Plans versus Paths

Introduction

Let me again say welcome to everyone that’s here. Our regular preacher is at a meeting in Arizona. And I say that by way of thanking the elders for inviting me to speak at this time and also let our visitors know not to panic. Come back. The preaching is usually much better.

I want to talk a little bit this morning about our plans versus our path. Are you a planner? You have to have things done a certain way. I’m not saying that’s bad. It’s necessary. It can be a very good thing. In our family, especially when we used to take family vacations. We haven’t done that in a while. My wife was the planner. Okay. And I’m sure the kids will remember a lot of this. I mean, even a day trip to the beach, whatever it was. You get up, she’s got a list. We will begin eating breakfast at the local IHOP at 8 15. That will continue until 9 o’clock, in which we will leave and be at the place so that the tour that begins at 10, we will be on that.

On and on and on and on. A man could get spoiled like that, I’ll tell you. Like a guided tour through life.

But if we turn to Ecclesiastes in the ninth chapter.

Ecclesiastes 9 11. I have seen something else under the sun. The race is not to the swift or the battle to the strong. Nor does food come to the wise or wealth to the brilliant or favor to the learned. But time and chance happen to them all. I will tell you right now, that is the epitome of a Giles family vacation. Right there. We always make sure we have to have the insurance cards because someone’s going to the hospital before the vacation is over. Except for the last one we took a few years ago. And if the kids remember when I got stabbed through the arm by the catfish and it swole up like Popeye’s forearm. No, I am not going to the hospital on this trip.

1. Don't Confuse Your Plans With Your Path

I refuse. Eventually it went down. Vacations. Plans. It’s necessary to make plans for our lives. First Timothy. And the fifth chapter. Timothy is giving instructions there about the care widows. Throughout that chapter, different qualifications we see. But in the fifth chapter, in verse 8, Paul writes anyone who does not provide for their relatives and especially for their own household is denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever. Wow. That’s some responsibility, isn’t it? Providing for one’s family. That takes plans. God feeds the birds, but he doesn’t drop the worms in their nest. They have to go and get them. We have things to do. But this has to be balanced. And I know for much of my children’s formative years, I lived on an airplane.

I was not there. How many times do men, and in our day and age, even women say, you know, I had to sacrifice that time to make a living? Making a living is just the price of admission for having family. That’s a given. You have to provide. But that’s part of our plans. But that’s not necessarily our path. And again, that’s what I want to get across. Don’t confuse your plans with your path. I started thinking about a lot of this as we were studying James, as we concluded this morning. In the fourth chapter. They’re in verses 13 through 16. Now listen, you who say, today or tomorrow, we’ll go into this or that city, we’ll spend a year, carry on business and make money. Sounds like one of my company’s planning sessions for when they’re making the forecast for the next year.

Why you do not even know what will happen tomorrow? What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, if the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that. As it is, you boast in your arrogant schemes. All boasting is evil. Boasting, braggadocious. I’m going to do this, I’m going to do that. Is there anyone in here above the age of 35 whose plans have all worked out just like they plotted? 30? Twenty-five. Okay. If you get down below that. You’ve probably got some things figured out. What is touted most today that I see through television through the educational system at the high school, junior high, where my kids have gone and go.

2. Without God, Just a Plan With No Path

Is you have to get good grades in high school so that you can get into the right school. You get into the right school, you get the right degree. You get the right degree and you graduate and get the right job. Then you get the right spouse. Then you get the right career. Then you get the right retirement. Yes, with the second home, the vacation home, all of the trappings that go along with it. Golf at the villages, whatever that place is. But without God, that’s basically what we see in Luke, the 22nd chapter. When Jesus is relaying for us there, the parable of the rich fool. I’m sorry, Luke 12, not 22.

Luke chapter 12.

