Okay, good morning, everybody.
That's not bad, not bad.
Today we're continuing our series in Proverbs, and again, we're going to do a tag team approach.
Oscar's going to be sharing for part of the session.
I'm going to be sharing as well for part of the sermon.
And really, one of the hearts of what we're trying to do as Watermark is to be able to
use different gifts to develop and to grow as God moves us on, and as we raise up and
develop leaders and people who can preach in different ways.
And so it's very much some of the heart of what we're trying to do as a church, which
is why we have different people preaching at different times.
This sermon, how many of you thought there was going to be a typhoon today?
Okay, there's a few people.
We're talking today about planning, and I think it's totally ironic because we were going to
talk about this sermon last week.
And then a typhoon 8 comes in and completely messes up all of my plans.
My whole sermon series has been changed completely because God seems to know that we need a life
lesson sometimes in what planning looks like and the sovereignty of God looks like in our
lives.
And I don't know about you, but actually, a lot of the struggles that I think we have in
faith in our lives are actually because of that collision between our plans and what God
seems to be doing in the world, right?
You see, I've got a really good friend.
Seven years, he was planning language learning, planning, gathering a team to go and do mission
work in Kurdistan in Iraq.
Seven years.
Finally, he'd got the team together.
He'd got everything together.
It spent a lot of time, a lot of effort.
And then a few months before, his wife gives birth to a child, and the child has Down syndrome.
And they're unable to go after seven years.
And those questions come, well, it was supposed to be for you, God.
So what's going on here?
Why do you sometimes, God, seem to interrupt the plans, even the very good plans that we
seem to make?
And sometimes, I don't know about you, but we ask those questions which are, well, if
God is really good, why has he let this happen?
Why has he not worked things out the way that I thought they were going to work out?
And so that's kind of what we're going to have a little look at today in terms of how God
works in our lives through these plans and what he's up to in the world.
So if I can ask you a question, what's your plan for your life?
What's your plan for your life?
Some of you may say, I have no idea.
But if I asked you, in 20 years' time, where would you like to be?
What would you like to be doing?
How many kids would you like to have?
Would you like to be married or single?
How much money?
What level of comfort?
What would you like to happen in your family?
Those are things which actually tell you what your plan for your life is.
That's your vision for where you want to go in life.
And so we're looking at this book of Proverbs, and we're looking at what it means to have
chokmah.
Do you remember chokmah?
Chokmah is the word for wisdom.
It's a world where there isn't a formula, a kind of plug-and-play formula for how to live.
And there are many situations, we just don't have a set answer.
The Bible doesn't kind of say, okay, go to page three, and there you go.
You're going to be able to sort out all your problems in life.
It doesn't work quite like that.
And we need chokmah.
We need this wisdom which comes out of a healthy fear in this relationship with God, getting
Him in the right place in our lives to enable us to be able to navigate the complexities
of life.
So in this series, we've talked about a number of things.
Two weeks ago, we talked about affirmation, okay?
And we talked about using our words.
Who was here two weeks ago?
About five of you admit to being here.
We talked about how God wants us to be wise with our words.
We talked about three to one ratio in terms of affirmation and correction.
And I asked you to go and affirm someone who you don't normally go and affirm.
How do we do with that?
Anyone do that?
Because we want to be people who don't just hear the word.
We want to be people who actually do the word.
And actually, I went out and I decided I was going to contact a relative of mine to just
encourage her.
And I was going to WhatsApp her, just some things that I'd noticed.
And suddenly, as I got to WhatsApp, I realized I was really nervous about WhatsAppping her.
And I realized that having the wisdom that God wants for the words that I use is totally unnatural
in so many ways.
And God calls us as a church to be this church of wisdom in our words, in our friendships,
in our relationships, and in our plans.
And today, God is going to say to you, He wants you not just to hear His word, He actually
wants you to do His word.
So, let me just pray for us.
Let me just pray for us.
And I want you to pray in your heart as well.
Father, I don't just want to listen to Your word.
I don't just want to hear words.
I want to hear from You.
