God's Purpose in our lives

ursen

Officer SOE/LoE/Where's "here"?
Ok this is not an argumentative funsy topic, it is one I and many Christians struggle with. The question is:
Is it possible for a Christian to fail so badly that it totally derails God's plan for you life? I mean so radically fail that what was a ministry, and purpose totally falls apart, and nothing is left. That your life becomes such chaos and disaster that even the Psalms don't capture the essence of it. That the world's view of you changes permanently.
Can even this derail God's plan for your life? And before someone can quote it, here is Romans 8:28.
Romans 8:28
And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.

My own personal opinion can wait until later.
 
I tend to agree with Ewoks on this, on the grander scale. For example, good luck in ever having derailed God's plan of salvation, or God's plan of getting his chosen out of Egypt.

But the question I have asked myself often is: How do we know that Moses was Plan A and not Plan B? How do we know that Jonah was Plan A and not Plan B. How do we know that Mary and Joseph were Plan A and not Plan B.

I think of experiences in my life, where I was faced with the obvious decision: I have to speak these words to this person, I feel these words are from God and in a moment of desperation and doubt I don't speak them, somebody else comes out of the blue and does. How do I know if I was Plan A to speak those words to the person or was I Plan B especially when in my hesitation somebody else comes and takes the words from my mouth?

tldr; You are not going to derail God's sovereign plan, (satan has been trying a long time) but you might find yourself left on the sidelines when you least expect it.
 
Avesther your last sentence was more where I was going, I totally agree God's overall plan cannot be derailed, but the question is whether or not His plans for me can be sidetracked.
 
A man once quoted me Romans 8:28 the day after my house burned down. He was correct but at the time I could not see it. I wanted to punch him in the nose and ask if that worked for good. However, 5 years later, I can see it.

In our finite view, it's hard to see God's sovereignty in everything. But God's sovereignty is infinite as well as His viewpoint. We see this dichotomy in human interaction with God. Thru prayer, a man was given additional years of life. God was willing to spare Sodom if 10 righteous men could be found in the city. God knows what he is/was going to do and nothing we do can change that. But, we have free will in all things.

As a man, a husband and a preacher, I could go out and do things that would destroy my marriage, my ministry and my testimony. It is my free will to do those things but, nothing I do will surprise God nor disrupt His plans. God has a plan A for my life. But he also has a plan B, a plan C ect. But none of these changes His infinite plans.
If we had no free will to obey or disobey His plan and His will, there would be no need for the Holy Spirit to live within us and give us discernment.
 
The Bible does seem to teach that you can "quench the Spirit" (1 Thessalonians 5:19) and God will not choose to do much of His kingdom building through you when you are in this position. Does that sidetrack His plans for you? Probably not, His plans for you were always to go through a very hard time of suffering in order to fully submit yourself to Him at the end of the period. I don't think the God of the Universe who already knows the future and how it all unfolds, is a reactionary God who waits to see what you do and then changes His plans accordingly. That is too small of a God and confines him to time restraints.

To say that God has a plan A,B,C seems to imply that God is going through life with us like its all new to Him and He has to learn/respond on the fly. That is the heresy of open theism is it not?

I believe the reformed theology view of "The best of all Worlds" so that, in the long run, His glory will be more fully displayed and His people more fully satisfied than would have been the case in any other world. There is only plan A.
 
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If God already knows the future then He already knows all the challenges I will face and mistakes I will make. His plan would have to already be a part of that because He already knows what will happen.

Why would a God who knows the future and all the decisions that I will make before I have made them make 2, 3 or 1000 plans for my life? Why make plans that He knows will fail from the start?

That's not to say I won't regret things I choose to do. I may sorrow Him with my actions. But I won't surprise Him. It may not be His desire that I do certain things, but He already knew I was going to do them beforehand.

