The Ultimate Plan of God
The gospel is the good news of the coming Family, or Kingdom, of God. God is a Family. The Bible teaches that every human being who has ever lived will have the opportunity to receive salvation and be born into the Family of God—most of them, after a resurrection that is yet to come.
But there is a mind-shattering truth we need to understand, and have not understood. Three scriptures strongly indicate that after God completes His Work on Earth—and everybody who obeys God and will become a Spirit being has become one—He will repeat what He has done here, at least to some degree, throughout all the universe!
The universe is overwhelmingly vast. Light travels at 186,000 miles per second, and the light from the other side of the universe hasn’t even reached us yet. By their best estimates, astronomers say there are some 2 to 3 trillion galaxies. That means there are likely more stars than grains of sand on Earth! Yet God calls all the stars by name (Psalm 147:4). This alone shows that He has a wonderful plan for the future of those stars and the planets that orbit them. What an omnipotent Creator God we have!
During the Millennium, God is going to rule for 1,000 years and create a godly utopia, a paradise this world has never seen. Isaiah 35:1 says Earth is going to “blossom as the rose.” “For the Lord shall comfort Zion: he will comfort all her waste places; and he will make her wilderness like Eden, and her desert like the garden of the Lord …” (Isaiah 51:3). Satan will not be around to interfere.
Many scriptures reveal this is also what the whole universe will be like eventually! It will become like “Eden the garden of God.” And the three scriptures I want to show you strongly indicate that, at that phase in His plan, God will still be working with carnal-minded people and bringing them along to baptism and repentance and conversion. Just as in the Millennium, Satan will not be around. But we will have to help convert those people and teach them the truth. If what I’m telling you is true, those planets are going to be inhabited!
These scriptures strongly indicate this royal majesty of the future. Look at them and see what you think about them.
The House of Jacob
Look first at Luke 1:31-33: “And, behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name Jesus. He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest: and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David: And he shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there shall be no end.” This is describing a Father-Son relationship between God and Christ. God is a Family—and He is going to bring us into that Family if we are willing to obey Him.
For years I have wondered why God inspired the word “Jacob” in this verse. Jacob was the name of the great biblical patriarch before he was converted, at which point God changed his name to Israel (Genesis 32:27-28). Those whom God calls into His Church and begets with His Spirit are spiritual Israel (e.g. Galatians 6:16). Eventually, all mankind will be converted and become spiritual Israel! Many prophecies talk about that. But Luke 1:33 says Christ will “reign over the house of Jacob for ever.” You can check both Old and New Testaments and see that this means exactly what it says: the house of Jacob.
How do you explain this? I think there are astounding implications here! The name Jacob refers to people who are unconverted. Surely this means that God will be dealing with unconverted people forever—just as He will in the Millennium. That must include the period after God’s plan has finished on Earth, and every person who is going to become a Spirit being is born into the Family of God. Even after that, there will still be people who grow up and then become converted and join spiritual Israel! I don’t know how else you can understand this scripture.
It seems carnal human beings like Jacob are going to be out there in the future—not on Earth but on vast, distant planets in the universe—and God will be teaching them to become members of the God Family forever and ever! Jesus Christ’s death is going to continue to pay for men’s transgressions throughout eternity.
This is a mind-staggering truth that we need to think about, because I believe this is God’s ultimate goal! Forever Christ will reign over “the house of Jacob”! That must mean God is going to continue expanding His Family forever!
I’ll show you two more scriptures that are even stronger in stating this.
The Increase of His Government
Next, let’s examine Isaiah 9:6-7. This is an Old Testament prophecy of Jesus Christ, the Son of God the Father, being born of a physical woman, Mary: “For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder …. Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David …. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.”
This says there will be no end to the increase of Christ’s government and peace. Now, you don’t necessarily need a government in an uninhabited wilderness. But this government will keep increasing and bringing peace—with no end! You don’t have a government and bring peace unless you have inhabitants there—human beings! People must learn how to have peace, and to have peace in all the planets of the universe. This verse seems to say clearly that God’s Work will continue, and His government will bring peace into men’s lives that only the Spirit of God can bring—which they must receive at baptism and go on from there. That verse says there will be no end to this process. Endless growth! Surely that means God is going to keep re-creating Himself through men throughout eternity!
Of this, you can be sure: God is going to use every inch of all that universe He has created!
The June 1974 issue of the Good News, published by the Worldwide Church of God under Herbert W. Armstrong, said this: “God the Father and Jesus Christ are reproducing themselves. They are enlarging their God Family. They are begetting sons. Real sons. Literal members of the God Family. That’s the purpose of human life. That’s the purpose for this Earth. And that very well could be the purpose for the entire universe.” The entire universe!
“Now we recognize that there is no single, specific place in the Bible which explicitly states that God created the entire universe for the purpose of populating it with His growing Family,” this article continued. “So we cannot be dogmatic. We are journeying, at least in part, into the realm of possibility.”