We’ll start there in verse 16. And he told them this parable. The ground of a certain rich man yielded an abundant harvest. He thought to himself, what shall I do? I have no place to store my crops. Then he said, This is what I’ll do. I’ll tear down my barns and build bigger ones. And there I will store my surplus grain. And I’ll say to myself, You have plenty of grain laid up for many years. Take life easy. Eat, drink, and be merry. But God said to him, You fool. This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself? And don’t miss this important verse at the end. This is how it will be with whoever stores up things for themselves but is not rich toward God.

God does not enter the thought process for this plan. That’s the same thing as the good grades and the good school and the good career. Without God storing up things for yourself, leaves emptiness to God. What is our plan versus what is our path? And how upset we can get when the plan doesn’t work out. If you’re one of those people, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a man do this, but you know, if someone loaths the dishwasher, guys are great with that. You ever seen a woman come back by and rearrange the top of the dishwasher? They were in there. Close the door, let it go. Don’t rearrange that stuff. Whatever. It washes better, I guess. We want our way. What happens when our earthly plans just don’t seem to come to fruition?

So much frustration. This is the things that the godless chase all the time, though. These riches, this great plan with no path. But guess what? The goddess, their plans failed just as regularly. Trust me, I’ve been there. Their plans failed. Stopped serving God. You know, all of a sudden the tires of my car stopped wearing out. Nobody in the family ever got sick. The devil just left me alone. Wrong. You end up in the same condition with no path. With no God, with no help. That’s life without God. Just a plan. And no matter how hard you try, you cannot make it work out. Because there’s so much beyond your control. I think a lot of times we want to rebel against the path that’s been established.

I want to do my own thing. I’ve lived that as well. It didn’t work out so good. Proverbs in the 16th chapter. A couple of bites of wisdom from Solomon. Proverbs 16, if we look at verse 3. Commit to the Lord whatever you do. And he will establish your plans. Verse 9. In their hearts, humans plan their course. But the Lord establishes their steps. Isn’t that so true? They plan their course. And I’m sorry, I didn’t mention the beginning. I know Tony uses a New American Standard. I use the NIV, so 2011 version, just in case.

3. Abraham: Trusting the Path Versus the Plan

But that’s all it is. And I want to look briefly through scripture at some of the examples in history that we see. Let’s start with Abraham in Genesis. Now, Abraham, for even the Jewish people, even us today, is such a tower of faith. God told them to, you know, pull up everything, leave Ur the Chaldeans, and go to a land I’m going to show you. You’re going to get descendants there. They’re going to take over that land there. You’re going to have a son with your wife Sarah. And, you know, him and Sarah seemed like it was taking a long time, so they had this plan to help God out with Hagar, and that didn’t work out at all. When you try to supplement God’s plan.

Eventually they did have a son. God had promised all this land of his descendants, but in Genesis chapter 23, we see the details of the death of Sarah, his wife.

And if we just look down to the end of that chapter of Genesis 23, so we’ll start there in verse 17. So Ephraim’s field in Macpellah, near Mamre, and I can just feel Tony cringing if he listens to this and my pronunciations of things. Both the field and the cave in it, and all the trees that were within the borders of the field, was deeded to Abraham as his property in the presence of all the Hittites who had come to the gate of the city. Afterward, Abraham buried his wife Sarah in the cave. In the field of Macpella, near Mamre, which is at Hebron, in the land of Canaan. So the field and the cave that were in it were deeded to Abraham by the Hittites as a burial site.

After all this time, Abraham, who was not a poor individual by any means, doesn’t have a place in this land to bury his wife. Doesn’t have it. Not yet. It’s coming for his children. But his plan, I mean, I don’t see this plan. How is this plan working? This is a path. And it took Abraham quite a while to come around to trusting the path that God had him on versus the plan that he was envisioning and the way things were going to be. And sometimes we don’t like that things aren’t going towards our plan. I mean, look at Andre Johnson. Rebuilding again? For three years in a row? I had to throw a sports analogy in there. I don’t typically do that, but he’s got to go.

