Monday, November 29, 2010

Was There a Divine Plan Behind History Part Two


DID GOD HAVE A MASTER PLAN FOR HISTORY PART TWO
 
There was a Divine intention that God has a fixed plan for the history of Isarel and the nations from one end of time to the other.

Rather than just popped in on some special  occasion, God was involved in what was going on in history.

Micah says Is this not in the context of a plan which involves many nations  simultaneously.  

God does have some long-range planning which counters the moves and planning of the total world community
.
·       Isaiah 41:   26Who hath declared from the beginning, that we may know? and beforetime, that we may say, He is righteous? yea, there is none that sheweth, yea, there is none that declareth, yea, there is none that heareth your words.  Note 40 too.  Isaiah 42:9; 44:7-8; 45:21; 46:10-11; 48:3-6.

Even more important is the connection between the claim of God to have already announced, long before anything happened, the course of events, from start to finish and the fact that all this was in accordance with His “PLAN” and ‘PURPOSE”. As seen in Isaiah 46:9-11

·       9Remember the former things of old: for I am God, and there is none else; I am God, and there is none like me,  10Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure:  11Calling a ravenous bird from the east, the man that executeth my counsel from a far country: yea, I have spoken it, I will also bring it to pass; I have purposed it, I will also do it

My plan shall stand.  I will accomplish all My purpose (note singular purpose) I have formulated it, indeed, I will accomplish it.

God is willing to stake, as it were, His whole character and claim to be the one umique God on the fact that He is able to speak and declare the future.

Note too God’s announcements are not random and lib comments on this and that, here and There.  They follow a premeditated plan which encompasses the start and finish of the parts and the whole.  All will take place as He has said.


GOD HAD A PLAN FOR ALL HISTORY.  ABRAHAM…….

1.      Genesis 12:1 and 3  1Now the LORD had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will shew thee:   3And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.

THE FIRST TERM TO SIGNIFY THE PLAN OF GOD

PROMISE IN THE N.T.  and  several words in the O.T.

·       Genesis 1:  22And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth.  28And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.
You see the word BLESSED used first. “to promise.”
The central action of God is formed in this term:
·       Genesis 17  7And I will establish my covenant between me and thee and thy seed after thee in their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be a God unto thee, and to thy seed after thee.  8And I will give unto thee, and to thy seed after thee, the land wherein thou art a stranger, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession; and I will be their God.
Israel became God’s special people: Threefold: I will be your God, you shall be My people, and I will dwell in the midst of you.   Exodus 4:22;  19:5-6; 20:45-46

THE CONTINUITY OF THE HISTORY OF THE OLD TESTAMENT.  GOD’S SINGLE ON GOING PLAN.

·       “I am the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.” “I am the God who brought you out of the land of Egypt.”  These terms used 125 times in the O.T.  Stress a continuity between the past, present, and future.  They are parts of God’s single ongoing plan.

Now to make this case of a unified plan to the entirely of the OT progress of theology, you would have to have the writers of the OT to have some interlocking moments in history made significant because of their content, and refer back to each other.

And the word or term that is used to interlock all the OT together is in the term “BLESSED”.

A “blessing”, a “given word,” a “declaration,” a “pledge,” or “oath,” that God Himself would freely do or be something for all men, nations, and nature.

TWO OLD TESTAMENT PASSAGES ON THE PROMISE:

So as with Abraham, God made a convent with  him in the present, but also and an oath to the future generations of the seed of Abraham.  Genesis 12:1-3. And with David in 2 Samuel 7:11-16.  

NOTE GENESIS 3:15.  15And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel. 

Here as we have stated in our lesson on Wednesday night. Here is a promise by God given to Adam and Eve and then continues throughout the O.T.  The promise to crush Satan and bring judgment on those who disobey, but at the same time bring someone who will crush Satan was given to Shem, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and their descendants that a representative child continued to be both God’s visible guarantee for the present and a pledge for the future.

NOTE GENESIS 12:1-3  2  SAMUEL 7 AND JEREMIAH 31

The divine plan pointed to a SEED, A RACE, A FAMILY, A MAN, A LAND, AND A BLESSING OF UNIVERSAL PROPORTIONS – all GUARANTEED, according to Genesis 17, as being everlasting and eternal.





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