God Wants You To Be A Planner And Follow His Plan

Hello, and welcome to Social Media Ministries. My name is Spencer Coffman. Thank you so much for tuning in today. We’ve got a great message for you.

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Today we are diving into an excellent sermon, on how it is important for you to make plans to be a planner. Be a planner, like my plan for every day, my plan for the month. Do you have a five-year plan? Do you have a 10-year plan? I don’t even know what I’m doing tomorrow, half the time, but guess what? God wants you to have a plan.

Now this is a very, very delicate subject because having a plan – is that the same as having a will? What’s a will? Like a will, when you die. No! Like a will to do things, like a plan to do things, because aren’t we supposed to pray “Lord, not my will but yours”? We are.

So would that be “Not my plan but yours.” Well then, why would we need to have a plan, if we want to follow God’s plan? You do. The key is making your plan, the same as God’s plan. How do you do that? Stay tuned, we’re going to dive into it. Your main goal in life is to be more like God. Be more like God to be holy. You want to be a Godly person.

Let’s start out with some scripture. 1 Peter 1:16 says “For it is written. Be holy, because I am Holy.” Where did that come from? That comes from the Old Testament, all the way back in Leviticus Chapter 19, Verse 2.

So let’s go there: Leviticus 19:2 says “Speak to the entire assembly of Israel and say to them, be holy because I the Lord your God am holy.” In the original translation, this would have said “I Yahweh your God am holy,” so if God is holy and you are a Godly person you need to be holy.

Now how can you be holy? Because we are simply humans, we’re not holy. You can be holy. How do you be holy? You start to become it. We can’t just be it, we have to become it. How do we become holy? It starts off by inviting Jesus to live in your life, then to be baptized with the Holy Spirit.

Now you have the Holy Spirit living alive, on fire inside of you. That’s on fire for Christ, filled with the Holy Spirit, operating in the gifts. You now are filled with the Holy Spirit. If there is something holy in you, you have the ability to become more holy.

We’ll never be perfect. We’ll never be fully holy, but the more and more we can become like Jesus, the less and less we become like this world which is sin.

Evil, Satan, the less we become like that, the more we become like Jesus. We start to move over and over, pretty soon Satan looks at us and says “I don’t see anything in you that I identify with” and then he flees because he cannot relate to you. So as you start shunning sin, turning your thoughts for Christ, making thoughts obedient to Christ.

I’m taking them captive as you start acting in love, being more and more holy, feeding the spirit within you. Satan looks at you and says “I can’t identify with anything in you” and he runs the other way. Why does he run? Because you are becoming more holy.

The Holy Spirit is within you, and it’s thriving. And that is way more powerful than anything Satan and his demons have at their availability. So be holy, because God is holy. You want to be like God in all ways, not only a few. The more ways in which you are similar to God, the closer you are to being like Him.

Let’s go to James. I like James. James 4, Verse 8 says “Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you Sinners, and purify your hearts.” you double-minded.” Guess what? If you go near to God, he comes near to you, just like I explained.

You start going closer and closer to God, and God’s filling you up more and more and more and more and more. You are becoming more holy. Satan will flee.

We have sermons on that. “Resist the Devil”, and he will flee from you. Check it out in a card up here or navigate to our YouTube channel or website and search for it. God has a plan for everything. This is one way in which you can become more like God. You can have a plan.

How do we know God has a plan? Well, we did a sermon on it called “God Plans in Detail”. Again, card up here, or navigate to the website of the YouTube channel. You can type it out: “God Plans in Detail.” He is very detail-oriented, He leaves nothing to chance. God is on time and punctual. He makes sure that everything goes according to plan.

Let’s go to Romans 8:28, “And we know that in all things, God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.” God’s working. He’s working for the good of those who love him. Hopefully, you love him. That means “Guess what? He’s working for your good.”

So if you make plans for your good, and you love God, God is also working to fill those plans. Now, those plans for your good can’t be like: “It would be really good if I had a million dollars. God, work for my good, give me a million dollars. I love you.”

No, it doesn’t work like that. Now if you say “It would be good if I had a million dollars, to give a million to that charity.” Okay, you’re getting better, but you’re missing the point.

The point is not “God, give me a million dollars so I can give a million to charity.” No, the point would be God would say to you: “Why don’t you give a million dollars to charity, and then I will reward you with 10? 10 million dollars because you trusted God and acted on faith” and He rewarded your deeds.

