Deeper Dive
God Plans
“Being both Infinite and Eternal gives God something unfathomable to us common folks — He has the hallmark of knowing and determining with full understanding what is best to accomplish His desires for Himself and His Creation. He is not unprepared for the consequences of creation, choice, rebellion, sin or redemption. He knew the possibilities and had prepared the remedies for all contingencies. And He still was willing to give Will to angels and mankind knowing full well what their rebellion would cost Him personally. But it was worth it to Him to create us in His image albeit finite and with other intrinsic limits to prevent consequence without order.”
Jesus did much of His teaching using parables to make simple what we seem to see as complex. The current example is God’s Plan, His intention for us in relation to Himself.
“And he began to tell the people this parable: “A man planted a vineyard and let it out to tenants and went into another country for a long while. When the time came, he sent a servant to the tenants, so that they would give him some of the fruit of the vineyard. But the tenants beat him and sent him away empty-handed. And he sent another servant. But they also beat and treated him shamefully, and sent him away empty-handed. And he sent yet a third. This one also they wounded and cast out.
Then the owner of the vineyard said, ‘What shall I do? I will send my beloved son; perhaps they will respect him.’ But when the tenants saw him, they said to themselves, ‘This is the heir. Let us kill him, so that the inheritance may be ours.’ And they threw him out of the vineyard and killed him. What then will the owner of the vineyard do to them? He will come and destroy those tenants and give the vineyard to others.” When they heard this, they said, “Surely not!” But he looked directly at them and said, “What then is this that is written:
‘The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone’?”1
In western societies we seem to have a sense of entitlement that goes beyond the bounds of reality. In the parable, the man (representing God) creates a vineyard and then places it in the care of tenants (us folks) who are to be responsible for the care of it so it produces as intended by the man. After a suitable time goes by, the man knows it is time for the crop that the vineyard was created to produce. His (the Creator’s) expectation is that the tenants would fulfill His right to profit from the crop so He sends His representatives to the tenants to receive His share of the crop. But the tenants no longer want to honor the terms of His “letting it out” to them and want it all for themselves. The tenants ultimately come to believe they can have it all by killing the Son (Jesus) of the Man (God).
The parable is an example of God’s plan for our relationship with Him. He created not only our world but gave us the ability and responsibility to care for that as His representatives — we do not ‘own’ this world but are His tenants living in the world. His plan is for us to continue to agree with Him to the terms of relationship but we determine (in the parable) to have it our way and ignore His claims as God.
Often we want God’s Plan for our life as if it were something we would possess apart from Him, that we would not be stewards under Him in the execution of the terms of relationship. That expectation would give us the primacy over God and we would have it all to ourselves for our purposes.
The Plan of God for your life is not something you would receive, possess and then depart on your own course to do as you please but rather the expression of His desires through your heart and then actions. His Plan is to be who you are above what you do; the doing flows from the being. And you do not take the place of the Son.
FOOTNOTES:
1 Luke 20:9-17 (ESV) – https://www.blueletterbible.org/esv/luk/20/9-17/s_993009