And to counter the somewhat fatalistic view of God knowing everything that is going to happen: I do not know what is going to happen. I still need to make choices in the present and I will still reap the consequences (good or bad) of those choices.
 
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Isaiah 45:9b (NIV)
Does the clay say to the potter,
‘What are you making?’
Does your work say,
‘The potter has no hands’?


Isaiah 46:10 (NIV)
I make known the end from the beginning,
from ancient times, what is still to come.
I say, ‘My purpose will stand,
and I will do all that I please.’


Daniel 2:21 (NIV)
He changes times and seasons;
he deposes kings and raises up others.
He gives wisdom to the wise
and knowledge to the discerning.


Psalm 147:5 (NIV)
Great is our Lord and mighty in power;
his understanding has no limit.


Psalm 139:1-4 (NIV)
You have searched me, LORD,
and you know me.
You know when I sit and when I rise;
you perceive my thoughts from afar.
You discern my going out and my lying down;
you are familiar with all my ways.
Before a word is on my tongue
you, LORD, know it completely.


(Actually, almost every verse in Ps139 talks about God's infinite knowledge and power)

After reading these, do you really think that God doesn't already know what your next sin will be? Do you think that He doesn't already know if you will respond appropriately to the struggles in your future?

I don't think God needs a "Plan B" because He already knows how many people won't help the guy that's hungry on the street corner, and which one will finally feed him. I don't think of it as a "Plan A" and "Plan B" but all one giant plan in which 20 people are meant to pass over an opportunity because they're not ready for it yet.

John 9:1-3 (NIV)
As he went along, he saw a man blind from birth. His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”

“Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” said Jesus, “but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him.


Just as the blind man did nothing wrong, his parents did nothing wrong (to cause the blindness, anyway), there are things that happen just so God can reach out and teach us. Why did the other priests all along not heal the blind man? Because God needed him to be blind in order for Jesus to teach the disciples (and us) a lesson.

tl;dr: You can't derail the plan. Where you are at any given moment in your life is the plan.
 
Just to carry a thought into the great God mystery - And I know there is a huge theological debate behind this point, bring it up if you wish:

If God knows everything (and I believe God does) then what is the purpose behind waiting as long as possible so that none will be lost? For example: Why give Noah 120 years to preach to his unbelieving neighbours and in the end, save only 7, his family? God's patience appears to have limits, and if God knew in the end only 7 would be saved, why wait 120 years, why not simply start the flood with the conversion of the 7th person if no more would be saved?

This is where that free will theology can come in. I don't understand this aspect of God and I don't wish to give or take away from God in attempting to make it somehow clear to me. This is where my logic fails. Maybe, God doesn't know what your free will decision will be, out of Gods choice. Or maybe God knows all the possible choices and in Gods infinite wisdom, is able to make any choice work to his will? Maybe my terms of Plan A and Plan B are not the most appropriate ways to understand the will of God. That is in my infinite human stupidity one way I try to understand free will and God's omni-everything.

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God's plan is too big for me to understand, sometimes, breaking it up to Plan A and Plan B also help me string together (with my unique logic) the tools I need to understand God.

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I'm just sitting here contemplating that maybe God waiting 120 years was not for the benefit of Noah's neighbours but rather us today to come to grips with Gods patience as to why we see God not quickly stricking down those who we consider evil, ie...Osama Bin Laden, Jeffrey Dalmer, the rapists and murders of the world.) That's Plan C in my mind.
 
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If God knows everything (and I believe God does) then what is the purpose behind waiting as long as possible so that none will be lost? For example: Why give Noah 120 years to preach to his unbelieving neighbours and in the end, save only 7, his family? God's patience appears to have limits, and if God knew in the end only 7 would be saved, why wait 120 years, why not simply start the flood with the conversion of the 7th person if no more would be saved?
I would suggest that God waited because (not that I know the mind of God)
a) Those people would be completely without excuse.
b) For those who come after to realize those destroyed were without excuse and for us to see the incredible patience and mercy of God.

