I had a plan…When I was about 13, there was a skunk that hung out around our house.
My Dad used to complain about it. Our neighbors dog would bark and it would spray, and the house smelled like…well…skunk for a few days.
Dad was worried that one of us would be outside at night and we would inadvertently stumble across this skunk and get ourselves sprayed.
Well, I had a plan. I borrowed a trap from my uncle, the humane kind that simple slammed a door on the animal and then you could transport it someplace and release it.
I set the trap up and in the morning I was surprised to find that I had caught a black cat. I opened the door and it took off like a rocket!
I reset the trap and the next morning I found I had caught another back cat. I’m sure it wasn’t the same black cat, how stupid do you have to be to get caught in the same trap twice.
Once again I reset the trap and in the morning I could hardly believe it, I had caught another back cat…only as I was getting ready to release the cat I noticed it had a white stripe down its back.
I must have let out a cry or something because the “cat” got scared…I said I had a plan….I didn’t say it was a good one.
God had a plan. He would be close to His creation!
God created Adam. He wanted to be with Him and in fact He did walk with Him in the garden. But that snake the devil, tempted them and sin entered God’s world.
Over the course of time Satan turned the hearts and minds of most people on earth against God. Because of the sin and rebellion in their hearts he could not have the kind of relationship with them that He had always wanted, so he called a man…Noah. And his plan is to erase most of mankind, and start again.
So God told Noah to build a boat…on dry land. And he gave Noah a simple sermon to preach while he built that boat, just 3 words, “I’ts gonna rain!”
But see, where God has a plan, Satan has a plot.
Like a chess game, back and forth they go…
Satan too finds a man, his name is Nimrod, and he is instrumental in creating 2 civilizations, Assyria and Babylon.
These two civilizations become a thorn in God’s side.
They lead the people of the earth to join together and build a tower…the tower of babel.
…a monument to their humanity, ingenuity and independence.
Now it’s God’s move and He eliminates their means of communication. They can no longer understand each other, and so the project comes to a halt. And the people are scattered.
God finds another man in the land of Ur, his name is Abraham, and God says, “Thru him I will build my own nation!”
Satan makes a counter move, Pharaoh takes God’s people captive in Egypt.
God’s move now…He calls Moses…”Set my people free!”
Satan responds and chases them to the edge of the Red Sea.
God’s move…the sea opens and they walk across on dry land.
Throughout the entire Old Testament it is move and counter move. With no clear winner!
Then comes 400 years of silence. Between the Old and New testaments…I think they were both just studying the board.
In the New Testament…God turns to the offensive!
Up until now called a man, and used a man…
Finally God says, “I am taking care of this myself!”
And He becomes flesh…
John 1:1 says, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”
Jesus was with God in the beginning. Capital “W” on Word.
He always was. But Verse 14 says:
John 1: “The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us.”
Jesus, God in the flesh, came to earth.
Very human: “tired and thirsty”, “wept”
Very God: “raised Lazarus, Jairus’ daughter, healed blind…”
He came to earth for you and me.
But sin separates God and man.
It has since the garden…and it does today.
Adam and Eve, first thing they did after sinned…hid!
Sin makes us hide from God. Why some stay out of church.
Think they’re too bad. No one is too bad for God.
If sin in your life, this is where you belong.
If it weren’t for our need Jesus wouldn’t have come!
Because we all have sinned…”wages of sin is death.”
This time of the year we are all making a special effort to be “good”. Reminds me of a young boy…writing letter to God…”I’ve been good for 6 months…3 months, 2 weeks…went over to window and the manger scene w/2 figures, Mary and Joseph. Took Mary, went back to writing, “Dear Jesus, if you ever want to see your mother again…”
Jesus came to us because no matter how hard we try, we aren’t good enough to earn heaven…Because we were far from Him, He made the first gesture to bring us close.
Michelangelo painted a number of beautiful scenes on the ceiling of the Sistine chapel. Of all the scenes I think my favorite is the one that shows God reaching out to man.
God is leaning toward man, and man is reclining back, but is lifting his hand toward God.
It is easy to see from the picture that god has the greater desire to touch man. His finger is outstretched, his arm straight.
While the image of man is curious, leaning ahead slightly.
Still holding back. Trying to be good, reaching godward.
There is a neat feature on Windows XP…it’s called “System restore”. Here’s how it works…
Suppose you suffer a system crash on Thursday, you downloaded a bad program or something…You’re not a computer expert and you aren’t sure how to recover the last 2 weeks of financial information you had saved on your computer on Wednesday, or how to get back your daughter’s history paper she did on Monday, and you lost your favorite computer game.
All you have to do is select, “System restore” and specify the date to which you want your machine reset.
Voila! Problem solved! All the things you somehow messed up are now put back the way they should have been.
Wouldn’t you like to be able to market that for human lives?
Joe could system restore to the day before he had the affair.
Sue could go back to the day before she and her daughter had the big fight.
Tom could go back to the day before he ran away from home.
Jess could go back to the date before she first did drugs.
God came so he could system restore each of our lives.
Because we have all messed up. We have all sinned.
What windows calls system restore, God calls forgiveness and salvation.
God came down, and wants to give you a system restore.
For that to happen Jesus couldn’t just come to earth and live as a baby, or a man. Jesus had to die.
When Jesus was crucified on Calvary I think Satan pushed back from the board. With a smirk on His face, he thought he’d won.
But God had one more move! On Easter morning Jesus rose from the grave…Death was defeated, and the way to eternal life was made available to you and me.
Checkmate! God wins! The plan is fulfilled!
God wants to be close to you. You are the reason he came, (ou are the reason for the season! He will do whatever it takes to see that plan through. All Because He loves you.
They didn’t know that first Christmas day.
Not really, who He was and what He’d do.
But we know.
Prayer