And Father, I pray that with the words that I speak, Lord, we would not just, and Oscar
speaks, we would not just be talking, but Lord, this would create life in our hearts and
You'd change us so that we live out in a way which is consistent with what You say and call
us to.
In Jesus' name, amen.
So, we're looking at plans.
Okay, have your bulletin with you because we're going to go through some of the passages
here.
And we're going to look at God's plan and our plans.
We're going to go look at God's heart and our heart.
We're going to look at God's love and our confidence.
Okay?
So, God's plan, our plans to start with.
One of the really interesting things in the Bible is it contains some very hard truths.
Let me give you one very hard truth.
The world is not about you.
It's about God and it's about His glory.
The sun doesn't orbit around us.
We orbit around the sun.
In the beginning, Chris, is not how the Bible starts.
It starts in the beginning, God.
And though everything in me wishes that I was in charge of my life, the Bible story is that
God is working out a plan.
And He's working out a plan of flourishing and redeeming and restoring a broken creation.
And He invites us to be involved and part of His plan.
And the question is, how do we get involved with His plan?
Well, Proverbs 21 verse 5 says this.
The plans of the diligent lead surely to advantage.
But everyone who is hasty comes surely to poverty.
Okay?
The word diligent means someone who's strategic.
They plan.
They think through things.
Someone who is hasty is impulsive.
They do things just according to their own feelings at the time.
And what He's saying is this.
He's saying, what you plan has consequences in your life.
Okay?
What you plan has consequences.
You don't go into parenting or go into a war just saying, I'm just going to wing it.
Okay?
That's not a good strategy.
That's not a good plan.
We have to plan.
Now, our culture kind of looks at this and it says, in the words of Invictus, you know the poem Invictus?
It says, I am the master of my fate.
I am the captain of my soul.
Which is, I mean, we like that kind of thing.
Right?
We want to believe that we have this kind of, the free will to decide our lives.
And our plans are kind of the way that we shape our future.
We can act.
We can do.
We can make it happen.
You know, that's why we kind of love these rags to riches stories.
Or why we love, you know, movies about rats who become top chefs.
And one's about geeky celebrities who then, geeky kind of whatever, who become celebrities through talent competitions.
Because we want to believe that our plans, like, you can do anything.
You can follow your dreams.
Just plan your way and you'll make it happen.
Does anyone else's life revolve around your Google calendar and your to-do lists?
Because we can sometimes believe that our life is fully worth living if we've achieved everything we've done on our to-do list.
We believe we are the masters of our fate.
But it's quite interesting that, although some people think there's free will, other people will say, well, life is just determined.
Okay?
It's just fixed.
You know, there's quite a few brain scientists now who believe these kind of things.
And whether it's a God or the spirits or our DNA, they say, well, this has decided how you're going to live.
You know, we say things like, the fortune teller told me that this year was going to be a bad year.
And I reshaped my office.
I put in a water feature to get better feng shui.
But no matter what I've done, bad luck is happening to me.
It's just determined.
It's fixed.
It's fate.
So some of us think it's all about free will.
Some of us think it's determined.
Proverbs 16, 31 says, the lot is cast into the lap, but it's every decision is from the Lord.
It's every decision is from the Lord.
Casting lots is a bit like tossing a coin.
You know, you toss a coin, you know, you have a tennis match.
You toss the coin to see who's going to start first.
Right?
And what Proverbs is saying here is that even who's deciding first who's going to play at Wimbledon is under God's sovereign hand.
Every little detail of my life is ultimately going to work out in some way how God has planned it.
The fact that you're here this morning is under God's great plan.
The fact that my printer broke down is in some way under God's great plan.
And the fact that you're here this morning, I don't think anyone put a gun to your head.
I hope they didn't.
Okay?
That's not a great way to get people to service.
But we made a choice to come here.
But in some way, God is working through our choices to work out his plan.
And what it is, it's a bit like having a rope like this on a pulley.
And at one end of the pulley is my actions have consequences and I have freedom.
And the other end of the pulley is, well, God is completely in control of every aspect.
And it's difficult.
I can't put those two things together.
Intellectually, I don't know how it works.
Because either I think I've got freedom or I think it's fixed.
