Ever suffered from paralysis of analysis? New graduates stepping into the workforce often experience its symptoms. They hope God will tell them exactly what their job should be. They wish He would show them beyond any shadow of a doubt that they’re making the best choice. So some of them hesitate to send out their resumé to even one company.

Often, in making the big decisions of life, we weigh and reweigh the options, implications, and possibilities before us. We’re so afraid to make the wrong move that we’re paralyzed by our indecision.

King Solomon offers us some helpful advice. In Ecclesiastes 11:4, he observed that if a farmer holds out for the most opportune moment to plant (when there’s no wind to blow away the seed), and reaps only when there’s no rain to ruin a ripe harvest, he’ll spend much of his life simply sitting and waiting.

There are many things in life that are mysterious, like the “path of the wind” and how a baby is formed in a mother’s womb (Ecclesiastes 11:5). But God knows and controls all these things. So after prayerfully assessing the options based on biblical principles and consulting with godly advisors, we can step out boldly in faith—not sweating the uncertainties. Elisabeth Elliot wrote, “God is God. Because He is God, He is worthy of my trust and obedience. I will find rest nowhere but in His holy will that is unspeakably beyond my largest notions of what He is up to.”

As we prepare to step out in faith, we also apply due diligence (Ecclesiastes 11:6). Don’t turn everything into a mystical decision about what you “feel” God wants you to do. Do the sensible thing. Apply wisdom, pray about it, and then boldly go where God leads!

NLT 365-day reading plan passage for today: Ezra 3:7-13