Summary of Finding God’s Will for You by St. Francis de Sales

Here are 3 tips from St. Francis de Sales to discover God’s will in our lives.  

1. Faith

Satan often tries to distract us from achieving God’s will by proposing another idea that seems better. The evil one is satisfied if we make many beginnings, provided we never finish anything. Once you find God’s holy will, stay committed!

“Just as a shrub that is often transplanted cannot take root and, as a result, cannot come to maturity and yield the desired fruit, so the soul that transplants its heart from plan to plan cannot profit or gain proper growth in perfection, since perfection does not consist in beginnings but in accomplishment.”

We must cultivate a special love for tribulation & trial, for nothing is to be loved except God’s will in these events. Happy is the heart that loves God with no other pleasure but that which it takes in pleasing God. What purer and more perfect pleasure can we ever have than that which we take in God’s pleasure?

“If I like only pure water, what does it matter to me whether it is served in a goblet of gold or in one of glass, since in either case I drink only the water? In fact, I will prefer it in the glass, since the glass has the same colour as the water, which I can thus see much better. What does it matter whether God’s will is offered to me in tribulation or in consolation? In each of them, I neither desire nor seek anything except the divine will, which is better seen, because no other beauty is present there but that of God’s most holy, eternal good pleasure.”

“The indifferent heart is like a ball of wax in God’s hands, ready to receive all the impressions of His eternal good pleasure.

2. Hope

If we do not find progress in the devout life as much as we would like, do not worry. Stay hopeful. Maintain your peace of heart.

“It is for us to cultivate our souls well, and therefore we must faithfully attend to them. But as for plentiful crops and harvests, let us leave care of that to our Lord. The labourer will never be blamed for not having a fine harvest, unless he did not carefully till and sow his fields.”

Have patience with every one, but especially with yourself. I mean, do not be over-troubled about your imperfections, but always have courage enough at once to rise up again when you fall into any of them. I am very glad to hear that you begin afresh every day. There is no better means for persevering in the spiritual life than continually to be beginning again, and never to think that one has done enough.

3. Love

We always conform our wills to those we love, especially in the decisions that are hardest. Since the saints love God the most, they conform their wills most perfectly to God’s will. So, we must fall in love with God!

“We ourselves, as little children of our heavenly Father, can walk with Him in two ways. In the first way, we can walk with the steps of our own will, which we conform to His, holding always with the hand of our obedience the hand of His divine intention and following wherever it leads us. But we can also walk with our Lord without having any will of our own. We simply let ourselves be carried by His divine good pleasure, just as a little child is carried in his mother’s arms, by a unity of our will with that of God… [that child] does not think of wanting to be on one side or the other, or of desiring anything else whatever save only to be in the arms of his mother, with whom he thinks himself to be one being. He is never at pains to adapt his will to his mother’s, for he does not know his own will and does not think he has one. To his mother he leaves complete care to go, to do, and to will what she finds good in him.”

Pursuing the perfection of the Christian life is essential to know God’s will. And saints are those who are best at doing the will of God.

The sun’s rays give light (God’s will) while giving warmth (God’s holiness) and warmth while giving light. Inspiration is a heavenly ray that brings into our hearts a warm light that makes us see the good, and fires us on to its pursuit. Oh, how happy are they who keep their hearts open to holy inspirations! They never lack the graces necessary to them in order to live well and devoutly according to their conditions, and to fulfill in a holy way the duties of their profession.

“What becomes of the light of the stars when the sun appears on the horizon? Such light does not actually perish, but it is ravished and absorbed into the sun’s supreme light with which it is happily intermingled and joined. What becomes of man’s will when it’s entirely abandoned to the divine good pleasure? It does not wholly perish, yet it is so engulfed in and intermingled with God’s will that it no longer shows forth and has no further desire apart from God’s will. In such