I can't put them together.
But the Bible says you've got to hold those both in tension.
It says, many are the plans in the mind of man, but the purpose of the Lord will stand.
I plan the sermon series.
God's not going to plan the sermon series for me.
The typhoon hits and the outcome is under his control.
And you see, the thing that we struggle with is if you just try and hold one end of the rope
and you don't hold the other end of the rope, life becomes actually impossible to live.
If you think that life is completely on God's autopilot and it's just fully determined,
you just become passive, you know, and you become cynical and become bored with life.
Why do I need to send out CVs to get the job?
Well, God's going to provide.
Right?
Or worse, some people say, I know I committed adultery, but God made me do it.
Really?
You see, we don't take responsibility for what God has given us.
But on the other hand, if it's all on you, that's really scary.
Really scary.
My best friend, when he was younger, he tried desperately to get a girl to marry him.
Who, looking back, would have been a disaster for him to marry.
Like, complete disaster.
And Tim Keller, pastor in the States, says,
Imagine you looking back in your life to whether you were a teenager or in your 20s,
depending on how old you are.
Think about the ratio of the goodness of your plans.
Probably about two-thirds of my plans were bad plans when I was a teenager.
Right?
Now, the question is, the more frightening question is,
what's the percentage for you now?
How good are your plans now?
Maybe I've improved a little bit.
Maybe I'm kind of at 50% good planning.
But still, if the planning is all on you,
then our lives, we can screw up our lives really easily.
But the Bible says, if you hold both of those ropes together,
God's totally in control, but you have free choices in what you make to make,
then there is a freedom to live well.
You know, in the Bible, there's the story of Joseph.
You know the story of Joseph?
Joseph.
You know, he's the favorite kid of his father.
He has dreams about his family bowing down to him,
and he tells all his family,
and it just annoys his brothers so much that they want to go and kill him.
So they go and throw him in a pit,
but eventually they change their minds and decide to sell him to slave traders.
Gets down to Egypt, and he's a great worker,
but he's thrown into prison anyway.
He's waiting, doesn't know what's going on in his life.
But eventually, the whole plan comes through where he becomes second in command in Egypt.
Yeah, you know the story?
And you know what's really interesting is that at the end of the story,
his dad dies, his brothers come back to him,
and they're really terrified about what he's going to say.
And they say to him,
Hey, please give us mercy for how we treated you.
And Joseph, with incredibly great grace, says to them,
he says in Genesis 50, 20, he says,
You meant this for harm, but God meant this for good.
You were planning something evil.
God was working something bigger and greater.
You know, just for the ordinary things in life,
I signed up for a new broadband package just this last week.
It was my choice, okay?
I chose it.
But the company has tried to mess me around all this week,
and then last night, two hours late,
they turned up at my house to try and install it,
and they arrived at 11 p.m.,
and they didn't leave till midnight last night.
And it's driving me nuts,
because I've got to preach this morning,
and I want to get some sleep.
Was God in control?
Absolutely.
But have I made choices?
Absolutely.
But is God going to work in me
and wanting to change me in some way through this?
In my frustration and anger, absolutely.
So I'm going to pass over to Oscar
to share a little bit more about God's heart.
Thank you.
Guys, ever seen WWF wrestling?
Like tag team?
Yeah.
Leo's seen it.
Yeah.
Leo's laughing.
Morning.
Great.
The microphone is enthusiastic.
So as Chris explained,
it is fundamentally good for us to plan.
God, in his infinite wisdom,
has given us the ability and responsibility
to plan for our lives
and for the lives under our care.
But I think the challenge for me
and perhaps for some of you here
is that oftentimes we have the wrong motivation
behind our plans.
Proverbs 16.1 says,
The plans of the heart belong to man,
but the answer of the tongue is from the Lord.
Plans of the heart belong to man.
Our plans, our desires,
our future intentions,
they come from the heart, don't they?
If you've been to Watermark for any period of time,
you probably hear us talk about the heart a lot.
We teach about actions, what we do,
words, what we say,
but we emphasize the heart
because everything that happens outwardly,
it comes from within.
