sermonette: God Alone Can See

God's Master Plan
Mark Schindler
Given 18-Oct-03; Sermon #FT03-13s; 20 minutes

Description: (show)

---

Long in every silence. Hello That's all. me This is not something. And And there is I Yeah It's Yeah. you know Until this season something. can see. On. Until is something unknown something. Um Um Something God alone can see from before the time, the great God and the word have envisioned this great day. Today represents the culmination of a glorious plan that we only see through a glass darkly as the apostle Paul says, but it is a vision that we must firmly grasp because this day is the pinnacle of God's success for us as a race of men. His plan and his purpose have been set since before the foundation of the earth, and he clearly sees its end on this great day. This is not the first time that I delivered a message on the Last Great Day. The last time was 7 years ago, on October 5, 1996. It was in the Catholic Church at my father's funeral. My father died suddenly on October 2nd while Nancy and the kids and I were at the feast. Suddenly death and the resurrection became more of a reality to me than ever before. All the way home on the plane for the next and the next 2 days, millennial scriptures and scriptures of the last day raced around through my mind. I begged God to help me understand why this had happened and why especially it happened during the feast days and what I needed to do about it. By the day before the funeral, I knew what I had to do. If given the opportunity to eulogize my father at the funeral on the Last Great Day, I would tell the people assembled about what a fine man my father was, but also about the family of God and the hope for all mankind revealed to us through the holy days and specifically through the Last Great Day. I told over 400 Catholics assembled at a Catholic mass that their eternal hope actually is revealed in some ancient abandoned Jewish holy days kept with the final judgment and reward pictured in a day that was being kept that very same day that we were burying my father on the Last Great Day. But before brethren, I even spoke those words, I'd ask God that if this in fact was what he had in mind for me to do, He would give me the right words to say. I asked that he would give me his words to speak about his holy days and not my own. Words that would bring comfort and not anger to a group of people not yet called and trying to deal with something very painful to them, and they did not really understand it. I do not intend to make you think that on that day, I went charging in with great words like the apostle Paul on Mars Hill. I merely told them about the ancient Israelite tradition of pouring water at the foot of the altar on the Last Great Day of the feast and how Christ used that illustration on the very same day that we were burying my father to describes himself as the source of living waters. I told him the day that Christ said those very words as recorded in John 7 was observed on this very same day that we were burying my father some 1960 years before. I told them that all the world would be resurrected on the Last Great Day to the judgment of the great God and that the physical family like the one that my mother and father had so carefully nurtured. would be born was a type of the family of God that would be born into that all could be born into it the Last Great Day. The words that I spoke that day were not my own. They brought great peace and comfort to my family and those assembled there that day. They even inspired the priest, praying over my father's grave at the cemetery afterwards to say, and I quote, as Larry's son said, we look forward to seeing Larry again at the resurrection on the Last Great Day. I was flabbergasted. There was a Catholic priest repeating a part of the plan he really knew nothing about as they lowered my father's physical body into the grave, saying that we would see him again at the Last Great Day. But as I look back on it, our great God took that opportunity that day to give a group of people not yet called but surely with the opportunity of some day of being in his family, a peek into his plan and just what their hope really was all about. He gave me the opportunity to understand that this is not about me or about you or about the world, brethren. It's about all of mankind together with the Father and the Son as we rejoice at the completion of God's plan, God's generous purpose for all of mankind on this, the Last Great Day. There was a very interesting sermon given at the Feast of Tabernacles and a number of years ago that showed this whole book is a book of history. A real book of his story. It is not the whole story, brethren, but it is the part of the story that God has deemed necessary for us to see at this time. His story, as far as we've permitted to see it, started in John 1. In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. It started with a family of two who were creators and created all things. We see the story moved to their creation of a magnificent beings, the angels, and by a being described in Ezekiel 28 as spectacular in verse 13. God made him the anointed cher of that sat at his throne. We see God's story moved to Genesis 1 and the beginning of the physical universe which when it was created, all the created angels shouted for joy at its splendor and the immense opportunity for creation. After this and perhaps after years and millennium, billions