Some spiritual teachings do not believe in a Divine Will. Perhaps it makes God seem too anthropomorphic? So they reject any belief in God and in God's Will. But one does not have to accept a human-image idea of God. God can simply be understood as the universal consciousness we all have and share, and the universal love we all have and share. God can be understood as the consciousness of Absolute Unity and the Inclusive Love that unites us all together.
As well, Divine Will can be understood without the out-of-date religious connotation of God deciding and determining everything. Divine Will is a power. But it is misunderstood by many religious and spiritual teachers. It is not a power that is absolutely enforcing, absolutely dictating, or absolutely manipulating. Instead, Divine Will is a power that moves the world in a general direction and towards a general vision of creative good; but it does not dictate specifically how this will happen, nor does it manipulate every activity like a puppeteer or a chess master. Divine Will moves the world in a general direction, but it does not force a set plan or specific design on everything. Instead, the Divine Power allows for creative freedom throughout all existence, yet still moves existence in gradual and subtle manner towards its Creative Vision.
Divine Will is the influencing Power of Divine Purpose – the power that motivates and inspires intuitions of Life's Purposes and the needed efforts to fulfill those purposes. The power of Divine Will does not absolutely force or dictate, nor absolutely determine things; instead, the Divine Power works through life – through us, from within us, from the innerness of who we are, if we can sincerely listen and be truthful with our innermost feelings and intuitions. For this comes from our inner spiritual soul.
The Divine Will moves the world predominately through humans – giving us creative inspiration and creative vision, an awakening holistic intelligence, and through our human feelings of love, empathy, and compassion. This is how the Divine Power works – it works through us to transform and evolve the world. It allows freedom, which is essential for real creativity. Yet it still nudges us forward towards the highest divine goals, not by external manipulations like moving chess pieces, but by nudging and inspiring us from within. Thus, the Divine Power works through us from within. It moves us, gradually, from within us – through inspiration, intelligence, and love. Thus, the power of Divine Will works inwardly through us – giving us inspiration (the divine breath) – inspiring our love, our intelligence, and our will. But only if we freely choose to be open to this.
Most simply, Divine Will can be understood as Divine Purpose. There is less connotation in this of the 'Hand of God', or God who determines everything, which is why many people reject the idea of a greater Will. Thus, if there is reservation or confusion about believing in Divine Will, then one could replace the idea of Divine Will with Divine Purpose, ...accepting that there is a Divine-Greater Purpose in life and existence.
There is Purpose in life. This is the Divine Purpose, which are the Purposes for life. To believe in a Divine Purpose is to believe in an originating purpose for life, for the universe and for our world. Without this, life would not have a given purpose. Though granted, we could construct our own purposes, which is the existentialist view. Therefore, a belief in Divine Purpose, rather than just a 'self-constructed purpose', is the difference between a spiritual view and just an existential view. One has to ask – is there a greater real Purpose in life and for my life? ...or are there only self-constructed purposes? A spiritual view can include our self-constructed purposes, but it must also realize that there is a greater Spiritual Purpose. Realizing this greater Purpose, or at least facets of it, is essential to developing spiritual alignment in our life. Then, when we realize spiritual Purpose, our will comes into alignment with and works for the Purpose. We also need to make real commitments and efforts on being aligned with spiritual Purposes.
The Divine Purposes and God's Will are the same. For example, one of the great Divine Purposes is love, a great purpose in life. So, God's Will is for love to be – to be realized and expressed. The purpose of love means that God's Will (the Divine Will) is for there to be love. The purpose of beauty means that God's Will is for there to be beauty (that beauty be realized, expressed and manifested). The purpose of increasing-intelligence means that God's Will is for there to be increasing intelligence.
Thus, in general, God's Will is to manifest the Divine Purposes; and the Divine Purposes are Divine Visions that God Wills to be fulfilled. Divine Purposes are what God Wills, and God's Will are the Divine Purposes. The only real distinction between Divine Will and Divine Purpose is that Divine Will is the power to fulfill these Purposes, while Divine Purpose is the Aim, the Vision, or the intended Fulfillment of Divine Will.
As well, Divine Purpose and Divine Vision are the same, from the perspective of God. For ourselves, a purpose of life means about the same as a vision for life. Vision is seeing the goals – knowing what's most important to live for, to make effort for, to achieve. So every realized great Purpose is accompanied by a great Vision – which is its realization, its seen goal. This vision can range from general to specific. Divine Vision at its highest is more general, though it still has a direction; while our own creative visions (or goals) can become quite specific, though can still being guided by the general Divine Vision.
Divine Will is correlated with Divine Vision. There is always a Will-to-be in any Divine Vision. The Vision and the Will go together; they work together. This is true of the highest Divine and also true in our own self. As Above, so then below; though we are in the world of becoming – from Divine Beingness. From the One Divine Being emerges Creative Vision and the Will to manifest this Vision (or creative ideas). Thus, each Divine Vision has a correlated Will-to-manifest – which is its Power-to-become. This is the Divine Will-power which sends this Vision into our minds. But then it is up to us to do the final work of manifesting the Vision through the power of our own human will.
Spiritual will is a will with spiritual vision or with a higher spiritual aim. In man, vision and will develop separately, though both are co-related. Therefore, for some people their will could be strong, yet they might lack vision (of what the aim is, or the purpose to work for). For others, their vision could be strong and clear, but their will might not be as developed; so they see the aim but need to develop more will to achieve it. Usually though, if one has a strong vision, then one's will is inspired by this and become stronger. Or if one has a strong will, and if this is a will-to-Good or will-to-serve, then vision usually comes in response.
A third divine energy is related with will and vision; which is love. Love connects vision with will, and will with vision. For example, when there is love for the spiritual vision, then this motivates one's will to work towards this vision and to achieve it. And when there is love for others or for humanity or the earth, then this motivates the will, the spiritual will to give and to help. And a vision will unfold about what is good, helpful, and healing for humanity and the planet.
Next read Our spiritual will & purpose