We live in a world of a thousand choices. Like a child in line at the snack shop frozen by the myriad of options in front of him, so are many Christians today – who stand wondering, “What is God’s will for my life?” Their life is on pause as they wait to know what they should do with their life. It doesn’t have to be this way.

A friend texted me this past week to let me know he had used me as an illustration in his Bible study. Apparently one of the men in the small group had asked about how to know what to do with your life. My friend shared my story with him.

Many people share this same struggle. You might have a job, or are preparing to have one, but you aren’t really excited about what it is. You envy others who claim to love their job so much they say they would do it for free. But not you. You are watching from the sidelines, wishing you could switch places with someone else.

A couple of months ago I read the book, The Conviction to Lead by Albert Mohler. It had the usual tidbits about leadership, but Mohler made an overarching point throughout the book that I thought was good. It was this:

The leadership that really matters is all about conviction. The leader is rightly concerned with everything from strategy and vision to team-building, motivation, and delegation, but at the center of the true leader’s heart and mind you will find convictions that drive and determine everything else.

What an excellent point. What if you or I began to determine what we might do next based on our convictions?

I tell people fostering has changed my family. This is more true than many realize. What started out four years ago as welcoming a baby in need into our home has now influenced what I do for a living. Slowly but surely, God began to open my eyes to see the needs of young kids in our own community. I either hadn’t seen it before, or didn’t think I could do anything about it.

Here we sit, four years later, having fostered a few kids and adopted two. After seeing the impact we’ve had on our new kids, and the impact they have had on us, we were convinced we could do more. Now we are looking to see up close and personal God changes the hearts of kids from hard places in our own community.

Once I began to sense that conviction, Steph and I started praying about what that might mean for our future. Now that I’ve landed in a role leading a ministry for at-risk kids, I can relate to what Mohler says about leadership:

The credibility of leadership is based, without question, on the leader’s identification of his own story within the organization’s story. The leader must articulate how he came to be a part of this story, how it came to possess him, and why he now gives himself to it.

I’ve met with many people over the past month. Each has asked in some way or another about why I made my recent job change. With each one I tell of the heartbreaking stories we have come to know through fostering, and how we decided we wanted to try to do something about it in our own community.

As I said earlier, my friend let me know he had used me as an illustration in his Bible study. The point he was making was that we need to consider what God has put in our hearts, and then move forward. I guess you might call it the conviction to lead.

God has hard-wired this into all of us, but each one is unique. Maybe start by asking yourself the question, “What makes you angry?” You might not know the answer overnight, but I’d encourage you to consider it.

Discover that passion within you, and then boldly step forward to make a difference. If God truly put it there, I expect he’ll provide you what you need in order to step out.

Do you know what your conviction is?