As we come to the end of a year, there are many brothers and sisters who feel that because they have sinned and failed God at some time in their past lives, therefore they cannot fulfil God's perfect plan for their lives now.

Let us look at what the Scriptures have to say on this matter, and not lean- on our own understanding or our sense of logic. Notice first of all how the Bible begins. "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth" (Gen. 1:1). The heavens and the earth must have been perfect when God created them, for nothing imperfect or incomplete can ever come forth from His hand. But some of the angels whom He had created fell away, and this is described for us in Isaiah 14:11-15 and Ezekiel 28:13-18. It was then that the earth came into the condition described in Genesis 1:2, "formless, empty and dark". The rest of Genesis 1 describes how God worked on that shapeless, empty, dark mass and made something so beautiful out of it that He Himself declared it to be "very good" (Gen. 1:31). We read in Genesis 1:2,3 that the Spirit of God moved over the earth, and God spoke His Word - and this was what made the difference. What is the message in that for us today? Just this that no matter how much we may have failed or made a mess of our lives, God can still make something glorious out of our lives through His Spirit and His Word. God had a perfect plan for the heavens and the earth when he created them. But this plan had to be set aside because of Lucifer's failure. But God remade the heavens and the earth and still produced something "very good' out of the chaos.

Now consider what happened next. God made Adam and Eve and started all over again. God must have had a perfect plan for them too, which obviously did not include their sinning, by eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. But they did eat of the forbidden tree and frustrated God's original plan for them - whatever that plan might have been. Logic would now tell us that they could not fulfil God's perfect plan any longer. Yet we see that when God came to meet them in the garden, He does not tell them that they would now have to live only on His second best for the rest of their lives. No. He promises them in Genesis 3:15 that the seed of the woman would bruise the head of the serpent. That was a promise of Christ's dying for the sins of the world and overcoming Satan on Calvary.

Now consider this fact and see if you can reason it out. We know that Christ's death was part of God's perfect plan from all eternity. "The Lamb was slain from the foundation of the world" (Rev. 13:8). Yet we also know that Christ died only because Adam and Eve sinned and failed God. So logically, we could say that God's perfect plan to send Christ to die for the sins of the world was fulfilled, not despite Adam's failure, but because of Adam's failure! We would not have known God's love shown on Calvary's cross, were it not for Adam's sin.

What then is the message that God is trying to get through to us, right from the opening pages of the Bible? Just this that He can take a man who has failed and make something glorious out of him and still make him fulfil God's perfect plan for his life. That is God's message to man - and we must never forget it: God can take a man who has failed repeatedly, and still make him fulfil His perfect plan - not God's second best, but God's best plan. This is because even the failure may have been part of God's perfect plan to teach him a few unforgettable lessons.

Whatever your blunders or failures, you can make a new beginning with God. God can still make something glorious out of your life. Let us then "give glory to God by being strong in faith" (Rom. 4:20), trusting Him in the days to come for the things which we considered impossible up until now. All people - young and old - can have hope, no matter how much they may have failed in the past, if only they will acknowledge their failures, be humble and trust God. Thus we can all learn from our failures and go on to fulfil God's perfect plan for our lives. And in the ages to come, He can show us forth to others as examples of what He could do with those whose lives were total failures. In that day He will show what He could do in us, through the "surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus" (Eph. 2:7). Hallelujah!