How to See the Promises of God Come to Pass

Bible Reading: 1 Chronicles 17

David was troubled that he was living in a cedar palace but the Ark of the Lord’s Covenant was still outside under a tent. He sought the prophet Nathan on what he should do. Nathan seemed to think David had the right mind about it to build the Lord a temple, and gave David the Lord’s blessing. But that night God made clear to Nathan, “My thoughts are nothing like your thoughts,” says the Lord. “And my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine. For just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so my ways are higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts” (Isaiah 55:8-9). Proverbs 14:12 states, “There is a path before each person that seems right, but it ends in death.” Much like David and Nathan, we go about our lives, sizing up which path seems most right. This job makes more money. This house has a pool. This career path seems like the one with the best long term payout. This school has the right program. But, oh how temporary are our thoughts. We see the day, the month, the year, but God sees the eternal. He sees the final moment when we arrive and what it will take to hear, “Well done, my good and faithful servant” (Matthew 25:23).

God quickly shuts down David’s plan stating, “You are not the one to build a house for me to live in. I have never lived in a house from the day I brought the Israelites out of Egypt until this very day” (1 Chronicles 17:5). David had a plan for his life. He even wanted to honor God with it. There may be times we think what we are planning will worship God, but He says, “you are not the one to… fill in the blank”. We may think it is what he wants because it is what seems godly for us to do, but it may not be what He has called for us to do at all. Additionally, in a way, David thought he had a plan for God. ‘God needs a temple too,’ David thought. How many of us have found ourselves trying to help God come up with a plan? David at this point was successful and with his success he thought, ‘I should elevate God.’ But God didn’t need his help to be elevated. God is God. At this point God lays out before Nathan and David that He is the one upholding David, not the other way around. It is God who changed the course of David’s life from sheepherder to king. It was God who granted him victory over his enemies. It was God who put him in a big cedar palace. And it was all for God’s glory. He had a plan that through David’s lineage would come the Messiah, the King of kings, and the Lord of lords, and it wouldn’t be by David’s strength, but by God’s will. All David had to do was be faithful for what God had called him to do. God did have plans for a temple, but the eternal temple of Christ was to be first on His checklist.

When the Word of the Lord comes to us it always seems impossible, whether it be promise or plan. It is always too grand, and God’s plans are beyond what mere human hands could ever hope to accomplish. When we hear, “If you openly declare that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved” (Romans 9:10), are we in shock of how simple this promise is? I bet we were at one time, but by God’s grace and the working of His Spirit we couldn’t help but confess the truth, and then something miraculous happened. The eternal promise of God came to life in us. We were born again. This is true of all the promises of God we receive through Christ. Peter said, “by which have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature” (2 Peter 1:4). It wasn’t just one promise we received, but exceedingly great and precious promises. Only through the Lord’s Word, only through His promises sealed by the sacrifice and resurrection of Christ do we partake of the divine nature of God. We can partake of His nature. We can receive what is eternally true for our lives.

When David heard the Word of God, he had a decision to make. It was a promise that seemed too great to grapple with. But instead of shrugging it away and saying, ‘well I guess if you want to God, go on ahead’, then going about his life however he wanted, he grabbed ahold of this promise by faith and followed God’s will for him, actively. David shows us how we are to receive the promises and plans of God.

In 1 Chronicles 17:25 we see David was bold to pray because God had revealed… oh how beautiful is it that God has revealed His truth to us. He has made known His Word and we see all His promises, intentions, desires for us all wrapped up in Jesus of Nazareth! The book of John proclaims, “No one has ever seen God. But the unique One, who is himself God, is near to the Father’s heart. He has revealed God to us” (John 1:18). Jesus was a living epistle in His day, the Word made flesh, the living embodiment of God’s will. He is the fullness of every promise in Scripture. Every yes and amen in heaven and bellow. And He extends this to all who would believe in Him, “To all all who believed him and accepted him, he gave the right to become children of God” (John 1:12). A child of God, just as Jesus is. The same Jesus who said, “Father, thank you for hearing me. You always hear me…” (John 11:41c-42a). We can pray like that. We can pray with boldness just as David did. We can come boldly before the throne room of grace to receive whatever it is we need (Hebrews 4:16).