Our actions and our words,
they stem from our heart,
the core of our inner person,
source of our will and our desires.
But as Jeremiah says,
the heart is deceitful above all things
and desperately sick.
Who can understand it?
The heart is deceitful above all things.
You can hear the pain in Jeremiah's voice.
He's talking about the people of Judah.
They had seen and heard the goodness of God
for hundreds and hundreds of years.
Their forefathers had told them
the faithfulness of God.
And at time and again,
they turned their back on their father
and they went and worshiped idols.
It made no sense.
It's totally illogical.
But as Jeremiah says,
the heart is deceitful.
This is the human condition.
We are prone to do things
that benefit ourselves.
We are inclined to serve ourselves,
to make plans that put us number one.
A few weeks ago, my wife Celeste,
a few months ago now actually,
my wife Celeste asked me
if I still had plans to run my own hedge fund,
start my own hedge fund.
I've been in this business for a number of years.
I love what I do.
I'm passionate about it.
I love going to work every single day.
And so she logically asked me this question.
And I think if she asked me five years ago,
I would have said,
100%, totally.
I want to do it.
Be my own boss.
But you know,
as I've thought about this
in recent times,
you know what I've realized?
My motivations weren't that pure after all.
He wanted to run my own hedge fund
because I wanted to be the boss.
I didn't want to have to report to somebody.
I wanted my name on the door.
And to be honest,
I also wanted to be able to work from home
so I can see my daughter every day.
You know,
there's nothing inherently wrong
with running a hedge fund
or being a CEO
or a leader in the political world,
in government or in academia.
Nothing wrong with planning your career either.
I think the issue that I have,
and maybe for some of you today,
is when we pray to the Lord about our plans,
our prayer is,
God, this is what I want.
These are my plans.
God, please help me to get where I want to go.
But our prayer should be,
Father, what are your plans for my life?
What do you want from my career?
And how can I fit into your plans
so that I can do your work?
One way to check or test our hearts
is to ask ourselves,
if I didn't have this career,
would I still be content?
Would I still be able to say that God is good?
And then there's the aspect of trusting God
with our plans,
which is so important.
We can make a plan today,
tomorrow.
We don't know the outcome.
One year down the line,
we don't know the outcome.
We didn't even know we could be at church today.
Thank God the weather's okay, though.
Planning typically involves
some aspect of the unknown,
of uncertainty.
That is why trusting God is so important.
Proverbs 3, 5 and 6,
trust in the Lord with all your heart
and lean not on your own understanding.
I think if you've been a Christian
for any amount of time,
you probably know this verse.
Trust God.
Pastors love to say it.
Elders love to say it.
It's probably one of the most commonly used directives
from Christian to Christian.
Trust God.
But what does that mean to trust God?
What does it look like?
Proverbs 16, 3.
Commit your works to the Lord
and your plans will be established.
Commit your works to the Lord.
Commit.
The word commit,
the word commit
literally means to roll.
As in to roll a ball
away from yourself,
out of your hands,
out of your control,
and into the control of another.
Like you roll a bowling ball
down the alley
and it's out of your hands
and in the hands of
gravity and air conditioning.
What the passage is saying here
is that if we
commit our works to God,
if we surrender our plans to Him,
God begins to shape our planning.
And this is where the wisdom
of Proverbs comes in.
Through the wisdom of God,
our planning improves.
We're better at planning.
Our plans become more efficient,
more orderly,
and we start to plan
what God wants for us,
not only what we want for ourselves.
For some of us,
our plans become
a weight on our shoulders,
a ball and chain
around our ankles.
So if we can release
that ball
and roll it to God,
a weight is released
and a lightness
and a peace
and a freedom
is what comes out of that.
How many parents
do we have in the room?
Parents?
Lots of parents,
don't we?
Yes.
My wife Celeste and I,
we have a 17-month daughter
named Kiva.
In the past two years,
I think I've had more conversations
about family planning
and raising children
than I've had
in the combined 30 years
of my life.
It's such a huge topic, right?
And if you're a parent
here this morning,
God has given you
a precious gift.
God has entrusted
His child
into your hands.