4. Moses: His Path Gets Pointed Out Again

This is not working out. This is not right. I didn’t plan it this way. I need to do something different. The path that we’re on. Moses in Egypt, just over in Exodus. We read about that. Now Moses grew up a prince. Educated as a prince in this empire. Military tacticians. Architecture, mathematics, studying all these things. Chariot racing, I’m sure. You know where they have the little fish that go down for every lap, or maybe I’m confusing that with Ben Hur, I’m not sure. All of those things. Moses knows. He is a prince in Egypt. He has a plan for these great things that he’s going to accomplish. He’s 40 years old now, but he finds himself running across the desert, fleeing for his life because the Pharaoh is going to kill him.

In Exodus in the second chapter.

All the people at the well there. And he rescues these seven daughters. Exodus chapter 2 and verse 19. When their father had asked, you know, why have you returned so early? In verse 19, and they answered, an Egyptian rescued us from the shepherds. He even drew water for us and watered the flock. When they saw Moses, what do they think he was? What was he to them? He’s an Egyptian. He’s dressed like a prince with whatever he had, and he took off, right? I guess all their head was shaved except for that little braid, you know, that was coming off. Okay, that’s the Ten Commandments. But it gives you an idea. Right? Talk and Heston. That’s probably not how Moses looked, but when you’re a young child and you only have one TV station, these things are imprinted on your mind every Easter.

He was an Egyptian. In power. Of course, he knew his people. He had been taught. And that things weren’t right. But an Egyptian rescued us. From this place where he was, from being a prince to having this authority. Now he is, guess what? A goat herder. Talking about a long way to fall. Did he do that for a couple of years? No. Four decades. Forty years go by. You ever been around built and sheep? No. Lucky you. They’re not the brightest animals. Okay. I guess they do have redeeming qualities, but the smell is not one of them. That’s what Moses is doing. He doesn’t look like an Egyptian anymore. Forty years. Herding sheep like a Bedouin. But his path gets pointed out to him again. Exodus the third chapter.

Start there in verse 10. So now go. I am sending you to Pharaoh to bring my people, the Israelites, out of Egypt. But Moses said to God, Who am I? That I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt. Moses looks around, you know, and he hears a voice from the burning bush and is like, who, me? I’ve been out here for 40 years. I got a different plan. That chariot race thing was a long time ago. God has a different path. His path is going back through Egypt. He begins to try to persuade God that he’s not persuasive. That doesn’t work out either. Go. Get my people. Bring them out. Moses goes. After that, after the plagues, after the Red Sea, after the complaints of the bitter water, after them wanting meat.

When Moses says, God, if you care anything about take me now. I’m ready to go. After all that, he doesn’t get to enter the promised land. Because the event with the rock. Do we look at Moses and say, oh, what a failure? His plan didn’t work out at all.

No. We see Moses at the Transfiguration on the Mount with Elijah, talking with the Lord. They call it the law of Moses because he was there when it was delivered from God. He is a hero of faith. His plans. Not so much. Sometimes we think, why isn’t my life easier? I had a plan. Why aren’t things going my way? And I would ask, who are you? Whose plans are going their way? I can speak from one that, you know, my plans and my path have, you know, diverged. But what’s the path? Are you on the path? No matter what your earthly plans pan out to be. One of those fascinating biblical stories to me, and I every time I read it, I can’t hardly get my head around it.

5. Jonah: God, I Don't Like This Plan

It’s a story of Jonah. The story of Jonah. How many times have I thought to myself, if God would just tell me directly what he wants me to do, then I would not have to worry. I just know exactly what he wanted me to do. If you turn to Jonah in the first chapter there, the first verse, the word of the Lord came to Jonah. Son of Amitia, go to the great city of Nineveh and preach against it because its wickedness has come up before me. But Jonah ran away from the Lord and headed for Torshish. He went down to Joppa where he found a ship bound for that port after paying the fare. He went aboard and sailed for Tarshish to flee from the Lord.

Huh?