Your righteous actions were rewarded with earthly things by God. See, when you are thinking of what is your good, and you’re making these plans, you need to be thinking in terms of heavenly plans, not in earthly things.

This is very difficult. It’s a mind shift. It’s a paradigm shift for a lot of people. When you’re thinking of “okay what is my good,” like for example what is the good of Spencer Coffman? My good would be reaching more people, and bringing them into the body of Christ.

Not simply converting them, but discipling them. Teaching them. Training them. Giving them understanding, wisdom, knowledge. Helping them understand the Scriptures in the Bible, that would be my good.

And you say “Wait a minute, that doesn’t make sense. That sounds like you’re talking about the good of others.” Yes. What did Jesus do? He didn’t come down to Earth and do things for His good, He did, but primarily He did things for others.

He acted for others. He put others before himself. He acted in love. He died for other people. He was doing things for the good of others, which was also for the good of Him and His Kingdom.

So we need to have that mindset. We need to be thinking about “what is the good of me,” and not thinking “good” in earthly terms. Yes, on Earth, man, it would be great if I had a car. It would be great if I had a bank account full of money, and had a house that I didn’t have to make payments on a mortgage or rent. It would be great if I had passive income coming in, and I could go to the beach every day and sit by the ocean. That would be good, that would be my good.

And what benefit is that to others? Not a lot. Sure, I could give some money away, or I could say “hi” to people or help them. But we need to be thinking about what is good for my soul, my identity in Christ, is really good for others.

That’s the kind of plan we need to put in place. Yeah, sometimes plans may change, but those changes that go into the new plan are usually coming from God. It’s a course correction, or a check.

And if you stay tuned with what God has planned for your life, oftentimes those changes are minor. Most of the time when plans change, it’s because of our lack of obedience, or our failure to listen to God or to notice what God is saying.

How many times is God talking to you and you’re not even paying any attention? Could be often. Do you dedicate time every day to simply sit and listen to God? You say “Wait a minute God doesn’t talk.”

Yes, He does. God is talking all over. Find that quiet place that you can sit and listen to God. He’s speaking to you, He’s always speaking to you. You need to be ready and willing to hear God’s voice. We have a sermon on that: “Hear God’s Voice,” check that out.

So back to plans. you need to have a plan. You need to be making plans. For what? For your good. For the good of God, the good of the Kingdom. That’s the primary focus.

Here on Earth, you say “Wait a minute, but my primary focus is making money, to provide for my family.” Hey, seek the kingdom first. All these earthly things will be given to you as well. Yes, God knows you have a family. God knows you need money.

Look at the sparrows. We have a sermon on that, too. “Do Not Worry.” It’s a series. Check it out. It’s a playlist. Two parts. You can watch it.

God knows you need all these things. He’ll give them to you. Trust in Him, so when you’re making your plans and there are changes, don’t worry. God sees those changes ahead of time. He knows them already.

So yes, you’re at a slight disadvantage because you don’t see the plan adapting, but you’re living it. You’re experiencing it in real-time. Roll with those changes. Trust God.

Let’s go to Proverbs. Proverbs 16:9. “In his heart, a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps.” So humans plan, but the Lord determines the steps. Or establishes the steps. That means that when we make our plans, we need to know that we do not see the entire picture.

We’re seeing a limited scope. And so when we make plans, we need to trust that God is looking over everything, over across all of time. We might be trying to do something, and God says “No it needs to be done like this,” because 50 years from now what you did, is going to have a major impact.

But we may not see that. We may not even be alive for that. Trust God. Adapt with his plan. He establishes or determines the steps. We can make the plans, then we trust Him to fulfill the plans. All right. now what else? If you want to be like God, you need to have a plan. But you need to follow his instructions and His plan.

Psalms 119:105, “Your word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path.” You need to follow God’s path. How do you do that? The Bible. If you know your Bible, and understand the Scripture, it’s very, very clear what you need to do.

Yes, there are going to be hard times, there are going to be troubles and trials. There are going to be points where you’re not sure what to do, and you need to reach out and rely on God.

In prayer, you need to seek counsel with other people, you need to ask questions, you need to get advice, but guess what? All of that is biblical, so trust the process. Continue making plans, achieving goals, and moving forward. Proverbs 16:3, “Commit to the Lord, whatever you do, and your plans will succeed.”