And as parents,
we have an active responsibility
to take care of our children
and part of that
is planning.
And in Hong Kong,
especially,
a huge part of that planning
relates to schooling,
doesn't it?
You know what I'm talking about
if you're a parent here, right?
We all spend a fair amount
of time
researching schools,
doing school site visits,
talking to other parents
about schools,
networking
to increase the probability
of getting into schools.
My daughter's only 17 months old
and I've done
all of those things already.
I admit to you.
And I also admit to you
that it's tough.
I get anxious.
I get worried.
Will my daughter Kiva
get into school in Hong Kong?
I don't know.
If she's as smart as my wife,
then yes,
I think she will.
But will she survive
the school system in Hong Kong?
It's tough, right?
The stress,
the pressure.
The question that I ask myself
and maybe you should ask yourself is,
do we commit the planning,
do we roll the planning
of our kids schooling to God
and do we surrender that to Him?
For example,
when we pray,
I think a lot of us probably
pray for our children
to get into school.
But when we pray,
is our prayer simply,
Father,
please help little David
get into GSIS or CIS.
That's a good prayer.
That's a fine prayer.
But it's only half the prayer.
You know,
rather,
we should be praying,
Father,
please help little David
get into GSIS.
But also,
we should pray,
Lord,
I know you're a good God.
Lord,
I know you're sovereign.
I know you're a faithful God.
You have proven your love to me
through the Bible,
the Word of God,
through my life,
through even giving me a child.
I know you're faithful,
Lord,
so I commit,
I roll this plan to you,
Lord.
I surrender to you,
Father.
Father,
I've done my responsibility.
Now it's in your hands.
You know,
there's an old,
there's an old TV show
in the 80s
called The A-Team.
Anybody ever see The A-Team?
Yeah,
Ed's seen The A-Team,
yeah.
I was made into a movie
a few years ago
starring Liam Neeson
and Bradley Cooper.
The basic storyline
of The A-Team
is that there's a team
of former soldiers
and they are part
of The A-Team
and in each episode,
effectively,
they have this elaborate plan
to outwit the bad guys
and they typically do
every single episode
outwit the bad guys
and at the end
of each episode,
Hannibal,
the leader of The A-Team,
he lights up a cigar,
takes a puff,
leans back in his chair
and says,
I love it
when a plan comes together.
But it never always
happens that way,
does it?
life has a way
of surprising us
and in some cases,
life throws us
massive curveballs
that we totally
never prepared for.
I became an elder
of Watermark
a year and a half ago
and when I became
an elder of Watermark,
I didn't verbalize
a lot of stuff
but in my head,
I had plans.
Yeah,
it was going to be
a smooth job,
really great,
you know,
no problems,
no heartache,
no difficulties,
no challenges.
Why was I wrong?
I didn't plan
for our lead pastor,
Tobin,
who Celeste and I
are very close to,
to have to go back
to the U.S.
I didn't plan for us
to have to leave
our community center
because the rent
went up three times.
I didn't plan for us
to have to move
from Satterport
to Ebenezer.
And I admit to you
this morning
that there were times
when I would come home
from elder meetings
and I'd tell my wife,
I don't know
what's going on,
I'm worried.
I'm not sure
if our staff
will be able
to go to the office
next week
because we may not
be able to pay our rent
because they've increased
their rent so much.
Many of you here today
have plans,
you've made plans.
And for many of you today,
your plans
also haven't worked out
exactly as you wanted.
for some of you,
maybe you plan
a certain financial
security level
or career.
But as housing prices
in Hong Kong
continue to go up
year after year,
you're like,
I still can't buy a house?
That wasn't part
of your plan,
was it?
And you're frustrated.
Maybe for people here
who are single,
you've wanted to be married
for a very long time
and you've been praying
to the Lord
and nothing's happened
and you're also frustrated.
But you know what?
And I acknowledge
this is not
that easy to swallow.
But you know,
in our multi-year journey
as Christians,
some of our plans
are going to go
very smoothly.
But others,
for some of our other plans,
the outcome
is going to be
the exact opposite
of what we had hoped
and desired
from the beginning.