That’s crazy. Okay, if you don’t know the history of the Assyrians, and we’re talking about a brutal, a brutal empire. Living in our Western civilization, we don’t have a lot of exposure to some of the things that human beings can do to each other. I’ll tell you now, the Assyrians invented new brutalities. That’s who these people were. Jonah was like, no. Tarsus is on the Atlantic coast of Spain. All the way through the Mediterranean, through the strait, around. Instead of going the other way to Nineveh. Jonah gets on a boat going to Spain. The other side of the med. That doesn’t work out so well. God, I don’t like this plan. And I ain’t doing it. Didn’t work out. After three days in a fish. He kind of comes around in his thinking.

The end of chapter 2, verse 10. And the Lord commanded the fish and it vomited Jonah onto dry land. Chapter 3. Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time. Go to the great city of Nineveh and proclaim to it the message I give you. Jonah obeyed the word of the Lord and went to Nineveh. Yeah, I guess so. Right? Okay. I’m on my way to Nineveh. Now I ask you this. Could God have totally eliminated the ship that Jonah was on with him with it? Everybody that was on it? Had a water spout, lift Jonah off, had the fish just eat him and be done with him and send somebody else to Nineveh? Sure. Sure he could. That wasn’t the path that Jonah was going to be on.

That wasn’t God’s plan. And Jonah knows about God. He gets so angry when he goes and preaches to the Ninevites there. Chapter 4. Second verse. Isn’t this what I said, Lord, when I was still at home? This is what I tried to forestall by fleeing to Tarshus. I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love. A God who relents from sending calamity. Now, Lord, take away my life, for it is better for me to die than to live. You are gracious. You are compassionate. You do not want to bring calamity. So God of heaven, Jonah knew God of heaven isn’t looking down on Nineveh going, wow, I’m about to make a lot of charcoal brickets. Get rid of these folks.

Like Sodom and Gomorrah. But do you remember Sodom and Gomorrah when Abraham was talking with God? If you find 50. What if you find 40? 30, 20, 10. And guess what about Sodom and Gomorrah?

You didn’t even find anybody there that was righteous. God’s looking down on Nineveh and He’s telling Jonah, go. Tell them to repent. He doesn’t want to bring calamity. Jonah knows that. He doesn’t want him to be saved. He wants brickettes. But then God sent the bush to grow up and shade him from the heat and the wind. Then he sends a worm to kill it, and the bush dies. And of course, Jonah, so human.

Verse 9. But God said to Jonah, Is it right for you to be angry about the plant? It is, he said, and I’m so angry, I wish I were dead. Jonah, tell us how you feel. Really? I’m so mad, I wish I was dead. Welcome to the human race. I hope you never get to that point, but if you do, realize you ain’t the first. Moses said the same thing. Elijah, when he ran, there’s only me left. Take me now. Okay, we’re human. We had these plans, right? This ain’t working. What is God telling? But God said, You’ve been concerned about this plant. Though you did not tend it or make it grow, it sprang up overnight and died overnight. And should I not have concern for the great city of Nineveh?

In which there are more than 120,000 people who cannot tell their right hand from their left. And also many animals. You’re worried about this one little plant that gave you some shade. And there’s 120,000 people there that are so young they can’t, they don’t know the difference between right and left.

Is what we have to trust, not our plan. His path. Are we on the path?

We could go on about Saul the Pharisee and his plans. Or Simon the fisherman who became Peter. Ezekiel, the death of his wife, and Jeremiah, who was thrown down in a dry cistern as a prison. And had to live in that small confined space. It must have been horrible. Why isn’t things, aren’t things going right for me? I’m serving God here. And I’m in a well. Joseph in prison. This is not my plan.

6. Jesus: Not My Will, but Yours Be Done

How we fall apart sometimes when our feeble little human plans don’t work out. And if we’re not careful, we can leave the path. Don’t confuse your plans with the path. The greatest example of anyone following God’s plan and the path is our Savior Jesus Christ. Luke the 22nd chapter.

Let’s just read a few verses there, starting in verse 41. He withdrew about a stone’s throw beyond them, knelt down and prayed. Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me. Yet not my will, but yours be done. An angel from heaven appeared to him and strengthened him, and being in anguish, he prayed more earnestly, and his sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground. Not my will, but your will be done. For this purpose he was born. We think about our plans. We think about our path. How much more could God deliver in accordance with his plan? God died so that we could have an avenue. So that we would have a worthy sacrifice to get us back in a right relationship.