If you commit your plans to the Lord, and you make sure your plans and God’s plans are in alignment, they will succeed. They will if you are living God’s plan. You can’t fail. There is no way for you to fail. If you are doing exactly what God wants you to do. Yes, there can be detours.

Look at Jonah. Jonah was a prophet doing exactly what God wanted him to do. God says “Go to Nineveh”. Jonah says “No way, I’m going to Tarshish.” Guess what? Jonah’s plan, and God’s plan, were in opposite directions.

God’s plan wins. What happened to Jonah? Overboard. In a whale. The whale swims him all the way over to Nineveh, pukes him up, and Jonah says “Fine, I’m going to Nineveh.” God’s plan wins.

Now, if Jonah would have aligned his plan with God’s plan, he would have avoided all of that trouble. But God used Jonah’s misalignment disobedience to teach all of us, thousands of years later, what happens if we don’t follow God’s plan.

Today, people are still learning from that. God works for the good of those who love Him. That story has helped my good, why I’ve learned to follow God. I don’t want to get swallowed up by a fish, do you? what a cool experience but no thanks.

Proverbs 3, Verse 6, “Do not forsake wisdom, and she will protect you. Love her, and she will watch over you. God has you in the palm of His hand. Do you think Jonah thought “Man, God’s really watching over me. I’m in a storm, I’m going to get thrown in the sea, I’m going to get swallowed up by a fish. I’m in the belly of a whale, God’s got me, He’s got a plan.”

Jonah was probably in despair, man he was being digested. Skin was probably bleached white might have even been falling off. He probably didn’t even have any hair left cause he was in the acid belly of a whale getting who knows what.

He looked like probably a hairless, eyebrowless guy with skin falling off. He went to Nineveh; people probably thought he was sick, dying, leprosy, who knows what.

But God had a plan. Why? The Ninevites worshipped fish. Now, if Jonah had simply gone to Nineveh like God wanted, the plan would have succeeded. But God used Jonah’s error for His good, for God’s good, because now the Ninevites listened to Jonah even more.

They said: “Here is someone who came out of the fish.” He survived the fish they thought no one could survive the wrath of their god, their false god. Jonah preached they listened, a whole nation turned to God. Unbelievable.

God did it then. He can do it today. Follow God’s plan and you too can change nations. What? What can you plan? You can plan a lot of things: your day, your life, money. Money is a great thing to be planned You need to know where your money is going.

Have a plan. It means budgeting. Create a budget. Be very very detailed. We have a playlist “Blessed to be a Blessing” all about money and finances. You can watch that.

Banks are successful. Why? Because they plan everything down to the last penny several times a day. By the way, you can do the same. Be detail-oriented. Leave nothing to chance. Have a plan. Know what is going on in your life. Have a plan for your future. Have a plan for your life. Have a plan for your career. Have a plan for your housing. Have a plan for your children.

There’s a guy. He is known as King Richard. He is the father of Venus and Serena Williams. He had a plan. He had a very detailed plan, over 70 pages, that he wrote. Before Venus and Serena were born, he had a plan for each of their lives.

To make one the greatest tennis player in the United States. To make one of the greatest tennis players in the world, or of all time. He had a very, very detailed plan. And every day for 15 years, he stuck to the plan, and when they became successful he turned it over to his daughters.

And he still stuck with his plan for them, he had a plan. If a human can have that detailed of a plan. To make his children wildly successful multi-multi-millionaires remembered forever, probably all history.

Who are we to think that God would not have an even better plan for you or me? Because we are His children. Tune in to God’s plan. Make His plans your plans, and your plans will succeed.

Let’s pray.

Lord Jesus, thank you so much for this day, this time together. I pray that each and every person would take this message to heart: that they would start being planners. That they would plan things.

That they would keep to their appointments and their word and their bond, and that they would apply all of these biblical principles to their lives each and every day.

That they would tune in with you, that they would listen to you, that they would read their Bible, that they would develop into a deeper relationship being filled with the Holy Spirit, that they would be holy.

Because you are holy, that they would have a burning desire to be more like you each and every day. And that their plans would succeed, that you would give them success in all they do.

Because they’re following you, that you would show them that when they listen and when they follow you, that things are just so much better. Reveal your blessings to them and motivate them to continue living for you, each and every day in Jesus’s name, Amen.

If you have any questions or comments, please post them below. I encourage you to share this with others. Plans are very, very important; the right plans are even more important, and trust that God takes care of it all is perhaps the most important of all. Have a great week, God bless.