But instead of seeing
these things
as bad things,
I just want to encourage
you guys today,
let's use opportunities
to learn and grow.
We actually want to be
in a place
where we have to say,
Lord,
I can't do this.
I cannot figure this out
with my own intellect.
I cannot fix this
with my own hands.
I surrender this to you.
I roll this challenge
to you, God.
Because, you know,
it's through these experiences
that God can teach us.
He can restore
our broken hearts.
The heart, right?
Maybe He needs
to humble us.
He does all these things
to change us,
to shape us,
to shape our hearts,
so that we can be used
to do His work.
For me,
as an elder of Watermark,
you know,
I've learned so much
in the past 18 months.
Firstly,
I've learned
that I lack faith.
But also,
I've learned
how amazing God is,
how much He's provided
for this church.
You know,
we're not perfect, right?
I'm not saying
that we are.
If we were perfect,
we wouldn't even have
to come to church
on Sunday morning, right?
What I see is today,
we're still meeting.
I see the community
is blossoming.
New friendships
are forming.
We have a community lunch
happening today.
I see God at work.
You know,
what I realize
is that
God is infinitely bigger
than my biggest impression
of Him.
And when I look forward,
I have confidence in Him
because of the amazing
faithfulness
that He has shown us.
So the final question
for us
before I hand it back
to Chris is,
you know,
will you allow God
to teach you something
about Himself
when your plans blow up,
when they don't go
as you expected,
when the opposite happens?
You know,
just as in a marriage
relationship,
a husband and wife
continually seek,
should continually seek,
to learn more
about each other
as they grow
in their journey
as a married couple.
And in the same way,
in our journey
as Christians,
you know,
the beauty
of being a Christian
is that
God uses
good things
and bad things,
good experiences,
bad experiences,
triumphs and tragedies
to teach us
about Himself,
about His goodness,
about His character.
The God of the universe
has said
that I know you
and He's asking us,
do you want to know me?
Let me hand it back
to Chris.
Thank you, Oscar.
So we've looked at actually
God's plans,
our plans,
the heart
of how God
changes us
and wants to use us.
And I want to just
kind of,
for the final point,
to really think
about God's love
and our confidence
in this
because
the call to trust
to roll everything
to Him
is a call
to total surrender.
That means
I acknowledge
my responsibility
to plan
in life
and make decisions,
but I also acknowledge
that my plans
are not ultimate.
and John Newton,
a writer
of Amazing Grace,
he prayed this
beautiful prayer
of surrender.
He said,
Lord,
what you will,
when you will,
how you will.
What you will,
when you will,
how you will.
You know what
I tend to pray?
For my internet connection.
Lord,
what I will,
good broadband.
When I will,
now.
How I will,
in the smoothest
possible way
at my total convenience.
Amen.
But you see,
even though it's
a silly little example,
we do that
in all of our lives
because some of us
put so much weight
on certain of our plans.
A kid's getting
into certain schools,
as he said.
The internet company
turning up.
Whatever it is,
that when it doesn't
happen,
it's not just
disappointing,
it can be devastating
to us because
we've lent so much
on those plans
because we believe
that's where our future
is held.
Because our plans
can become our saviour,
our plans can become
our hope,
our plans can become
our security.
And if we get that,
that's when we feel
like life's happening.
And if we don't,
we feel like life
has failed.
But you see,
the surrendered life
is one where we become
the kind of person
who is able to make
wise decisions.
We should love our kids,
but when we make our plans
for them ultimate,
what happens is,
don't we often end up
being so controlling,
trying to make them
who we want them to be,
that actually it can be
devastating for the emotional
health of your kids.
Have you seen that
so many times?
Because you see,
trust means I plan,
but I say,
here's what I want,
but what you will,
when you will,
how you will.
And here's the key thing.
The degree to which
you know God's love for you
is the degree to which
you will surrender to Him.
Did you get that?
The degree to which
you know God's love for you
is the degree to which
you will surrender to Him
because you can see
that He is trustworthy.
Because God interrupts
our plans to show us
that we're not in control
because He wants to reshape
the way you view His love.
