“I’ll take ‘Useless Purchases’ for 200, Alex!”
August 16, 2020
If you were a contestant on Jeopardy, and one category of questions was, “Useless Purchases”, what would you suggest as the answer? If you said, “A 2020 Planner”, you would be right for $200! With only 4 months left in the 2020 year, it is pretty safe to say that our 2020 planners did not play out as planned when we may have purchased them in 2019. They may have become pretty useless as the year progressed.
I cannot remember a time during which I have not used a planner to organize my days, weeks, and months, and 2020 is no exception! However, I do have more erasures, crossed out events, and the word, “cancelled” in my planner than any other year. And I must admit, I have begun to question my own practices of planning and wonder if I should just give up? Well, not so fast because the Bible does suggest many benefits to planning, even during a season of a pandemic!
The Bible gives us many principles for future planning but with at least one caveat! Before we get to the caveat, let’s look at a few planning strategies God suggests:
First, planning should include prayer. Praying to God gives us both God’s perspective on our future plans as well as how we should accomplish those plans. God has perfect strategic foresight, while we do not! Solomon, the wisest man, said “1The plans of the heart belong to man, but the answer of the tongue is from the Lord. 2 All the ways of a man are pure in his own eyes, but the Lord weighs the spirit.” (Proverbs 16:1-2).
Secondly, planning should include analysis. Luke records Jesus teaching that when one wants to build a tower, he should first sit down and estimate the cost to see if he has enough money to complete it. Luke 14: 28 – “For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it?“
Thirdly, planning should include consulting with others. In Proverbs 15:22, Solomon says, “Without counsel plans fail, but with many advisers they succeed”. Also, Proverbs 20:18, “Plans are established by counsel; by wise guidance wage war.”
Finally, planning requires trusting and following God’s clear, but sometimes unconventional instructions. Joshua was given precise instructions as to how he should take the city of Jericho by blowing trumpets, unconventional though it was. Gideon was told to drastically reduce his troops from 32,000 men to 300 in order to defeat his enemies. Paul chose to follow God in appealing to stand trial in Rome before Caesar when he could have been set free. Unlike these leaders, however, Jonah was so uncomfortable with how God wanted to use him in Nineveh, that he refused to trust and follow God’s instructions, and instead he headed in the opposite direction with full knowledge of the consequences.
But here is the caveat: We can plan for the future, but we must commit our plans to God.
1The plans of the heart belong to man,
but the answer of the tongue is from the Lord.
2 All the ways of a man are pure in his own eyes,
but the Lord weighs the spirit.
3 Commit your work to the Lord, and your plans will be established. (Proverbs 16:1-3).
Our 2020 planners do not have to be useless. We, as Christians can use our 2020 planners as tools to plan for the future, but then we must commit those plans to the Lord, asking that He would carry them out according to His will.
I’ll take “God’s Will” for 1000, Alex!