God's Plan does not always feel good.
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· 10 viewsGod's plan is a good plan even if it does not feel good at the time.
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Promises sound good, don’t they?
Promises sound good, don’t they?
Our scripture this afternoon in our brief time is one we may all be familiar with
For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.
So we know the verse, we call on it knowing God has good plan with a hope and future for us. But we need to know the context. In the midst of captivity they were given the promise of Jer29:11.
There is the requirement
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 search for Me with all your heart.
In the midst of our hard times, the times of tribulations, maybe times of trials or just difficult times we can learn from this to call on the name of the Lord. Now just a little more then I will develop my thought on this.
There is the promise (v.11); the requirement (vv.12-13) and then there is the proof
14 ‘I will be found by you,’ declares the Lord, ‘and I will restore your fortunes and will gather you from all the nations and from all the places where I have driven you,’ declares the Lord, ‘and I will bring you back to the place from where I sent you into exile.’
Now written to a captive Israel, what can we learn from it for us today?
Ever ask God why He allowing you go through something? Maybe to try you, to test you, to grow you, to prove you? But when you look at the passage it says
“I know the thoughts I have toward You”
It is not about my thoughts, it is about God’s thoughts, God’s plan
The word plan in Hebrew is
Machashabah - defined as thoughts
So God knows the thoughts and the thoughts about me, about you.
Do we want Gods thoughts and Gods plan? Of course we do, but we normally want them without pain, without suffering, without hardship. But it is not about me, and my plan’s and my thoughts it is about God and Gods thoughts and God’s plan.
My thoughts, my plan, my behavior, my performance does not change God’s plan and God’s thoughts.
13 When you were dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions, 14 having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.
His thoughts and His plan made us alive and forgave our sins
God’s thoughts and God’s plan is working in us, not us working in Him.
13 for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.
Work in you for His good pleasure. The God of the O.T. many call the God of wrath and the God of the N.T. the God of grace and one in the same for God does not change.
6 “For I, the Lord, do not change; therefore you, O sons of Jacob, are not consumed.
He has good plans for He is love
8 The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love.
The one who understands that God has a good plan with a hope and a future. knows the God who knows everything about us.
1 O Lord, You have searched me and known me.
The God who created me in His image
27 God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.
That chose us before the world was formed
Gen1:27
11 also we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to His purpose who works all things after the counsel of His will, 12 to the end that we who were the first to hope in Christ would be to the praise of His glory.
Who does not make junk, or make a mistake,
Eph1:11-12
15 My frame was not hidden from You, When I was made in secret, And skillfully wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. 16 Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed. And in Your book they all were written, The days fashioned for me, When as yet there were none of them.
HE brought us forth
6 By You I have been sustained from my birth; You are He who took me from my mother’s womb; My praise is continually of You.
We are held together, we are sustained by Him and for Him, thoughts that are countless (Psm139:17-18)
So I entitled this God’s plan does not always feel good and asked what can we learn from Jer29:11.
We can learn that sometimes we are pruned so we can bear more fruit
2 “Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit.
Sometimes we are disciplined by a goo father
6 For those whom the Lord loves He disciplines, And He scourges every son whom He receives.”
While pruning (conviction) and correction (discipline) still hurt we can be confident that God’s good plan, Good thoughts, Good promise is always good.
And because we know these things we can do as it says in Hebrews
16 Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
We can call on the name of the lord in confidence and come to the throne of grace in our hard times, difficult times, hurting times and trying times knowing He knows the thoughts and the thoughts He has for us! And we can walk in those!