Everything Serves His Plans Isaiah 46:9-11 Genesis 45:1-8 Genesis 50:18-21 Esther 4:7-14 Psalms 119:89-91 Jeremiah 33:23-26 Psalms 104:1-4 Jeremiah 31:35 Jeremiah 29:11-14 12.07.18

EVERYTHING SERVES HIS PLANS

BREAD

⁹ Remember the former things, those of long ago; I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like me. ¹⁰ I make known the end from the beginning, from ancient times, what is still to come. I say: My purpose will stand, and I will do all that I please. ¹¹  From the east I summon a bird of prey; from a far-off land, a man to fulfill my purpose. What I have said, that will I bring about; what I have planned, that will I do.  Isaiah 46:9-11 (NIV)

¹ Then Joseph could no longer control himself before all his attendants, and he cried out, “Have everyone leave my presence!” So there was no one with Joseph when he made himself known to his brothers. ² And he wept so loudly that the Egyptians heard him, and Pharaoh's household heard about it. ³ Joseph said to his brothers, “I am Joseph! Is my father still living?” But his brothers were not able to answer him, because they were terrified at his presence. ⁴ Then Joseph said to his brothers, “Come close to me.” When they had done so, he said, “I am your brother Joseph, the one you sold into Egypt! ⁵ And now, do not be distressed and do not be angry with yourselves for selling me here, because it was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you. ⁶ For two years now there has been famine in the land, and for the next five years there will not be plowing and reaping. ⁷ But God sent me ahead of you to preserve for you a remnant on earth and to save your lives by a great deliverance. ⁸ So then, it was not you who sent me here, but God. He made me father to Pharaoh, lord of his entire household and ruler of all Egypt.”   Genesis 45:1-8 (NIV)

¹⁸ His brothers then came and threw themselves down before him. “We are your slaves,” they said. ¹⁹ But Joseph said to them, “Don't be afraid. Am I in the place of God?
²⁰ You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives. ²¹ So then, don't be afraid. I will provide for you and your children.” And he reassured them and spoke kindly to them.   Genesis 50:18-21 (NIV)

⁷ Mordecai told him everything that had happened to him, including the exact amount of money Haman had promised to pay into the royal treasury for the destruction of the Jews.
⁸ He also gave him a copy of the text of the edict for their annihilation, which had been published in Susa, to show to Esther and explain it to her, and he told him to urge her to go into the king’s presence to beg for mercy and plead with him for her people. ⁹ Hathach went back and reported to Esther what Mordecai had said. ¹⁰ Then she instructed him to say to Mordecai, ¹¹ “All the king's officials and the people of the royal provinces know that for any man or woman who approaches the king in the inner court without being summoned the king has but one law: that he be put to death. The only exception to this is for the king to extend the gold scepter to him and spare his life. But thirty days have passed since I was called to go to the king.”  ¹² When Esther’s words were reported to Mordecai, ¹³ he sent back this answer: “Do not think that because you are in the king's house you alone of all the Jews will escape. ¹⁴ For if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your father's family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to royal position for such a time as this?” Esther 4:7-14 (NIV)

⁸⁹ Your word, O LORD, is eternal; it stands firm in the heavens. ⁹⁰ Your faithfulness continues through all generations; you established the earth, and it endures. ⁹¹ Your laws endure to this day, for all things serve you.   Psalm 119:89-91 (NIV)

²³ The word of the LORD came to Jeremiah: ²⁴ “Have you not noticed that these people are saying, ‘The LORD has rejected the two kingdoms he chose’? So they despise my people and no longer regard them as a nation.” ²⁵ This is what the LORD says: “If I have not established my covenant with day and night and the fixed laws of heaven and earth, ²⁶ then I will reject the descendants of Jacob and David my servant and will not choose one of his sons to rule over the descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.  For I will restore their fortunes and have compassion on them.’”   Jeremiah 33:23-26 (NIV)

¹ Praise the LORD, O my soul. O LORD my God, you are very great; you are clothed with splendor and majesty. ² He wraps himself in light as with a garment; he stretches out the heavens like a tent ³ and lays the beams of his upper chambers on their waters. He makes the clouds his chariot and rides on the wings of the wind. ⁴ He makes winds his messengers, flames of fire his servants. Psalm 104:1-4 (NIV)

³⁵ This is what the LORD says, he who appoints the sun to shine by day, who decrees the moon and stars to shine by night, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar-- the LORD Almighty is his name.   Jeremiah 31:35 (NIV)

