Do you have any big plans for 2008?  Every year when we flip the calendar from December to January and add a digit to the year, we make resolutions, vows, and plans. According to research every year the vast majority of those resolutions, vows and plans never become reality. Why?  Why is it that we have such grand intentions in our lives, but so often they never “take on flesh” and become real?  As we start 2008, here at New Life, God has laid it on my heart that we’re to invest the entire year on Sunday mornings in a series of messages titled BACK TO BASICS.  That doesn’t mean we’ll be offering messages without challenge or depth, or that we’ll be offering only spiritual “milk” or “baby food.”  Far from it!  What it means is as we go about 2008, the 53 Sunday morning messages will emphasize the core beliefs of Scripture and challenge us to live them 24/7!  As we do that our resolutions, vows and plans WILL become reality, not just good intentions.

     The Bible has always provided all the information we need to plan and live in ways that glorify God and bring the abundant life Jesus promised.  Why is it then, that most of us find ourselves making New Year’s resolutions year-after-year, because we find ourselves living beyond our means financially, living in less than optimum health spiritually and physically, and in general just aren’t where we want to be in life?  Today’s Scriptures give us insight into why our plans don’t bring the results we desire, and how we can change our good intentions into God’s reality. The first readings come from the Book of Proverbs.  Proverbs is unique in the Bible in that it contains little in the way of extended narrative.  In fact, most of the wisdom is found in one or two verse axioms, adages, and recommendations.  Today, we’ll examine four of them.  They’re all about planning, but each makes a slightly different point about planning our lives.  When we talk about getting BACK TO BASICS, one of the most basic aspects of living is planning each day, so that our lives are focused and make a difference, rather than just letting life come at us and then reacting.

     We’re also going to look at five verses from the Book of James that emphasize the importance of our planning being in the Lord’s plan for our lives.  Many people have “life plans,” “business plans,” “reading plans.”  Those who do are typically more organized and “successful” than others.  The question is:  “Successful at what?”  At the end of the day, at the end of the year, at the end of our lives, success is determined by what God thinks is important.  Jesus once asked a penetrating question regarding what is most valuable in our lives, “36And what do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul? Mark 8:36 NLT  If salvation is the ultimate gain, if living according to God’s will is the ultimate intention, then our plans must be laid with Him at the center. 

     My assumption throughout 2008 is that those who come here on Sunday mornings want God to be in charge of our lives.  You may not agree with that assumption at this moment, but you need to understand that we don’t gather here on Sunday mornings primarily for our benefit.  We gather here to praise the living God of the universe and to offer ourselves to Him.  We gather here to worship the living God of the universe and to gain a deeper understanding of His plan for our lives.  We gather here to submit our will to His will, and to renew our commitment to serving Jesus as Savior and Lord each day.

     One absolutely essential component for each of us in 2008, if we want to live God’s plan, is for us to make corporate worship of Him a first priority.  There ARE 53 Sundays in 2008.  If God is to be first in our lives that means those 53 Sundays will be planned as part of our schedules.  We’ll write them into our calendars NOW. Worship can’t be one option among many.  If we’re out of town, or on vacation, then we’ll seek out a place where God is worshiped and join them.  If it’s a nice day, and there’s yard work to do, or some sporting event to attend then, we’ll find a way to worship God FIRST, and then attend to the other activities.  If the weather’s bad, or just a little less than ideal---which it nearly always is in western Pennsylvania—we’ll still make worshiping Him a first priority.  If we have to work on Sunday morning, then we’ll worship on Saturday evening—there are good churches in our area with Saturday evening services.

     You may be wondering, why is Chris making such a big deal about corporate worship?  Isn’t that legalistic?  The answer’s simple:  we become what we’re committed to in life.  Here in the USA, folks consider themselves “regular” worshipers if they attend worship one out of three Sundays, according to George Barna.  Employers wouldn’t consider their full-time employees’ participation at work “regular” if they only came to work one out of three days. None of us would consider ourselves regular “eaters” if we only ate one meal out of every three!  While it’s important for us to worship God on our own and in our families on a daily basis, this weekly time of gathering with brothers and sisters through our Lord, Jesus, is essential for our health and growth as His followers.  That’s not just my opinion.  It’s biblical.  As the Letter to the Hebrews put it:  25Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.  Hebrews 10:25 NIV We really need each other as followers of Jesus.  Meeting together is essential for our health and growth as His followers. 

