When God Makes A Plan...

When God Makes a Plan…

Matthew 26:1-5, 14-16

June 21, 2009

Note: The ME/WE/GOD/YOU/WE format is from Andy Stanley’s book, "Communicating for a Change." Unfortunately, I’ve still got a way to go before I’ve fully implemented the book!

Before I get into the message, I’d like to just take a moment and encourage you to go to my blog, “Living Intentionally,” which you can find by going to www.brianlacroix.com, or by going to the website and following the link on the page about me there.

I’m not saying that as an advertisement for the blog. I’ve had it for a couple years, but haven’t been real regular in posting to it, but yesterday I posted the first of a series on the power of the quiet time.

Each part will discuss one reason why it’s so important that we spend regular time with God in His Word and prayer.

I also share my own struggles in being consistent with quiet times, because I don’t ever want to come across like I’ve got it all figured out or that I’m perfect in all this.

But I don’t want you to just go and read the posts. I’d like you to respond with your thoughts and your stories on how you interact with God during your quiet times, as well as give suggestions for folks who would like to either develop the habit or rekindle it in their own lives.

You can respond by clicking on the little post-it note looking thing at the top of the post.

I’m hoping this will be an encouragement to you, but I really do want to hear from you on this very important topic, okay?

Me/We:

I think many of us sit here today in a situation that we hadn’t planned on as we were growing up, or even a few years ago, right?

You had dreams and goals that either you set for yourself or someone like a parent set for you.

But here you are, and those things haven’t come to pass.

I had started out wanting to be a cowboy, a fireman, a paramedic, and a high school band director. And in my mid-30’s I became a pastor.

That wasn’t my plan! But apparently it was God’s.

Or we look around. Crime, war, religious persecution, big-name Christians having public moral failings, and all sorts of stuff leave many wondering if God’s really got a handle on things.

And even on a local church level – there’s squabbling, grumbling, scandals, and splits.

Do God’s plans really work all the time?

Can something happen to throw God’s plans off track?

Can people get in the way of what God wants to have happen in a given circumstance or situation?

Well, people try – all the time. And the Scripture passage for today gives an example of that.

But it’s also an example of how God works to bring His plans to action. And I hope that you’ll find some personal encouragement as we go through this.

God: We’re going to be looking at two short passages in Matthew 26 (p. 703) that bookend a special anointing with perfume that Jesus had received a few days before.

There are three pieces to this part of the story, but they all work to show us what God had in mind as Jesus walked closer and closer to what He knew was coming in just three short days.

We start with a brief statement that Jesus makes while He is on His way back to Bethany to spend the night on Tuesday.

This comes the end of the recorded conversation He’s just had with His disciples that started in chapter 24 and included His talk about the end times and His upcoming return.

Now He changes the subject to what’s going to be happening starting in the next couple of days, here in the first two verses of chapter 26 –

1 When Jesus had finished saying all these things, he said to his disciples, 2 "As you know, the Passover is two days away--and the Son of Man will be handed over to be crucified."

This is the fourth time in this gospel that Jesus predicts His death, but this is the first time He lets the disciples know that His death would come during the Passover – this Passover.

While this conversation is happening, we find that the religious leaders haven’t just been sitting around.

Verses 3-5 –

3 Then the chief priests and the elders of the people assembled in the palace of the high priest, whose name was Caiaphas, 4 and they plotted to arrest Jesus in some sly way and kill him. 5 "But not during the Feast," they said, "or there may be a riot among the people."

The phrase “not during the Feast” is incredibly significant.