Knowing God’s Will by Kevin Sanders

Discovering His Plan for Your Life

“How can I know God's will for my life?” It's a question Dr. Kevin Sanders has heard countless times in his fifty-plus years of life and ministry—sometimes broad, sometimes painfully specific, like whether to marry someone or accept a new job. Knowing God's Will is his answer, born from decades of wrestling with that very question himself.

Rather than offering clichés or self-help platitudes, Sanders points readers back to Scripture, walking through six crucial questions for discerning God's will, real-life encouragement for common situations in “The Journey,” and eight devotionals to root the message in daily practice.

Readers describe the book as a wake-up call about how quickly life passes and how easily regret can take root when we drift from obedience—paired with the reassurance that surrendering control to God brings real peace, not loss.

Drawing on his Master of Divinity, his Doctor of Ministry, eleven years as a missionary in the Philippines, and years as a pastor, Sanders offers a guide that's equal parts biblical and deeply personal—helping readers trade fear and overthinking for confidence in following God's plan.

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Excerpt from Knowing God’s Will © Copyright 2026 Kevin Sanders

The First Step: Knowing Him as Lord and Savior

I am guessing that many who pick up this book already understand what it means to follow Jesus. But it would be foolish for me to write about following God’s will without covering the first step: salvation.

Jesus said this during His earthly ministry:

¹⁴ “I am the good shepherd; I know my own sheep, and they know me, ¹⁵ just as my Father knows me and I know the Father. So I sacrifice my life for the sheep. ¹⁶ I have other sheep, too, that are not in this sheepfold. I must bring them also. They will listen to my voice, and there will be one flock with one shepherd.
-John 10:14-16

Jesus said His relationship to His followers was just like that of a shepherd to sheep. It is a perfect analogy, because sheep can only thrive under the guidance and protection of a shepherd. Sheep are also known for their ability to recognize and respond exclusively to their shepherd’s voice. They will ignore (or avoid) an unfamiliar voice but follow the voice they know to be their shepherd’s (John 10:5).

But you can only know God’s voice if you belong to Him, and belonging to Him is not our default status when we come into this world. The Bible, in fact, says that we have a strong tendency to run from God instead of towards Him:

All of us, like sheep, have strayed away.
We have left God’s paths to follow our own.
Yet the Lord laid on him
the sins of us all.
-Isaiah 53:6

We see both our predicament and God’s provision in this verse. Let’s look at both in a little more detail by considering a few passages in Romans:

²³ For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard. ²⁴ Yet God, in his grace, freely makes us right in his sight. He did this through Christ Jesus when he freed us from the penalty for our sins. ²⁵ For God presented Jesus as the sacrifice for sin. People are made right with God when they believe that Jesus sacrificed his life, shedding his blood.
-Romans 3:23-25a

For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord.
-Romans 6:23

We are disobedient, or sinful, by both nature and by choice. The “wages” we have all earned is death—separation from God. Without some divine intervention the end result of our rebellion would be eternal separation from God—a terrible place called hell.

But the consequences of our disobedience were placed on Jesus Christ—He paid the penalty for our sin through His sacrifice on the cross. Salvation is freely offered to those who are willing to place their faith in Christ and receive Him as Lord and Savior. John’s Gospel puts it this way:

¹² But to all who believed him and accepted him, he gave the right to become children of God. ¹³ They are reborn—not with a physical birth resulting from human passion or plan, but a birth that comes from God.
-John 1:12-13