Bible verses for a hard decision, and a way to pray one through
Fourteen verses on guidance, arranged as a way of praying through a decision over a few weeks rather than a night: asking, listening, and then choosing.
Should we take the job? Move closer to her parents? Leave the church? Big decisions are rarely settled in one prayer, and the people who tell you they got a clear answer on the first night are usually leaving out the six weeks before it.
The verses below are quoted word for word from the World English Bible and arranged as a way of praying a decision through, in three movements: asking, listening, and choosing. It is not a method that guarantees an answer. It is a way to keep praying about the same thing for long enough that an answer has room to arrive, and to have a record of what you asked when it does.
One suggestion before you start. Date your first prayer about the decision. Most guidance in hindsight looks like a series of small nudges, and you only see the series if you kept the earlier ones.
Asking
The first movement is simply asking, plainly, for wisdom. Scripture treats this as a request God is glad to receive, which takes some pressure off. You are not trying to guess the right answer. You are asking to be taught.
But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.
James 1:5 · WEB
Liberally and without reproach. You will not be scolded for not knowing. Ask.
Show me your ways, LORD. Teach me your paths. Guide me in your truth, and teach me, for you are the God of my salvation. I wait for you all day long.
Psalm 25:4-5 · WEB
Show me, teach me, guide me. Three verbs, and then I wait for you all day long. The waiting is part of the asking.
Cause me to hear your loving kindness in the morning, for I trust in you. Cause me to know the way in which I should walk, for I lift up my soul to you.
Psalm 143:8 · WEB
A morning prayer. Cause me to know the way. Pray it at the start of each day the decision is open.
Your word is a lamp to my feet, and a light for my path.
Psalm 119:105 · WEB
A lamp, not a floodlight. Enough light for the next step is what is promised, and it is usually what you get.
A prayer to write
We have to decide about the move by the end of the month and we do not know. I am asking for wisdom because you said you give it. Show me the way, one step's worth of light at a time. I will keep asking every morning until it is clear.
Listening
The middle movement is the uncomfortable one. You have asked. Now you keep the question open without forcing it closed. These verses are about the voice behind you and the Spirit who guides, and about not leaning on the version of the answer you have already decided you want.
Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and don’t lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.
Proverbs 3:5-6 · WEB
Lean is the honest word. The temptation in a decision is to trust your own understanding because it is the only thing that feels solid. The verse asks you to acknowledge him in the middle of the not-knowing.
and when you turn to the right hand, and when you turn to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, “This is the way. Walk in it.”
Isaiah 30:21 · WEB
A voice behind you, not ahead. Guidance in this picture often comes after you have taken the step, confirming it, rather than before.
I will instruct you and teach you in the way which you shall go. I will counsel you with my eye on you.
Psalm 32:8 · WEB
With my eye on you. You are being watched over while you decide, not graded on the result.
However, when he, the Spirit of truth, has come, he will guide you into all truth, for he will not speak from himself; but whatever he hears, he will speak. He will declare to you things that are coming.
John 16:13 · WEB
The Spirit guides into truth. It is not a promise of a map. It is a promise of a guide.
A prayer to write
I notice I have already decided what I want the answer to be. I am putting that down. Keep my ears open for the voice behind me. If this is the wrong way, make it clear before I turn.
Choosing
At some point the decision has to be made, usually before you feel certain. These verses are for that day. They say something surprising: that you can plan and choose, and that God directs the steps anyway. The pressure to get it perfectly right is not one scripture puts on you.
A man’s heart plans his course, but the LORD directs his steps.
Proverbs 16:9 · WEB
Both halves are true. You plan the course. He directs the steps. Choosing is not a failure of faith.
A man’s steps are established by the LORD. He delights in his way.
Psalm 37:23 · WEB
Established. Once you have chosen in good faith, the step is his to hold up.
and the LORD will guide you continually, satisfy your soul in dry places, and make your bones strong. You will be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water whose waters don’t fail.
Isaiah 58:11 · WEB
Continually. Guidance does not stop at the decision. If you choose wrong, you will still be guided, from wherever you end up.
For I know the thoughts that I think toward you,” says the LORD, “thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you hope and a future.
Jeremiah 29:11 · WEB
Often quoted, rarely in context. It was written to exiles who would stay in exile for seventy years. The hope and future are real. The timeline is God's.
A prayer to write
We are going to say yes to the job. I have asked, I have waited, I have listened as well as I know how, and this is where the light seems to point. Direct our steps from here. If I have chosen wrong, guide us anyway.
Keep the prayers on both sides of the decision
The strangest thing about praying through a decision is how quickly you forget what you prayed once it is made. A year in, the move feels inevitable, or regrettable, and the weeks of asking are gone. So is the evidence of the small answers along the way.
Prayed brings each written prayer back to you at three days, a week, a month and a year, so the prayer from the first morning of the asking is placed in front of you again once you are living inside the answer. You can mark it answered, or ongoing, and the whole sequence stays together. Nothing you write leaves your phone.
Write the first prayer about the decision today, before you know how it ends. That is the only time you can.
Write the prayer. Prayed finds the verses.
Prayed is a private prayer journal for iPhone. Write what you're praying for and it matches three verses from the same Bible quoted above, on your phone, then brings the prayer back to you at three days, a week, a month and a year so you see what came of it. No account, no server. Writing is free forever.
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