Maybe, God doesn't know what your free will decision will be, out of Gods choice. Or maybe God knows all the possible choices and in Gods infinite wisdom, is able to make any choice work to his will? Maybe my terms of Plan A and Plan B are not the most appropriate ways to understand the will of God. That is in my infinite human stupidity one way I try to understand free will and God's omni-everything.
Consider written prophecy in the Bible. How do those work without foreknowledge? How do those work with a plan A and plan B?

I'm just sitting here contemplating that maybe God waiting 120 years was not for the benefit of Noah's neighbours but rather us today to come to grips with Gods patience as to why we see God not quickly stricking down those who we consider evil, ie...Osama Bin Laden, Jeffrey Dalmer, the rapists and murders of the world.) That's Plan C in my mind.
Or just part of the plan. :D
 
Consider written prophecy in the Bible. How do those work without foreknowledge? How do those work with a plan A and plan B?

The prophesy of Jesus doesn't quite include the names of Joseph and Mary. It does include their lines...so anybody from those lines would've been candidates. Just saying.
 
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Does that mean that God didn't know, or that we just didn't know? The prophecies also indicated that Jesus would be a king... It didn't happen how the Jews thought it would. Does that mean the prophet was wrong or that God works in ways we don't fully understand until we look back and process everything in hindsight?
 
The prophesy of Jesus doesn't quite include the names of Joseph and Mary. It does include their lines...so anybody from those lines would've been candidates. Just saying.
They did give the location of his birth.

And the prophecies proclaiming Jesus' birth are not the only prophecies. Many of the prophecies include a specific period of time before the indicated event happens.
 
The way I see it is, God plants seeds of who he is into all of us. The reason why I am able to simultaneously process multiple streams of possible outcomes to any given situation and the most likely consequences for them has to come from somewhere, have a purpose and point to something.

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As for sitting on the sidelines, yeah, I think it can happen. Ask Jonah...he sat on the sidelines in a whale. Moses sat on the sidelines permanently as the people he help God lead out of Egypt and around the desert for 40 years entered the promised land while he did not. David waited and lamented on the sidelines for an heir after God took his first child from him. I think in every situation God's plan was never set aside, just your part in it may have had to be delayed or actually set aside. Think of Moses and the chosen people: 40 years in the desert is pretty much a whole generation that did not get to enter into the promised land. Those people who got up and left captivity in Egypt on the hope of getting into the promised land....didn't! Woah...the coach seemed to have sidelined them. But in the end, that side lining did not stop God's plan of getting his people into the promised land.
 
The difficulty is that we'll never know (on this side of Forever, anyway) is whether or not God had planned it all that way from the beginning or not. Does He need to "think" about all the different paths, or is He all-knowing and all-powerful enough to just make it happen all in one giant, unbroken line... exactly how He planned it?

I think you're on the right track. Genesis tells us that we are created in God's image (Gen 1:26-27). Based on that, I think God made us capable of logic and reasoning and all the things that make thinking through various possibilities....possible.

But in Isaiah, we read that God's ways are higher than our ways (Isa 55:8-9). He doesn't reason the same way we do. He doesn't think the same way we do. God reasons, builds, crafts, plans in ways we are not capable of, much less understanding completely. I suspect that God doesn't need a "Plan B" (or however you choose to describe it) because He is just that far beyond us.
 
The difficulty is that we'll never know (on this side of Forever, anyway) is whether or not God had planned it all that way from the beginning or not. Does He need to "think" about all the different paths, or is He all-knowing and all-powerful enough to just make it happen all in one giant, unbroken line... exactly how He planned it?

I think you're on the right track. Genesis tells us that we are created in God's image (Gen 1:26-27). Based on that, I think God made us capable of logic and reasoning and all the things that make thinking through various possibilities....possible.

