'Initiative' in the Bible
"Even if Balak gives me his palace full of silver and gold, I won't double-cross the command of the LORD and do anything whether good or evil on my own initiative, because I'm going to say whatever the LORD says.'
they took the initiative by preparing their provisions shrewdly: they took tattered sacks for their donkeys, worn-out, torn, and mended wineskins,
that the Lord God of Israel who rules over all has a message for him. Tell him, 'On your own initiative you sent a letter to the priest Zephaniah son of Maaseiah and to all the other priests and to all the people in Jerusalem. In your letter you said to Zephaniah,
‘Their prince will be one of them,And their ruler will come forward from among them.I will bring him near and he shall approach Me,For who is he who would have the boldness and would dare [on his own initiative] to risk his life to approach Me?’ says the Lord.
I will put my Spirit within you; I will take the initiative and you will obey my statutes and carefully observe my regulations.
“And why do you not even on your own initiative judge what is right?
So Jesus answered them, "I tell you the solemn truth, the Son can do nothing on his own initiative, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, the Son does likewise.
“I can do nothing on My own initiative. As I hear, I judge; and My judgment is just, because I do not seek My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me.
Then Jesus, while teaching in the temple courts, cried out, "You both know me and know where I come from! And I have not come on my own initiative, but the one who sent me is true. You do not know him,
So Jesus said, “When you lift up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am He, and I do nothing on My own initiative, but I speak these things as the Father taught Me.
Jesus said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love Me, for I proceeded forth and have come from God, for I have not even come on My own initiative, but He sent Me.
No one has taken it away from Me, but I lay it down on My own initiative. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This commandment I received from My Father.”
Now he did not say this on his own initiative. As high priest that year, he prophesied that Jesus would die for the nation,
For I did not speak on My own initiative, but the Father Himself who sent Me has given Me a commandment as to what to say and what to speak.
Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in Me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on My own initiative, but the Father abiding in Me does His works.
But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come.
Jesus replied, "Are you asking this on your own initiative, or did others tell you about me?"
And no one assumes this honor on his own initiative, but only when called to it by God, as in fact Aaron was.