     As we consider our plans and goals for 2008, let’s turn to God’s word and see what He has to say about them.  Instead of standing and reading all the verses from Provers as one, since they’re not, let’s read them one at a time.  You may remain seated, but please join me as we read Proverbs 16:1 aloud:  1We can make our own plans, but the LORD gives the right answer.   Proverbs 16:1 NLT  What does that tell us about making plans for 2008?  It tells us that as we make our plans, we need to call on the Lord to confirm or change them.  A number of weeks ago, I mentioned to you that I had more difficulty than usual in discerning God’s direction for 2008, when it came to the Sunday morning messages.  Typically, I plan a quarter to half a year at a time, what the Scriptures, themes and series will be. Then I pass that information onto the staff and elders for their input and implementation.  As I sat and prayed and reflected on 2008, time and time again through the fall, ideas came, but as I would take them to the Lord in additional prayer, none of them seemed right.  Finally, one morning, shortly after I had told Nancy I just wasn’t making any progress on planning for 2008, the Lord guided me to the plan for the entire year, not only for the Sunday messages, but for LIFE groups, LEAD classes and devotions for the elders’ meetings. 

     When you make your plans, do you submit them to the Lord, and listen for Him to give the answers?  Whether the plan is for getting in shape, or a new business venture, or where to go on vacation, or what Bible reading plan to follow, we need to submit the plan to the Lord.  The point of Proverb 16:1 is—planning is good, but only when the plan is submitted to God.  After all, if we call ourselves Jesus’ followers, then the primary identifying trait in our lives is that we FOLLOW Jesus.  People have often asked me, “Chris, how can I know if my plan is God’s plan?”  That’s a great question.  The simplest answer I can give is that God confirms His plans in Scripture, in our hearts, our circumstances and sometimes through other believers.   Once we’ve made plans, and BEFORE we start to implement them, we need to listen for God to tell us whether they’re right.  As we “tune” our ears and hearts to listen, He will give us the right answers.  It’s an ongoing process—but it STARTS with including God in our plans.

      Let’s read our next Proverb together:  2People may be pure in their own eyes, but the LORD examines their motives.   Proverbs 16:2 NLT  As we make plans, we seek to justify them in our own minds and hearts.  Obviously, as followers of Jesus, we don’t want to pursue evil plans, or even plans that just aren’t “right.”  But sometimes, when a plan sounds good to us, we “tweak” the details a little, so they’ll seem good, even when they aren’t.  This often happens when it comes to our plans in the area of finances.  Over the years, many people have said something like this to me:  “I want to be more faithful in my giving, but it just isn’t the right time. I’m sure the Lord understands.”  What they mean is they have “special circumstances” that make giving difficult: they just bought a house, or just had a child enter college, or need to buy another car, or---the list goes on and on.  The plan is that as soon as these situations are taken care of the person will become a more faithful giver.  Such reasons for not giving faithfully to the Lord seem pure to us.  But the Lord examines our motives.  Upon closer examination, virtually every reason for not giving faithfully to the Lord is motivated by a lack of sound planning in the first place, or a failure to recognize that everything belongs to God and that we must trust Him.  Since we’ll be participating in a 40 Days Spiritual Journey to a more Generous Life starting in two weeks, I’m not going to say anything else about this  right now.  I bring it up because the area of giving is one of the most important when it comes to demonstrating our motivations in life, and an area where planning is essential.

     Let’s look at our next Proverb:  3Commit your actions to the LORD, and your plans will succeed.  Proverbs 16:3 NLT  Notice that committing our actions to the Lord comes PRIOR to our plans succeeding.  Before we sit down to plan---and we truly ought to sit down and plan our lives—we need to commit our actions to the Lord.  This is another way of saying that if we don’t seek first the Kingdom of God, we won’t seek the Kingdom of God.  Imagine what 2008 will be like here in this community as each of us commits our actions to the Lord!  That will mean those who are students will commit your studies, your extracurricular activities, your relationships—every action to the Lord.  That will mean that those who are beyond our student years will commit our work, our relationships, our hobbies and activities—every action to the Lord.  The result will be our actions will be godly.  Godly actions—honesty, love, integrity, enthusiasm, perseverance and many others--will permeate our lives.  Jesus said when we live that way we become “salt” and “light” for those around us—We add flavor, zest, direction, and illumination!  Living as followers of Jesus 24/7 benefits everyone including ourselves.  Those around us will experience God’s love, grace and salvation through us, and we will see our plans succeed.   

