great Commission by ministering to a lost and dying world.  Where most of us get stuck is translating that general mission into specific actions. 

When the Israelites left Egypt, God guided them with spectacularly visible signs: "Because of your great compassion you did not abandon them in the desert. By day the pillar of cloud did not cease to guide them on their path, nor the pillar of fire by night to shine on the way they were to take. You gave your good Spirit to instruct them. You did not withhold your manna from their mouths, and you gave them water for their thirst. For forty years you sustained them in the desert; they lacked nothing, their clothes did not wear out nor did their feet become swollen." (Nehemiah 9:19-21)

Have you ever wished for God to provide you such clear signs as pillars of cloud and fire?  After all, if you're sure you're following God’s lead, you can also be confident of His constant direction and sustaining power. He'll surely bless your activities because He's chosen them for you, just as the Israelites were assured of manna and water for as long as they continued to follow the signs. Still, for most of us absent a celestial pillar, His guidance can seem frustratingly elusive.

So where can you look for guidance?  Let's begin with the basics.  You're unlikely to hear what God is telling you if you're not using the tools He’s given you--especially His Word, His people, and prayer. If you cut yourself off from the channels of communication He's opened to you, expecting clear guidance is a fool’s errand.

Let’s assume, though, that you've been doing these things faithfully. Discovering God’s specific will for your ministry life also requires you to examine the circumstances He's carefully arranged for you. Consider how the Apostle Paul did this:

"Paul and his companions traveled throughout the region of Phrygia and Galatia, having been kept by the Holy Spirit from preaching the word in the province of Asia. When they came to the border of Mysia, they tried to enter Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus would not allow them to. So they passed by Mysia and went down to Troas. During the night Paul had a vision of a man of Macedonia standing and begging him, ‘Come over to Macedonia and help us.’ After Paul had seen the vision, we got ready at once to leave for Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them." (Acts 16:6-10)

Paul and his companions were gifted evangelists who were commissioned and sent on a mission. When they reached the border of Mysia, they found they could not travel where they’d long assumed they were to go, so instead they followed God’s leading in another direction, where He greatly blessed their work.

Like Paul, God has provided you with certain gifts and talents with which to meet the needs and opportunities He’s placed before you. He makes resources available to you, but also places constraints on your service to guide you. The attached illustration of three intersecting circles demonstrates how these circumstances fit together to provide a picture of how God is arranging the terms of your service. 

Where God-given tools, resources and needs come together is a pretty good indication of how and where God wants you to minister. On the other hand, the dashed lines around the circles remind you to be bold, since your limited understanding of your circumstances may sell God short. Like Moses or Gideon you'll need to exercise faith in what God can do beyond apparent limits.

As a starting place toward better understanding the context of God’s direction, conduct your own, personal inventory:

• What gifts and talents do you believe God has equipped you with personally?  Moreover, has He also provided you with ministry partners who bring additional gifts?

• What particular resources has God has supplied you with? You might consider time, money, relationships, material goods, home or access to facilities, health, mobility, family situation, etc. On the other hand, what constraints has God placed on your capabilities and resources?

• What special needs and opportunities is God drawing your attention to?

Use this model as a way to organize your search for ministry guidance. Commit the above questions and answers to prayer and begin a discussion with God. You have a mission.  Now ask Him to reveal how He has equipped you ... and for what purpose.