Because, do you know,
nobody ever knows
that God loves them
just by being told
that God loves you.
You know that?
I can tell you
God loves you a hundred times,
and it may intellectually
you say yes, yes, yes,
but it will only go down here
if God shows you
in your life
how much He loves you.
Because you see,
for Joseph,
God could have come in
and He could have fixed
everything for him.
Right?
You know,
He could have gone,
Jacob, okay,
here's a parenting book.
Okay?
Joseph, just keep your mouth shut.
Okay?
Brothers,
just kind of quit the jealousy,
and in 15 minutes
could have all been done.
Fixed the whole thing
for Joseph.
Why doesn't God do that?
Because, you know,
He could do that
with your plans.
He could fix everything
right now.
You know that?
He could change everything.
Why doesn't He?
Because if you look
as Oscar's story showed,
as Joseph's story shows,
that through the trials
and the frustrations,
Joseph learned
to trust God
through this experience,
and he knew God's presence
walking with him
every step of the way.
And at the end of the story,
he has now changed
from being an arrogant kid
to being somebody
who was so gracious
to the brothers that he had
that he could have been,
could have hurt
so much in his life.
And through it,
he could look back
and see,
wow, God has loved me
all the way through.
And that's what He wants
to do in your life.
Sometimes you can't see now
how He's loving you,
but it's only when you get
to the end of the story
that you look back
and say,
wow, I can see
how He loved me.
Because He's growing us.
I wouldn't have planned
many of the illnesses
I've had,
I wouldn't have planned
the failures I've had,
but actually what God
is doing,
He's taking my fingers
off the steering wheel
and He's wanting to say,
I know how to steer
this thing better
than you do.
Tim Keller,
again, he says,
any parent knows
that at some point
your child
is going to look at you
when you withhold
something from them.
And when you don't
let your child
have something
which they really want,
they're going to
turn around to you
and look at you
and say,
you don't love me.
Right?
And when that happens,
He says,
he says,
as a parent,
you've got to try
not to kind of blow up
and get angry
because you want to say,
how dare you?
You want to say,
you have no idea
of what I've done for you.
You have no idea
of the sacrifice
I've put in from your life.
You've no idea
the things I've withheld
to raise you.
You have no idea.
If you knew
all that I'd done,
you would never question
my motive
from withholding
that from you.
If you knew
that I had sacrificed
for you so much,
you would know
that I have a loving purpose
from withholding
from you right now.
in Acts 4,
Jesus is crucified
by the deliberate plan
and choice
of the Jews
and the Romans
and the Bible says
even it's what
we would have done
because we want
to plan our lives
and we want to be
in control of our lives
and we want it all
to work according
to my regime.
But the Bible says
it was actually working out
according to God's
predetermined plan.
You see,
Jesus goes into
the garden of Gethsemane
before he's about to die
and he says,
he says,
God,
I don't like this plan.
He says,
this hurts.
He says,
can I get out
of this some way?
I don't want to
have to take the weight
of the outcome
of all of your
and my plans
which have been
for my selfishness.
I don't want to take
the outcome
of their rebellious
plannings on myself
and this is the son of God.
This is the perfect human.
This is the one
who did everything right
but then he says
in a moment of surrender
he says,
but not my will
but yours be done.
He says,
I know you're good.
I says,
I know you love me
and your plan
is so much greater
than what I feel
right at this moment
because so many,
every one of us
in this room
is the result
of his surrender.
if you have turned
to Christ,
your relationship
with God
is as a result
that he was willing
to put God's plan
before his own.
On the cross,
what's the last thing
that Jesus says?
What's the last thing
he says?
It's a quote
he says,
it's a quote
from Psalm 31.
He says,
into your hands
I commit,
I roll,
my spirit.
it wasn't just
his kids' education.
It wasn't just health.
It wasn't just career.
It was his very life.
See,
that's what he paid
to secure your future
for you.
He paid with his own blood.
That means your plans
do not determine
your future.
His surrender did.
Which is why right now
God's calling you
to roll his plans
to him.
Because if there's anybody
you can trust
with your life,
you can trust him
more than you can
trust yourself.