of years of joy and creation through part of the universe, it moves to a devastating time when the iniquity was found in the most magnificent of God's created beings, and he rebels with 1/3 of the angels against the family. And destruction enters the creation. We find ourselves back again in Genesis 1 and 2. Again, as the recreation takes place, God creates man in His image and his likeness. But before all this even happens, before the foundation of the world, as it says in I Peter 1:20. The only two members of the God family that have existed from eternity make it their purpose to bring others into the family who will be firmly committed to the peace, unity, and perfect harmony of the family without ever having even the slightest opportunity of another Satan. They devise a plan that's foolproof that will produce exactly the mind and spirit of a family that can only come from this perfect plan. They devise a plan that will involve a process over thousands and thousands of years, a plan that will include much time and patience, joy and sorrow, sickness and health, life and death, kingdoms and countries, sacrifice and reward with an ultimate sacrifice by one of them, and all these things known exactly to them from the beginning, as it says in Acts 15:18. All this done so that one family that walks in perfect unity can be born to create for all eternity. They have a perfect plan, and everything must be put together in exactly the right way. The details of which that lead to the big picture are only clear to them. Brethren, I do not need to explain the rest of the story to you. You know where it started in the Garden of Eden with the two trees. Before mankind could even be introduced to God the Father. The first man, Adam failed and was ejected from Eden before he could even take from the tree of life. Thousands of years go by and man continues to fall into seemingly the same calamitous situations over and over again, just in different forms. But all the time, God slowly works his plan through Abel and Enoch. Noah and the Father of the faithful Abraham through Sarah and Isaac and Jacob, through Joseph and Moses and millions of Israelites that died in the wilderness as a witness to us. Let's look at that because I think it's very important to his story. Turn with me to I Corinthians 10. I Corinthians 10 and then verse 1. First Corinthians 10:11, moreover, brethren, I would not. Should you, I would not have you to be ignorant. How did all our fathers were under the cloud and all passed through the sea and all were baptized unto Moses and the cloud and in the sea, and they all eat the same spiritual meat, to drink the same spiritual drink. They drank of that spiritual rock that followed them and that rock was Christ. But with many. The God was not well pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness. Now these things were our examples to the intent that we should not lost after evil things that they lost. They did not have God's Holy Spirit, and they went after these things. We do, and we are told not to. Neither be idolaters and some of them were as it is written. The people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play. Neither let us commit fornication, as some of them committed and fell in one day 3 and 20,000. Neither let us tempt Christ. As some of them also tempted and were destroyed of the serpents, neither murmured as some of them murmured and were destroyed of the destroyer. Now all these things happen to them, for examples, and they are written for our admonition upon whom the ends of the world have come. All these things happened to them as an example to us. God slowly moving his plan to the purpose he intends, goes to great lengths using people, time, nations to make his point, and the whole time there are a few who he lets in on a need to know basis. Brethren, do you see that Israelite family slogging through the wilderness trying to understand what's going on, a father, mother, children trudging through a wilderness, making decisions based only on carnal knowledge based only on the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, hot and cold, invigorated, tired, frustrated, sure, happy, heartbroken, confused, and rebellious. God saw them. And they will all have their opportunity to be in his family someday, but first, He used them to put his plan forward. He's not a heartless bully, but a loving father who sees far beyond what we see and what will make sure the bond that will be established in billions of his family members for eternity. We have seen a common thread through these sermons and sermonettes during these days of the Feast of Tabernacles. We have been shown in no uncertain terms that there are two ways of life to go to go into. The one is the easy way. The world's Babylonish system of things will just carry you away, as John said this morning, as Mr. Armstrong used to call it, it's the way of get. It's a way of competition and war. It's Satan's way of competing for the very throne of God. It's a way that God has allowed over thousands of years for a purpose and not by chance, but as we were told, the night is far spent, and we, and there are some right now who have been given the opportunity to have the light of God's truth in their lives. We are those few. We have the responsibility now to walk in the light, to come out of Babylon. And to think as God thinks, to have the outgoing concern for each other and for God's plan, that's the