Notice this, David prayed boldly. It is only because the Spirit of God reveals His Word that we can pray boldly. His first words seemed like unbelief, but read closely. David said, “Who am I, O Lord God, and what is my family that you have brought me this far?” (1 Chronicles 17:16b, NLT). But then in verse 27 he sums up his prayer with, “For when you grant a blessing, O Lord, it is an eternal blessing!” David is confident in God’s promise coming to pass. This sounds a great deal like Mary. Luke 1:38 records, “Mary responded, “I am the Lord’s servant. May everything you have said about me come true.” And then the angel left her.” When the angel told her she had been chosen to bear the Son of God, and that this would happen by God’s Spirit, she could have doubted. She could have told the angel why it was not possible. She could have insisted that she wasn’t worthy. But no. She humbly accepted what God had in store for her and what he wanted to use her for. She realized it wasn’t about her but about God and giving Him glory. The greatest act of humility is to accept what it is God has said about you and to believe it. Anything other than this is pride.

In the same chapter of Luke, Zechariah received a similar message that his wife would bear a son for him that would live for God. He responded with, “How can I be sure this will happen? I’m an old man now, and my wife is also well along in years” (Luke 1:18). How can I be sure? Not only are these words of doubt but they are entire and utter unbelief in a message from God, personally delivered by an angel. Could you imagine telling an angel, “I just don’t think so.” But this is what Zechariah did. He rejected the message from an angel that had been in the very presence of God. How much worse for us who reject the message of the Son of God? How many of us need to seal our lips the moment God wants to quicken a truth to life in us. If we cannot agree with God in that very moment then we should hit the floor and plead for Him to change our hearts to allow this seed of His Word to actually grow.

Jesus said the Word is like seed scattered by a sower. Jesus explained:

“The farmer plants seed by taking God’s word to others. The seed that fell on the footpath represents those who hear the message, only to have Satan come at once and take it away. The seed on the rocky soil represents those who hear the message and immediately receive it with joy. But since they don’t have deep roots, they don’t last long. They fall away as soon as they have problems or are persecuted for believing God’s word. The seed that fell among the thorns represents others who hear God’s word, but all too quickly the message is crowded out by the worries of this life, the lure of wealth, and the desire for other things, so no fruit is produced. And the seed that fell on good soil represents those who hear and accept God’s word and produce a harvest of thirty, sixty, or even a hundred times as much as had been planted!” (Mark 4:14-20).

The Old Testament bears witness to the fact that the soil of the heart is entirely up to us. Hosea 10:12 states, “I said, ‘Plant the good seeds of righteousness, and you will harvest a crop of love. Plow up the hard ground of your hearts, for now is the time to seek the Lord, that he may come and shower righteousness upon you.’” We decide our heart condition, and that condition is what either prepares us to receive the promises of God or to reject them. It’s what causes us to have a lasting faith in what He has said, or to be pulled away or uprooted by a strong gust of wind. The only way to have good soil is to seek the Lord. Many neglect prayer, fasting, and giving. Many neglect what it means to be before God and to wait upon Him to dig up the hard ground in our hearts. We neglect the stones left in the vineyard, and it causes us to be unfruitful in life. When we hear the promises and plans of God it’ll be evident if we are those who have spent time on our knees or not. There will be fruit.

Writing this all began when verse 27 leapt to life in me, “For when you grant a blessing, O Lord, it is an eternal blessing!” Amen! How often do we imagine that what could have worked at one time won’t work today? Some say they are too old for an assignment from God. That they had a calling at one point but missed it. Some say the cancer is too far gone. Some say ‘so-and-so will never change’. But the worst part is the cultivated field of doubts and unbelief which have been allowed to grow in secret. And those ugly things speak at the moment this new truth tries to come in. It’s the inner voice of resistance that sounds so subtly like the voices I listed above.

When God makes a promise, it is eternal. The same eternal Word at the end of our journey is the same Word for our ‘today’ journey. Many think of heaven as a magical place where God’s Word finally happens. They quote how every tear will finally be wiped away, but how many grab hold of what Jesus said in John 16:33, “These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.”

Notice the pattern. Jesus spoke promises and truth to us for us to grab ahold of. Then trials, tribulations, sorrows, all manner of things will come. But. Be of good cheer. Why? Because he’s already won the victory.

It is why Paul could say, Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. (Romans 8:37)

God’s plan for you is eternal. These promises, every yes and amen from above is eternal. If it was true in Jesus’ day then it is true today. Jesus heals the sick, delivers the captives, opens the eyes of the blind, gives hope to the hopeless. And notice he didn’t wait for getting to heaven to make this happen. He bore fruit, the Word bore fruit, in this life, today. There’s no expiration date on His Word. There’s no expiration date on His promises. Just because another trial comes doesn’t change His promise. Just because the flu came back around this year doesn’t put a stop to his promise of healing. Just because the devil tries to show us the same mountain as last year doesn’t put a limit on God’s word because it never dies. It is eternal and will come to pass. God just asks that we let our bold prayerful amen mirror His. He asks us to say, ‘so be it unto me as you have said’. We must say, “I receive by faith, right now, what God has promised, planned, and provided for me through His Word.”