The Eternal Purpose of God - Part 5

God never does anything by chance. He plans very carefully. He plans every step of the way until that purpose is realized.

You know what is time? Time is God's workshop. God created time to work out his plan. Time is important to God.

And he uses time to perform what he has purposed. So that's why the Bible says, for the administration of the fullness of the times. God divides the time into times, into periods of time.

And at each period of time, he is working something towards the fulfillment of his purpose. Now, his purpose is so gigantic, so glorious, so immense, so it takes all the time to work this thing out. The word administration, in some version you will find, management.

Now the word means management of household affairs. God is managing his house. He is managing his household affairs.

It is the administration of his own affairs. It is the dispensation, the periods of time that he works out into fullness his purpose. That's the reason why you find even in the very beginning, because God has that purpose in him for the foundation of the world.

So, he began to plan for it. And the first thing he did, he created. God created all things according to that purpose.

In the beginning, God created. And then God created man in his own image, according to his likeness. Why? The answer is, according to that purpose.

And then throughout the Old Testament, you can read through the Old Testament, and you'll find how God gradually worked out his plan during the patriarch age. How he called man Abraham. How he got a nation, Israel.

How he worked with that nation. And how he brings the Messiah, the Redeemer, in the fullness of time. So, you find that God just gradually working out all his plan.

He never missed a point. You know, Israel, they only know the acts of God. When God brought them to the Red Sea, they saw a miracle.

The sea opened and they walked through on dry land. Oh, they praise God. They worship God.

God is good. And then soon they forgot. When they have no food to eat, they say, can God provide set a table in the wilderness? Is God able to do that? Immediately you'll find they begin to doubt.

Because all they know is the act of God. Very shallow knowledge of God. But then God, Moses, knew God in a deeper way.

Because he had a life with God. You know, sometimes I wonder, when Moses went to the mountain and received from the hand of God the two tables of law, these stones were made by God himself. And God's finger printed the word on these two tables of stones.

How precious this must be. And when Moses came down and he saw the children of Israel how they worshipped the golden cow, Moses smashed these two stones. Sometimes I wonder, did he do something wrong? How dare him destroy the very handwork of God? Now, probably he was angry.

But maybe he had sinned. Why did he do that? Because he knew the ways of God. He knew God was righteous.

And because God was righteous, if people sinned against God and violated his law, punishment would follow. Severe punishment. And he made the children of Israel drink the water where the golden cow became powder and threw all of the water and asked them to drink it.

Drink your own sin. And other than that, he stood at the gate of the camp and said, who is on the Lord's side? Come. And go from one gate to another gate.

And the children of Israel, every one of them,