hallmark of the family. We are to be laying the foundations for the World Tomorrow, as Richard said on the first day. God is a generous God and so must we be and think like he thinks. Everything about his character is outgoing sacrifice for others. It is our responsibility to look at the big picture like God does and to think and act like God does. Why are we here? We've been told why we are here to come out of Babylon, to be zealous, to follow the light of God's truth, and to be ready to do whatever he wants us to do, to be of service and sacrifice for all of mankind who will come after us into the family of God. Brethren, please turn with me to what I think is some of the most, probably to me, it's the most remarkable scripture in the whole Bible. Turn me to Philippians 2. Philippoians too. And in verse one, If there be any, therefore any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any vowels of mercy, fulfill ye my joy, that you be like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind, let nothing be done in strife. Vainglory, but in lowliness of mind, let each esteem others better than themselves. In verse 4, look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others. Let this mind be in you, which also is in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, but it not robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation. He took upon him the form of a servant and was made in the likeness of men and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death of the cross. Brethren, do you grasp the significance of these verses? The one who created all things and had all the glory of the family name did not think that was the pinnacle of success. He saw success only in investing everything he had into the rest of the family. This is the ultimate refusal of the way of get by giving everything he had to ensuring the billions that would come up in the family of God. I remember years ago and worldwide, there were so many that were so concerned as to whether we were going to the place of safety or not. It became their goal. They missed the point. Maybe we all missed the point. We can do the same thing now. We can become so wrapped up in the process that we forget what it's really all about. We are only, we are a holy generation, a royal priesthood, a call out people, as it says in I Peter 2, and we will, God-willing, complete the course and rule with Christ in the millennium, but that's not what it's all about. That's part of the story. There is the rest of the story, as Paul Harvey said, part of many pieces along the way. It's not going about going to the place of safety or not, or ruling with Christ or our own personal salvation, or for that matter, even the individual sacrifice of Christ as we just read. Those are vitally important pieces of the story that only the Father and son see clearly now, but the ultimate end of the story, as God sees it, is a family composed of billions of creators who will have hearts that beat as one in outgoing concern for each other and in creating in perfect harmony. The choir sang a song yesterday. I honestly had a hard time getting through because it was the song of the Father and the prodigal son. It was the song of the Father will sing. As all his family is born in that day. Today, brethren, is not about us. This is our father's story, coming to the conclusion he saw from the beginning. Today is about the plan of the great God coming to completion. Mr. Armstrong wrote in Mystery of the Ages. And I quote, but see now how Christ already has been crowned with glory and honor and is already in possession, has already inherited. The living Christ already sustains the entire universe by His limitless divine power. Mister Armstrong continues, for the creation waits for the eager longing, for the revealing of the Sons of God, for the creation, all suns, planets, stars, moons was subjected to futility, not of its own will, but by the will of Him. Who subjected it in hope because the creation itself will be set free from its bondage of decay and obtain the glorious liberty of the children of God. Mr. Armstrong ends Mystery of the ages by writing, Finally, even God the Father will come to this earth. His throne over the whole universe will be established on this earth. Notice in I Corinthians 15:24 after speaking of the various resurrections, it is recorded, then cometh the end when he shall have delivered up all kingdom to God, even the Father, when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power. In Revelation 21:3, and I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself shall be with them and be their God. And further, in Revelation 22:3, and there shall be no more curse, but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it, and his servants shall serve him. Mr. Armstrong finishes up on the very last page of the Book of Mystery of the ages. He says, finally, the atonement shall be completed. Both God, the Father and the Son Jesus Christ in us, and we united with them as one great supreme God family. How wonderful beyond the ability of words to express is the glory of God and His wonderful purpose actually now in progress. Praise, honor, and glory be to the God and Jesus Christ forever and ever. With God's great master plan of 7000 years finally completed, the mystery of the ages finally revealed, and with the recreating of the vast universe and the eternity lying ahead, we come finally to the beginning.