Elisabeth Elliot: The central question for the father is this: Am I helping my son to discover not his bent or inclination merely, but am I encouraging him in every way to find what God wants him to do?

Lisa Barry: As my children grow and their strengths start to become more apparent, I feel a compelling need to nudge them further in that area. I guess that's not a bad thing, but as we just heard, the important question for our children is not to find out what they want to do but to find out what God wants them to do. As someone who changed my major in college three times, I would have done well to seek God about it at the beginning. As it turned out, God knew what I was capable of far earlier than I did.

Today on Gateway To Joy, Elisabeth Elliot continues reading timeless words of wisdom from her grandfather in the book FATHER AND SON. Let's learn more as we begin this Thursday edition of Gateway To Joy.

Elisabeth Elliot: "You are loved with an everlasting love." That's what the Bible says. "And underneath are the everlasting arms." This is your friend Elisabeth Elliot, reading again today from the book entitled FATHER AND SON.

This is a chapter on your son's life work. "You have been praying and planning and working for that boy of yours ever since he was a little chap, and now he is in the later teens-a living, vigorous, alert and out-looking young fellow who has a Bible question in his mind. It will not be denied an answer. For as surely as the sun rises and sets, as surely must the boy come to a decision concerning the work that shall be his own.

"A college student had invited two or three of his college chums to dine in his home. They were soon comparing notes as to what they were to do when college was over. 'How about you?' asked one of the fellows, turning to the student in whose home they were. 'I've decided to study law,' he said. 'Why, I thought you were going in for engineering,' said one in surprise. 'No,' was the reply. 'I had thought of that, but now I've decided to study law.'

"His father glanced at him with a smile and asked, 'Harry, is that a strictly correct statement?' Harry hesitated, looked puzzled, and then catching his father's meaning, laughing but somewhat ruefully, replied, 'Perhaps not, Father, for it wasn't really my decision. It was yours.' The father, who was a skilled corporation lawyer, nodded. And with a gleam of amusement in his eyes, he said, 'That's better. That is correct. It was my decision.'

"Then the subject was changed, but at least one of the guests has never forgotten the impression made upon him by the nature of that decision. Was the father right to take the matter into his own hands and dictate to his very able son, whose interests were not in the direction of the study of law but in the direction of mathematics and mechanics? To be sure, the son did turn out to be a highly competent lawyer. But how was the father to know in advance how to guide him in the choice of a life work, to say nothing of actually deciding for him?

"What are the factors that may rightly be taken into account in reaching the vocational decision? It is a noteworthy fact that very many men of 40 or 50 are not doing today what they once planned to do. Check up on what you know of your intimate friends and see how far this is true. It would be seem that, by no means, a majority of men in the middle life are in the work that they had chosen during high school and college years. Many are not now doing what they seemed either inclined or best fitted to do. Some are restless and unhappy misfits today, while others who have made a success of their tasks secretly would much prefer something else.

"Here's a young diplomat of great distinction in many lands, who was a lighthearted, apparently heedless, aimless and inattentive student. Here is a confectioner, trained in college as an engineer. There, a promoter of business enterprises, who passed through untold hardships in the days of preparation for the practice of medicine and was a physician in active service for years. What is a father to say and do in counseling his teenage boy concerning the intricate cross currents of the vocational choice?

"That which has gone before in these studies, progressively developed through the unfolding years of the boy's life, has had a direct bearing upon the nature of his later life choices. He will be likely to choose in accordance with the emphasis that you have placed and are placing upon what you regard as the purpose of life. If a son is fathered into a conception of life that makes the ingathering of money the great objective or even the distinctive mark of success, then the boy is pretty sure to cast about in his mind for the field and the opening that seem to promise the most cash.

"A man who had been spending a Sunday of addresses and conferences in an eastern college was walking in the evening with the Christian Association secretary, who led him to a place on the campus from which they could look down a long valley over miles of busy steelworks. Pillars of fire flung their wild flare against the sky. The clank of machinery came up from the great mills. The vastness, the fascination of modern industry gripped the imagination.