¹¹ “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. ¹² Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. ¹³  You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. ¹⁴ I will be found by you,” declares the LORD, “and will bring you back from captivity. I will gather you from all the nations and places where I have banished you,” declares the LORD, “and will bring you back to the place from which I carried you into exile.”  Jeremiah 29:11-14 (NIV)

BUTTER

“No one can dissuade God from His purposes; nothing can turn Him aside from His plans.”   A.W. Tozer

“Accept surprises that upset your plans…..Leave the Father free Himself to weave the pattern of your days.”   Dom Helder Camara

“Our Lord never worried and was never anxious, because His purpose was never to accomplish His own plans but to fulfill God’s plans.  Fretting is wickedness for a child of God.”   Oswald Chambers 

“Just as there are always blessings to obedience, conversely there will always be consequences to sin.  Every sin carries with it a death sentence – death to trust, death to relationship, death to freedom, etc. etc.  We do not sin merely as unto ourselves either, sin’s tentacles are far reaching and devastating – like a ripple in the water when you cast in a stone.  We get to choose to sin or not but God chooses the consequence.  Just read about what happened to King David after his encounter with Bathsheba and how it affected the rest of his life.  God is severe in His judgments because He knows what sin does to a life and the lives of others.  This is not a winking, joking matter with Him.  It cost Him the life of His Son.  He doesn’t want us to go there (to say the least) – He has far greater, pleasing and perfect plans for us than that.  Also, it is all too important to note, that while a believer in Jesus is forgiven for sin that does not mean there will not be consequences.  Just saying….”  BHY

“Our God is too real, and too big, and too glorious to work according to our human expectations and convenient timetables. He loves us too much to regularly do just what we want when we want in our times of crisis. But he always sees us. He always hears us. And in Christ, he will answer, not necessarily when and how we want, but with the answer we need, painful as it may be for now, for our ultimate good and glory.”  David Mathis

“It is natural for us to wish and to plan, and it is merciful of the Lord to disappoint our plans and to cross our wishes.  For we cannot be safe or happy until we are weaned from our own wills and made simply desirous of being directed by His guidance.  Although we understand this we seldom learn to put it into practice without being trained for a while in the school of disappointment.  The schemes we form look so plausible and convenient that when they are broken we are ready to say, ‘What a pity!’  We try again, and with no better success; we are grieved, and perhaps angry, and plan another, and so on; eventually, in the course of time, experience and observation begin to convince us that we are no more able than we are worthy to choose correctly for ourselves.  The Lord’s invitation to cast our cares upon Him, and His promise to take care of us, appear valuable; and when we have done planning, His plan in our favor gradually opens, and He does more and better for us than we could either ask or think.  I can hardly recollect a single plan of mine, which if it had taken place in the time and the way I wanted would, humanly speaking, have proved my ruin; or at least would have deprived me of the greater good the Lord had designed for me.  We judge things by their present appearance; but the Lord sees them in their consequences.  If we could do the same we would be perfectly of His mind; but since we can’t, it is an unspeakable mercy that He will manage for us, whether we are pleased with His management or not; and it is regarded as one of His heaviest judgments when He gives any person up to the way of their own hearts, and to walk according to their own wisdom.”  Newton

“You are incomparably made, uniquely loved, and powerfully purposed. God's promises for you are without rival, and His plans for you are beyond compare. Perhaps you've felt like you've veered off course, but God's pursuit of us is greater than our ability to wander. If you think you've blown God's plan for your life, rest in this: You, my beautiful friend, are not that powerful. He is a God of restoration and redemption, and He makes all things new.”   Lisa Bevere

“When ours are interrupted, his are not. His plans are proceeding exactly as scheduled, moving us always (including those minutes or hours or years which seem most useless or wasted or unendurable).” Elisabeth Elliot

“He’s making good out of even the bad days.  And God’s good plans are bigger than any of your messes, your regrets, your bad mistakes.  Lord, Thank You:  I am not the mistakes I have made.  I am not the plans I have failed.  I am not the wrongs I have done.  I am not forgotten.  I am not abandoned.  I am not alone. Because You say to the lost: Come. You say to the Unlikely: Beloved.  You say to the Battle Weary: Rest.  In a hard and beautiful world, Your grace is the only pillowed relief for my tired soul to rest in You this week — making all things new.  And all the brave heaved relief & smiled their men.”    Anonymous

HEART SAVOR

• ·         God is in the business of making beauty out of our ashes.  Praise Jesus!
• ·         He has a plan and He wants us to walk in it – period.  It is a plan which is always for our good and His glory and always has our best interest at heart.  Now we see so poorly as in a reflection as in a mirror, then we shall see face to face.  Now we know in part then we shall know fully even as we are fully known.  Quit grumbling!
• ·         Believe me, you want His way not yours.