But in Isaiah, we read that God's ways are higher than our ways (Isa 55:8-9). He doesn't reason the same way we do. He doesn't think the same way we do. God reasons, builds, crafts, plans in ways we are not capable of, much less understanding completely. I suspect that God doesn't need a "Plan B" (or however you choose to describe it) because He is just that far beyond us.

In my mind it comes down to IF the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are one and the same and yet three separate, how is it that only the Father knows certain things that the others do not? Is it a choice that God the son Jesus does not know the timing of the second coming? IF God can choose to not reveal such information to Jesus (which is God the Son) then it might well be possible that God choose to withhold information from himself.

For me to reconcile my understanding for free will and predestination and foreknowledge and prophecy I can envision a God (as imperfect my envisioning is) that can choose to know choices and choose to not know them. It is how my mind can wrap itself around the idea that God knew Noah to have him build the arc while waiting until the very last moment in case one person would choose to believe before sending the flood.

God must have emotions because I have emotions and those emotions were all manifested in Jesus. Jesus knew what was going to happen while praying in the garden...yet he feared it so much so that he asked for that cup to be taken from him, knowing full well it wouldn't. This is evidence for me as to why how I perceive the world is in some way related to how God sees it.

Maybe the best way to describe it is:

My God always has a plan regardless of what I choose to do.
 
how is it that only the Father knows certain things that the others do not? Is it a choice that God the son Jesus does not know the timing of the second coming? IF God can choose to not reveal such information to Jesus (which is God the Son) then it might well be possible that God choose to withhold information from himself.

To be honest, I've struggled with this very point. I don't have an answer. I don't even understand it at all. I just chalk it up to one of the points in which God is greater in His thinking than I in mine... is it withholding or intention disregarding? Quite possibly.

Jesus knew from the beginning of his public ministry that He would be treated poorly, rejected by His own people, and eventually die on a cross. He knew that the Father would raise Him from the grave. How or why would He have that knowledge, yet not the date of the Second Coming?

I can only assume it's something akin to the fact that when we accept Jesus, the Father sees us and treats us as only Jesus deserves to be treated. He forgives and forgets our sins that He took upon Himself so we can be white as snow (Isaiah 1:18). Beyond that, I cannot comprehend it.

My God always has a plan regardless of what I choose to do.

On this and your other thoughts, we agree wholeheartedly.
 
I know Jesus came to fulfill Father God's plan of redemption with the Holy Spirit's power, since Jesus laid down His God Powers to become a Man fully and yet still be God fully. Then took the seat of power at the right hand of God when He ascended victorious over sin and death! "It is finished."

Here are 4 pages from a Bible class I took titled: The Person of the Holy Spirit (Spring semester 2006)

ThePersonoftheHolySpirit1.jpg

ThePersonoftheHolySpirit2.jpg

ThePersonoftheHolySpirit3.jpg

ThePersonoftheHolySpirit4.jpg

This will show that Yes, Jesus agreed before the foundation of the world to NOT know the time of the Second Coming. Page 3 shows in B.5.c. : We could say, "the will of God comes out of the Father-is administrated by the Son-and is executed by the Holy Spirit."

Please take the time to do the short study presented here as I know it will help. (And this was JUST the first class :D)

God bless all of us with greater wisdom and knowledge of Him <3

Just to add, Jesus is happy to be the Son and allow Father God to be Father and the Holy Spirit to be the Holy Spirit. There is no evil striving/jealousy etc. God is Perfect Blessed Trinity <3 and just like a natural father doesn't tell his son everything he knows, yet will guild him as needed and share wisdom as the son asks for it or as the natural father determines the son needs it to fulfill his duties to the father. Like Jesus said at 12 yrs old Luk_2:49 And he said unto them, How is it that ye sought me? wist ye not that I must be about my Father's business?
 
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Going back to the original question about God's plan for our life - here is an interesting take on the Prodigal Son and our best plans for our life - from Stuff Christians Like.
 
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