The Plan
The Bible teaches that, “as a man thinks, so He is.” The power of God to move mountains in your life is dependent on two things. One, your belief that He can do it, and two, an unshakeable faith in His desire for the best for you. That is a tall order, and if you can learn to trust His will for your life – to the core of your being – you will recognize that the power of your agreement with His Words is paramount. This week, the Children of Israel read the story of their promise to follow God and are reminded that their covenant with Him is irrevocable. This is the most important and least told stories of God’s plan to turn a tribe into a nation – through the power of agreement.
God has been trying to get the same singular message out to humanity for over 3500 years. The Bible is a megaphone with an expanding Covenant through time that started with a promise from God to destroy the evil that constantly tries to separate us from Him. And, if you will look at the meta narrative – the Big Picture – of what God is saying to mankind over the ages, you will find your place in His Story. When you are secure that He is faithful in His desire to win your heart and ease your suffering, the picture will get clearer as you get closer to Him.
The Pattern
Here is His basic pattern for turning YOU into one of His success stories that can change the world with His message of SALVATION: Conception, Development, Production, Marketing, Publicity. Yes, it sounds like a good business plan. But in reality, it’s a great BIBLE plan. It’s a pattern that has repeated throughout the centuries with different names and titles, but it’s the same today as it was then. So just bear with me as I explain.
CONCEPTION: God started in a garden, when He created humanity, male and female. He gave them the breath of life, His Spirit inside us is proof that He is the source of all life. That is where He gave us the free will to choose Him to be our God. When Adam and Eve made the wrong choice, God made a promise to the first married couple. He promised the man would protect the woman, they would have children, the ground would feed them, and that God would crush the head of the serpent with the ‘seed’ of the woman. God used a sacrifice to cover their sin, but their innocence was lost.
DEVELOPMENT: When evil among humanity left God’s daughters bereft, He saved a righteous man and his whole family. Having kept his promise to defeat evil, He washed the earth clean of humanity’s sin. Their first act was to sacrifice a thanksgiving offering to soothe God’s broken heart and He promised to never again destroy earth because of man’s sin. Instead, He would shorten their years, and try to win their hearts. His first command was just STOP killing one another, “because the life of a creature is in the blood”. The beating human heart is the wellspring of life inside the body. Growing to maturity is a process of becoming.
PRODUCTION: When we grow to adulthood, we become capable of producing life. Maturity spawns creativity in us, because we are made in The image of our Creator. What we produce is surely begins with what we are taught as children, but in time become a function of what we think and what choices we decide to make. Production is what happens when what we believe in our mind and what we want in our heart come together to create what we believe is true. If you make wise choices and trust God to govern your behavior, the fruit – your productivity – will be good. Everything God produces is good. What you produce: your ideas, your words, your actions, your projects, your offspring, your labor, your investments – will be evident to all of who (and what) guides your life. By reading Genesis year after year, you can see how righteousness can grow or die over generations of making personal choices. Abraham’s righteousness came by choosing to trust God, first. Then God kept that promise to Abraham’s seed – and it is still in effect for all who choose to follow Him. The promise is to us and our children forever.
MARKETING: Marketing is not what you sell, it is how you message your life to the world. Moses has had a few very rough weeks this far into Exodus! Last week, he came down from God’s Holy mountain with the Ten Commandments after he and 70 Elders saw God for themselves only to find that they could not keep even the first two of God’s 10 Words! They made a golden calf and Moses smashed the tablets! But, Moses also begged God for forgiveness and refused to leave God’s Children behind. He showed them who He trusted because He had been forgiven by God Himself for committing murder – which cost him 40 years of desert wandering.
I believe Moses truly knew what that act of spiritual adultery would cost them. And, the faith Moses had to endure their shame was palpable. You can’t lead people to forgiveness if you have never truly known forgiveness – and that was His life song. Moses lived inside forgiveness – which is why the sacrifice that was sealed this week in the Torah is epic. Did you know that their corporate sin required corporate repentance? Passover blood saved each household, and it was the blood of the sacrifice sprinkled on them when they AGREED to the Covenant at Sinai that made them a Holy Nation. And, that corporate witness stands today as a sign and wonder throughout His Words to us in the Bible. That is why Levites still write out the words of the Law of Moses on animal skins EVEN today.
PUBLICITY: Even as a child, “show and tell” is the way we are taught to share our story. How awesome of God to send His only begotten Son to show us the way back to the garden via the promise – through the ‘seed of the woman.” From Eve to Noah’s Wife, from Sarah to Jochebed, from Elizabeth to Miriam to Anna and beyond, God has chosen both every seed and each womb to bring forth His message. Every single person who makes the choice to believe that God loves us enough to come to earth Himself, enrobed in flesh to become our Passover sacrifice, is another messenger for His love. We who have each been forgiven can personally be a messenger of ‘peace on earth to men of good will!’ I know that is what I want to be.
What other’s perceive about you is evidence of who is leading you. Believe me when I tell you, your life is a testimony of what you believe, even if you can’t see it for yourself. Even a child is known by their actions, whether their conduct is pure and right. Your beliefs will show what you truly know, and your sin will expose itself without your permission. So, be careful! Stay in His forgiveness! Every step of this sequence can hold you back if you get stuck in the revolving door of “why me, God?” Stay at peace and be secure in Him, move forward and take the next step!
The Purpose
“As a man thinks, so he is”. So, here’s what I think: I am forgiven, so I can lead others – like Moses – to forgiveness. I can be like Yeshua, a child of God, and point the way back to the one who can show me the pathway home. I can be a light to the world – a messenger of His love. After years of grappling with how to best get this GOOD NEWS of eternal life out to all mankind, I now realize that this Biblical pattern has been there the whole time! The message of salvation through the blood of the lamb is the megaphone that can turn my single voice into a trumpet for God – because I am the message. And, so are you!
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