D.L. Moody said this.
I'm going to finish.
Sorry.
Let God have your life.
He can do more with it
than you can.
I like that.
Let God have your life.
He can do more with it
than you can.
Some of us have placed
the weight of our decisions
and the weight of our lives
on our plans
and we're paralyzed
to make decisions.
Because we want certainty
that everything's going
to work out.
Some of you are in that
situation right now.
You know,
I remember before
I started dating Fiona.
I was in indecision
for a long time.
I wanted a sign.
I thought an angel
would come down
and say to me,
do not be afraid,
Chris.
She is the one.
I didn't.
But God did speak
to me very clearly
and he said,
stop looking for a sign.
He said it through
some friends.
He said,
okay,
is she godly?
Do you have,
can you be friends?
Is there a sense
of commonality together?
Do you like her?
I was like,
okay, yeah.
And he said,
now you've got
a decision to make.
Stop trying to make it
all about God
having to make
the decision for you.
Because that's
my responsibility
to walk out
prayerfully,
prayerfully saying,
God,
I want to honor you.
I want with your heart.
But actually,
I've got to make
a decision.
God's not going
to make it for me.
Right?
Some of you
are at that point
and you'll say,
what does God
want me to do?
And he's saying,
just do something.
Do something.
But some of you
are angry
because God
doesn't seem
to have kept
your plans
the way you thought.
He's turned
your world upside down
and you,
things just haven't
worked out
as the way you wanted.
There's cancer,
there's health issues,
there's all kinds of things
and you secretly wonder,
does God really care?
You secretly wonder,
is there something
wrong with me?
Maybe God is punishing
me for something.
And what God
wants to tell you
right now,
what the Father
wants you to know,
he wants you to say,
it's grace that I've
overridden your plans.
And you say,
how can it be grace?
And he'll say,
you know,
when this movie ends,
even though the scene
you're in right at the
moment seems bleak,
when you get to the end,
you'll see and you'll
look back and you'll see,
wow, that's what
you're up to.
That's what you're up to.
And he's leading you
right now to say,
will you take your hands
off the reign of your life
and will you trust me?
What you will,
when you will,
how you will.
Some of us right now
are waiting,
we're in a waiting game
and you feel like
nothing's happening
in your life right now.
You know,
God in your weight
is working in you
to make you
the kind of person
he can entrust
with your future.
So will you trust him?
So I want us just
to stop and pray.
And I want you
to think right now,
what is it that I'm
planning this week?
What is it that's
kind of wrapping up
my mind right now?
What are the plans
that I have in my,
that I'm so dead set
on at the moment?
Am I saying
what I will,
when I will,
how I will,
and God just kind of,
just bless my plans
or are you willing
to surrender those things
and start saying,
God,
I really want this.
God,
I want this relationship.
God,
I want this health.
God,
I want this job.
But Lord,
I'm tempted to complain.
I'm tempted to doubt
your love
if I don't get this.
Give me the grace
right now
to be thankful.
Help me to see
your love in this
because I don't see it
at the moment.
Lord,
I surrender to you
what you will,
when you will,
how you will.
So just bring that
now before God.
I just give you a minute
for the Spirit
just to touch you,
just to open up your hands
as a sign of surrender
to him.
Maybe there's something
specific you just right now
need to give him.
You've been angry
and frustrated.
That's a sign
you've been trying
to hold the control
of your life.
If you're worried,
just roll it to him.
Just roll it to him
because he loves you.
He says,
get off the throne
of your life.
Turn to me.
Never mind
You need to talk to me.
I know
that you might
like this.
He was
talking to
theлект
that you might
know what he is
and the
move the
which
takes
.
Jesus, thank you that you surrendered your life for us.
Because of that, our future is secure.
Our past is redeemed.
Our present is held.
And we can trust you.
Forgive us where we try and make everything about ourselves.
Help us to see you, Lord, where our plans, so often we make them about ourselves.
And they can be devastating for others.
But I pray, Lord, that you just keep us rolling it to you.
Help us to trust you.
And to love you.
In Jesus' name.
Amen.