That’s what we just remembered here this morning. The bread in the cup. Follow my path. Why? Because I died for you. Not so you could be a brickhead. But so you could be on the path. No matter what happens with the plans that we have here. Those things don’t work out all the time. Don’t get it confused. John 3 16, familiar with that verse. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son. He didn’t want to bring calamity on Nineveh. He doesn’t want to bring calamity on this world. He wants obedience. He wants us to be on the right path. To do the things that we should do. It’s the best way. And if you don’t follow God, that doesn’t mean your plans are going to work out any better.

Conclusion

Because guess what? They won’t. You’ll just have a plan with no path. No matter if you get the retirement home or not. And free health care. But that’s going to be for everybody. Okay. Circling all the way back around to James. Where we started. Where the idea started. Talking about plans. We’re going to go to this place, we’re going to do this, we’re going to do that. We’re going to make this great profit. And we’re going to give our salesman a forecast of this.

Again. Success in anything is rarely an accident. Would you agree with that? We accidentally succeeded with no plan. Plans are necessary for the things that we do in this life. What about the plans that you have spiritually? How much forecasting? I know with a company I work for. Revenues grossing up probably over $30 billion a year, and Tony’s PowerPoint is still much better than theirs. You didn’t get that today. What about spiritual planning? Go and make profit and make gain in the kingdom of the Lord. Do we consider that enough? When we’re making all these plans.

No matter how our earthly life is going. If you haven’t been baptized, that’s a great place to start in your plan. If you don’t know what that is, you need to find out. Planning. We have a lot of new faces here. This is a family to incorporate. What about reaching out? Do you have a plan for that? The idea to do that, to be profitable in the kingdom. Call. Visit a shut in. Making a phone call doesn’t require a lot. If you have a plan. Is it possible you could teach a class next quarter? Is it possible you have some time to babysit for your younger couple? As we talked about in class this morning, a lot of people move here away from their family. This is their family.

We are family. Do we have a plan to try to serve each other? Get to know each other. Help each other. What about your plan if you are married to help your spouse be the best Christian, the best person they could be? Is that part of your plan over the next year to make gain? As a parent to teach your children. As a child, to obey and honor your parents. A plan, an activity. I got things I need to accomplish in the kingdom. A plan for your finances. To contribute here, to contribute other places in the world. When you’re making a living. We set money aside for all kinds of things. Family vacations so that we can have emergency room trips. I can tell you, one American dollar is worth 42.9 Filipino pesos as of last night.

You can do a lot of good with a little bit. Now, obviously, if they’re importing and exporting something into the country, they’re against the same price, but for day-to-day needs of people that are carrying the gospel to places that we may never see. And hopefully I won’t. Do you have a plan to be profitable in the kingdom? To make gain on the path, to grow on the path. Not just the grade and the college and the career and the retirement homes and building bigger barns and tearing them down. You may not get that. Guess what? A lot of people in this book didn’t get that.

Peter said, or Jesus told Peter at the end before he ascended back to heaven, they’re going to take you and lead you where you don’t want to go. That’s your path. I don’t know what you were planning. But this is your path. We need to do what we can in the kingdom. We need to have a plan to grow and do his work. One more verse, and the lesson is yours. In Ephesians in the fifth chapter. An admonition from Paul there. Ephesians 5, verse 1. Follow God’s example, therefore, as dearly loved children, and walk in the way of love. Just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and a sacrifice to God in verse 8. For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord.

Live or walk as children of light. Be on the path. Whatever your plans are, and however those things turn out. Stay on the path that God has laid out. There’s salvation there. He died. We remember that every Sunday morning. If you need to come forward this morning, the prayers of this church, if you have not been washed in baptism for the remission of your sins and establish that relationship required. Christ, we plead you with you to come. There won’t be a better time than today. Come forward as we stand and sing.