Our Best Laid Plans

13Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, spend a year there, buy and sell, and make a profit”; 14whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away. 15Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we shall live and do this or that.” 16But now you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. 17Therefore, to him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin.
James 4: 13- 17 NKJV

I have a habit.  Some who have known me have recomended therapy for this disorder, but so I've resisted.  See, when it comes to many of my activities in life, I tend to do things in the spur of the moment.  Pre planning is for chumps, I'll just take it as it comes.  Of course, there are certain things in life which can and do require our best laid plans and indeed I have at times succomed to pre planning.  To be organized, it seems, is a foriegn concept to me.  James warns us against the arrogance of making plans for the future.  For we say to ourselves, "Tomorrow we will travel to this city and make a profit."  Rarely do we think that in our efforts to make our plans that we may be overlooking our Lords will for our lives.  It's happened to me many a time where I have prayed as I entered a certain situation only to not have things work out the way I had anticipated.  Was God against me from the start in that situation?  Most certainly not, but it was my own arrogance which led me to believe that what I was doing was what God intended for me.  James calls such thoughts boasting, and I agree.  For I myself am but a extension of Christ Jesus who is within me {Galations 2:20}.  Therefore, these plans I make always include Him as well.  When I have stepped back and looked at my decisions from this perspective, I've seen the arrogance which James warned against.  Indeed, my own arrogance.  If God Himself has assured us that He has His best intentions for us, how can we not trust in His judgement?  If we are indeed the extension of Christ Jesus who is within us, how can we not accept His direction for our lives?

16Then He spoke a parable to them, saying: “The ground of a certain rich man yielded plentifully. 17“And he thought within himself, saying, ‘What shall I do, since I have no room to store my crops?’ 18“So he said, ‘I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build greater, and there I will store all my crops and my goods. 19‘And I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years; take your ease; eat, drink, and be merry.” ’ 20“But God said to him, ‘Fool! This night your soul will be required of you; then whose will those things be which you have provided?’ 21“So is he who lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God.”
Luke 12: 16 - 21 NKJV

I've often wondered about those people whom I have had that conversation about Jesus with.  For inevitably I will hear someone tell me, "I don't need Jesus, I know where I'm headed."  Sadly, I don't think that they do.  The scriptures are filled with more than a few references of that place one goes when they pass the bonds of this life.  I truly believe in my heart what the scriptures claim, that there is indeed a heaven and a hell.  It is beyond me how one could choose the conditions of not living their eternity with Christ Jesus.  Ultimately I think this decision all comes down to that control which we falsely believe we have over our own lives.  It is this false belief that we are indeed a independent self which is contrary to God.  Truly, if we were independent, would we even need God?  Satan didn't think so, look where it got him.  Taken at face value, how is it that we can be independent of He who created all that we see?  Yet, each one of us has within us that burning desire to be truly independent.  We long to be in control of that life which we live.  More than a few have staked this claim in error.  For if we are indeed extensions of Christ who is in us, that independence we desire is a lie not of Jesus.  It is Jesus Himself who claimed that He only does the will of His Father.

19Then Jesus answered and said to them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He sees the Father do; for whatever He does, the Son also does in like manner. 20“For the Father loves the Son, and shows Him all things that He Himself does; and He will show Him greater works than these, that you may marvel."
John 5: 19 - 20 NKJV

It is Jesus who is within us, and Jesus who knows and does the will of the Father.

~Scott~