When God Messes Up Our Plans

When God Messes Up Our Plans

Watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=42NAzO5fKLI

When Jesus was born, nobody expected it, and nobody made plans for it. But what it did was mess up everyone’s plans.

• It messed up King Herod’s plan of being king because here was a new King. The Wise Men announced, “Where is He who is born King of the Jews?”

• It messed up the Wise Men’s plans for up to and possibly over a year. When they saw the star, they had to make other arraignments for their home and their trip.

• It messed up the Shepherds’ plan for a quite night of watching the sheep. Instead, they found themselves leaving their flocks to go and find the baby, and then they left to tell everyone the good news.

• It messed up the religious leaders’ plans in Jerusalem. They wanted a Messiah who would be a political king, who would set them free from their Roman captivity. But instead, they were introduced to a suffering Messiah, one who said, “Turn the other cheek,” and “Love your enemies.” Not the stuff they wanted from their Messiah.

But most of all it messed up Joseph and Mary’s plans. Here was a young couple with stars in their eyes looking forward to a simple quite life where they would work and raise little Mary’s and Joseph’s of their own.

But during the engagement period, God appears and messes with their plans saying, “Guess what, I’ve got something bigger, better, and far more rewarding for you.”

And so, Mary becomes pregnant through the Holy Spirit who places inside her womb, Jesus, the Son of God, the second person of the Godhead. Now, try to explain that to your fiancé. Try&& to convince your family and friends that the life you had planned was now totally different because God showed up and messed with it.

Now, most of us know what I'm talking about when I say God showed up and messed with our plans. For myself I can give a lot of different examples of how God saw my plans and said, “Nope, I’ve got something bigger, better, and more rewarding.66

It was such a change of plans that sees me here today. I thought I was going to be a multimillion-dollar businessman. But God said no, and used my business partner to bankrupt the company, which eventually saw me attend seminary and afterwards take over the church in Las Vegas.

Thinking about how our plans get messed up reminds me of a story where a woman in New York took her son to visit Santa Claus. When she got there, she realized that the man playing Santa was actually her ex-husband who hadn’t been paying child support. She came back three hours later with a court injunction. That guy got his plans messed up and I don’t think he was very merry about it.

The point is that our plans don’t always go the way we want. But what we also need to realize is that God is not always the one messing with our plans. Anything that is evil isn’t from God, because God is not the author of evil. The other thing is that a lot of my plans get messed up because of my own stupidity. But what God does promise is that He will work out these evil things for our good and for Kingdom of God good (Romans 8:28).

So, when God messes up our plans, or when He sovereignly changes the circumstances to bring about another ending than what was planned, how are we to take it? I mean, what can we do to not allow these plan changes to wreak havoc in our lives?

1. God’s Trying to Get Our Attention

God’s plan for Joseph and Mary was so far out there, so fantastic and unbelievable, that God used an angel to convince them of its reality. But please understand we don’t need wait for an angel for our plans to be messed up.

You see, the reason why God messes with our plans is because they’re just that, our plans, not His. And the problem is that we haven’t been listening. Instead, we’re listening to others say what we should be doing, or who we are to be. We listen to the TV, movies, or Internet, that tell us, “This is the way to find fulfillment,” or “This should be your goal in life.”

And so, to rearrange our thinking and our lives, God shouts at us through such things as pain and suffering. C.S. Lewis said, “God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks to us in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: It is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.”

The Lord said, “If my people would but listen to me … how quickly would I subdue their enemies and turn my hand against their foes” (Psalm 81:13-14). But because they wouldn’t listen, the Lord said that He would give them over to the stubborn hearts to follow their own devices.