"'There's our problem,' said the secretary. 'I mean, our problem in Christian service. The works down there stand out before our fellows as the greatest thing they know, and most of them hope that someday they can run or own mills like those. It's hard to get them interested in specific Christian work as a life calling. The overwhelming appeal, such as the great mills sent up to the campus day and night by their existence and their material success, is reflected, for example, in the appalling dirth of ministerial students and recruits for the foreign mission field. More intimate, more subtle, far more impressive than the big mill is the vision that a son may have of his rightful life work in the steady influence of a wise Christian father, who has been the boy's friend since babyhood.

"It may well be true that in the plan of God that boy is to become a mill owner, who will conduct his majestic enterprise for God. There are those who do precisely that, but the pull of the sheer materialism of it all, the glitter of the world's prizes, the challenge to the normal boy's competitive spirit-all are so powerful that many a father will need to discriminate in his talks with his son between business success as the world visions it and a successful, worthwhile life.

"A father need not be afraid that he will deter his boy from a noble business career by keeping prominently before him the claims of specific Christian work as such, for the urgent influences of school and college and the glamour of lucrative business life need precisely such an offsetting influence to give anything like a balanced prospect of usefulness.

"Who is to help the boy to discern the deeper elements that make up a life of God-led service if his father cannot throw his own study in experience and loving counsel into the solution of the problem and on the side of the higher values? On the other hand, it would be contrary to the evident plan of God to lead any son to suppose that business or professional life is necessarily a secondary calling. The highest possible place for anyone is the precise place where God would have that one live and serve. It would be a calamity to be in the ministry when one ought to be in the merchant marine.

"The central question for the father is this: Am I helping my son to discover not his bent or inclination merely, and not even what I may just now assume are his abilities, but am I encouraging him in every way to find what God wants him to do?

"How can one discover the will of God for himself, or in behalf of a loved son, when so many complex factors seem to press for consideration? To many a man, younger or older, George Mueller's simple suggestions as to his own way of finding the will of God have been a definite blessing, and they can readily have their place in the critical question of the steps that lead to a choice of a life's work.

"Mr. Mueller wrote this: 'Number one, an obedient heart. I seek in the beginning to get my heart into such a state that it has no will of its own in regard to a given matter. Nine-tenths of the difficulties are overcome when our hearts are ready to do God's will, whatever it may be. When one is truly in this state, it is usually but a little way to the knowledge of what His will is.

"'Secondly, feelings are not enough. Having done this, I do not leave the result to feeling or simple impression. If I do so, I make myself liable to great delusions. The will of God, revealed through His Word, is number three. I seek the Spirit of God through or in connection with the Word of God. The Spirit and the Word must be combined. If I look to the Spirit alone without the Word, I lay myself open to great delusions also. If the Holy Spirit guides us at all, He will do it according to the Scriptures and never contrary to them.

"'Number four, providential circumstances. Next I take into account providential circumstances. These often plainly indicate God's will in connection with His Word and Spirit. Number five, prayer. I ask God in prayer to reveal His will to me aright. Number six, deliberate judgment and a mind at peace.

"'Thus, through prayer to God, the study of the Word and reflection, I come to a deliberate judgment according to the best of my ability and knowledge. If my mind is thus at peace and continues so, after two or three more petitions, I proceed accordingly. In trivial matters and in transactions involving most important issues, I have found the method always effective.'"

I want my listeners to know that there is a little leaflet with exactly those words from George Mueller. The leaflet is entitled HOW TO KNOW THE WILL OF GOD. If you'd like to have a copy of George Mueller's rules for discovering the will of God, you can contact Gateway To Joy and they will be glad to send you a little leaflet with exactly Mueller's nine points on it.

Lisa Barry: Yes, we will. All you need to do is call or write to us and we'll send out one copy at no charge. I should also mention that it will take four to six weeks to receive it, so you'll want to keep that in mind. The title to ask for again is HOW TO KNOW THE WILL OF GOD by George Mueller.

As always, we have this series available to purchase as well. Here is our address: Gateway To Joy, Box 82500, Lincoln, Nebraska, 68501. Or call toll-free: 1-800-759-4JOY. Well, have you found us online yet? It's a great place to come and learn about Gateway To Joy. You can also find out what our upcoming topics will be and locate other radio stations across the country who carry Gateway To Joy. That way you can introduce your out-of-state friends to the program. That address again is gatewaytojoy.org. Gateway To Joy is a listener-supported production of Back to the Bible.

Elisabeth wraps up this series on father and son tomorrow with an important word on the boy's schooling. That's next time on Gateway To Joy.