     You may be thinking, “That sounds great, but it isn’t realistic.”  Really?  Is the Bible true?  (Yes.)  Is it? (Yes.)  If the Bible’s true—and it is—then as we commit our actions to the Lord, our plans WILL succeed.  The great news is that God has provided the Holy Spirit to empower us to commit our actions to the Lord.  It comes down to a simple willingness to submit our wills to Him.  In 2008 the only thing keeping our plans from succeeding, the only thing keeping us from committing our actions to the Lord is…. Us! 

     That leads us to this morning’s fourth Proverb:  9We can make our plans, but the LORD determines our steps.  Proverbs 16:9 NLT Whether our plans are inside or outside of God’s will, He is ultimately going to determine our steps.  That doesn’t mean we have no influence on the outcome of our lives, that we’re God’s “wind-up toys,” and that we’ll just do what He wants.  It means whatever we plan, the ultimate outcome is in God’s hands.  That’s more good news for us, because whether our plans are motivated by a desire to commit our actions to Him, or we’re just being selfish, God’s intervention brings about good.  The key for us is to make plans that glorify Him.  When we make plans that glorify God, and call on the Holy Spirit to bring them to fruition, God honors that and moves us forward—He determines or orders our steps.  But when we make plans that don’t glorify God, when we put our own selfish interests first, we may “succeed” for a time.  We may even “succeed” for a lifetime, but we won’t know the joy that comes from walking in God’s steps.  All “success” that dishonors God is ultimately failure.  All the money in the world can’t buy eternal life.  All the fame and recognition in the world, can’t substitute for a relationship with Jesus, because only when we know Him can we be truly satisfied.  Many live their lives quite “happily” without God, or so they say.  But in the waning moments of life, or in times of trial most of them have recognized the futility of their existence.  Even those who haven’t, have gone to face eternity—an eternity in which they may not even have believed—separated from God.  The only way to be sure our lives hold meaning, purpose and significance here and now, AND forever is to plan them with the recognition that God is in charge and orders our steps.

     Let’s turn now to the New Testament and read God’s word together from James 4:13-16:  13Look here, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we are going to a certain town and will stay there a year. We will do business there and make a profit.” 14How do you know what your life will be like tomorrow? Your life is like the morning fog—it’s here a little while, then it’s gone. 15What you ought to say is, “If the Lord wants us to, we will live and do this or that.” 16Otherwise you are boasting about your own plans, and all such boasting is evil.  James 4:13-16 NLT.  James point is  clear: when we think we’re in control of our lives, when we “boast” about our own plans, we’ve stepped across the line to evil.  It may not seem evil to say, “I’m going to move to Pittsburgh for a while and set up a business that I’m sure will make me a lot of money.”  But James says if we do that we’re making one vital mistake—we’re assuming that we’re in charge of our lives.  James makes a great case.  First, he points out that we don’t even know what our lives are going to be like tomorrow.  In fact, we don’t even know whether we’ll be here tomorrow.  When we make our plans, we often assume that we’re going to be here indefinitely.  We assume that if we’re 50, we have another good 25 or 30 years left.  If we’re 30, we have 45 or 50 good years left.  If we’re 10, we don’t even worry about how long we have left, because all of life is before us.  Most of us, maybe even all of us in this room this morning will live to see 2009, if Jesus doesn’t return, but some may not. In fact, we haven’t had a covenanting disciple die at New Life for the past two years.  But none of us knows who will and who won’t live to see 2009, only God knows.

     James tells us our lives are like the morning fog—here for a little while and then gone.  That image is particularly true from God’s perspective.  He lives forever.  That means even if we live to be 100, our lives ARE like a morning fog.  James tells us because our lives are so brief, because we have so little control over them, we must change our perspectives when it comes to planning.  Here’s the proper perspective:  “If the Lord wants us to, we will live and do this or that.” We must entrust our lives to the Lord.  His will must be first. When we plan—and again planning is important if we want to accomplish anything worthwhile in life—our plans must put God first.  They must recognize that He is the one who WILL determine our steps.  We are children and servants of the living God of the universe.  We exist because He created us, because His Son, Jesus redeemed us, and because the Holy Spirit lives in us and sustains us.  Our lives matter infinitely to Him, and He wants to see us plan and live them in ways that bring Him glory.  As we do that, He WILL be in our plans, but we must never assume or presume that our plans determine the future, or even that we will be a part of the future we plan.