I submit to you that maybe we can begin to be more dogmatic about this. We have speculated on this in the past, yet God has revealed more to us since the time of Herbert W. Armstrong, specifically with two other scriptures.
Isaiah 9:6-7 describe endless growth “on the throne of David.” That is something to ponder! Is this the ultimate goal of God? We cannot limit God. This is about creating families of God throughout the universe and for eternity! How inspiring! And I believe you can prove it from your Bible.
The Mystery of God
Look now at Revelation 10. This does not directly prove God’s ultimate plan, but it provides important background to another verse that does. This chapter is about the “little book,” a special message from God. And here is what God tells the people who have the little book to do: “But in the days of the voice of the seventh angel: when he shall begin to sound [more accurately, is about to sound], the mystery of God should be finished [more accurately, shall have been finished], as he hath declared to his servants the prophets” (verse 7).
This is an inspiring prophecy for “the days of the voice of the seventh angel”—meaning the angel who will sound the last trumpet. Revelation 11:15 says that when that trumpet sounds, the kingdoms of this world will become the kingdoms of God! So this really dates the Revelation 10 prophecy. Verse 7 says that when that angel is about to sound, the mystery of God shall have been finished. What is that?
Mr. Armstrong wrote a book titled Mystery of the Ages, and there is no other book like it! It is a synopsis of the entire Bible, and it explains what this “mystery” in Revelation 10:7 is. We need to understand what this mystery is and remove the mystery! This world does not know, but it can and it should! Though it is a mystery to this world, it’s not a mystery to God’s very elect.
This mystery means everything to people who truly believe the Bible. Revelation 10 shows a connection between Mystery of the Ages and the “little book.” God tells those who have the little book, “Thou must prophesy again before many peoples, and nations, and tongues, and kings” (verse 11). You must go out and prophesy again about that mystery. Why this strange command?
Mr. Armstrong wrote Mystery of the Ages just months before he died in 1986. The men who took over the Church after he died very quickly abandoned Mr. Armstrong’s teachings and discontinued that book! We remained loyal to God and to His truth, and began printing and distributing Mystery of the Ages again. The wcg actually sued us in an effort to keep that book out of print! We fought a six-year court battle to win Mystery of the Ages because it means that much to us! In a miraculous victory, we obtained the copyright of that book and 18 of Mr. Armstrong’s other works.
This is why God says, You must prophesy again about this mystery—just like it was done before. And Revelation 10:7 says the work of publicizing this mystery must be finished when the seventh trumpet is “about to sound.”
This helps you understand a third scripture that reveals God’s ultimate plan.
Dispensing the Mystery
In Ephesians 3:9, the Apostle Paul writes that he wants “to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ.”
The word “fellowship” is incorrectly translated. The Companion Bible says the translators actually rendered the wrong Greek word! Lange’s Commentary and some Bible translations render it “dispensation.” Dispensation means to disperse or distribute something. This is talking about dispensing or distributing the mystery.
So what is God talking about here? This verse doesn’t just say we should deliver this mystery—which we certainly must do. It says we should make all people understand that this mystery needs to be dispensed, or declared, to all mankind!
That only makes sense if you are taking it out into the universe and for all eternity!
“Ephesians 3:9 says all men must see that the mystery of god needs to be declared,” I wrote in my booklet Prophesy Again. “Think about that statement. God will give all the people of this world a vision like they have never, ever seen before! Perhaps He wants to show them that they are going to have to get that mystery to the universe—and perhaps to other men and women that God will create on other planets.” I think these scriptures teach us exactly that! “Ephesians 3:9 certainly does allow for that. Is God’s mystery going to be dispensed on and on and on—where men elsewhere in the universe will have this mystery revealed to them after they go through some experience like we have on Earth?” In other words, unconverted people will get baptized, receive God’s Holy Spirit and be converted—and then, once they have the Spirit, truly understand this mystery!
“[T]he word dispensation has mind-staggering implications!” I wrote. “The mystery must be dispensed, or declared, to every son who enters God’s Family.”
God is going to keep teaching and raising up and creating Sons of God forever, as I understand these verses. How can you understand them any differently?
This is astounding when you think deeply about it. It is, indeed, the ultimate plan of God!
Ephesians 3:9 says God has been hiding this mystery in His mind for ages, or eons and eons of time. The angels knew nothing about it. When God created them, the angels did not understand that He would re-create Himself in humans if His plan with angels failed. When they proved unable to do the job God gave them, He proceeded to create man! Even today, most men have never known this mystery. In that sense, it’s still hidden in God’s mind and in His very elect today.
But as this verse says, a tiny group of saints do understand this. We must understand Ephesians 3:9!
God wants us to set our affection on things above, not on things on Earth (Colossians 3:1-2). Get your mind up there and see your incredible human potential! Set your thoughts on God’s ultimate plan! What He is doing today leads into a fabulous eternity of making the universe blossom like a rose. And as these verses indicate—certainly to me—there will be no end to God expanding His Family, rearing up more families and more human beings that He can work with and spiritually convert! What a future God has in store for His Family!