Let the Lord Plan Your Life

“Look here, you people who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we are going to a certain town and will stay there a year. We will do business there and make a profit.’ How do you know what will happen tomorrow? For your life is like the morning fog—it’s here a little while, then it’s gone. What you ought to say is, ‘If the Lord wants us to, we will live and do this or that.’ Otherwise you will be boasting about your own plans, and all such boasting is evil. Remember, it is sin to know what you ought to do and then not do it.” (James 4:11-12, NLT).

In Proverbs 27:1 we read: “Do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring forth.” We do not know the number of our days. Neither can we know whether our plans will materialize. God alone knows and controls the future. With this knowledge securely in mind, we ought, therefore to let the Lord lay plans for our future. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus told us not to worry about our life, what we should eat, drink, wear. After using the birds of the air and the lilies of the field as examples, He then said: “But seek first His kingdom, and His righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore, do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” (Matthew 6:33-34, NIV). An adage states: “Today is the tomorrow you worried about yesterday.” Are we not to plan, then? Not to make any preparation for the future, such as an education to help us better do the work we are to do? Hardly that. But even in preparation for our life’s work, we take it a step at the time. We cannot worry and fret, nor boast. Prayer will be the springboard to guide us in the right way. Depend on God to lead, and at the same time be ready to serve willingly where He leads. The parts of the puzzle which is the future will then fall into place. James had the right advice, indeed, when he wrote: “If the Lord wants us to, we will do this or that.”

Life is like a fog which vanishes quickly away. Life is utterly dependent upon the sustaining power of God. Because of its brevity, how much more ought we to be within the parameters of God’s will and way. Psalm 23 is a good example of the believer’s dependence upon God. And watch the progression of what happens: whatever the need or situation, God is present and providing. Knowing to do good and not doing it is sin. This is what we often refer to as the “sin of omission.” When we make plans for the future, even though our plans are good, and fail to lay the whole matter before God, seeking His guidance and will, we are committing the sin of omission with a very important entity—our very life, its work, and its influence. God has numbered our days. How He would like to order our days as well, and bring fulfillment and purpose into our lives. God gave us talents and abilities for a purpose: to serve Him and others. Henry Blackaby in Experiencing God gave this advice for Christians: “Look to see where God is working and join Him in that work.” Be alert to God’s bidding; join Him and be blessed.

c Ethelene Dyer Jones; Sunday, October 24, 2010

Vision Is Necessary to Survival and Growth

“Where there is no vision, the people perish; but he that keepeth the law, happy is he.” (Proverbs 29:18, KJV).

I used the King James Version for Proverbs 29:18, the version I memorized. Some of the modern translations give additional insight to this important verse: “If people can’t see what God is doing, they stumble all over themselves; But when they attend to what He reveals, they are most blessed.” (The Message Bible by Eugene Peterson). The New International Version reads: “Where there is no revelation, the people cast off restraint; but blessed is he who keeps the law.” The Amplified Bible adds even more insight to the verse: “Where there is no vision [no redemptive revelation of God], the people perish; but he who keeps the law [of God, which includes that of man], blessed, happy, fortunate [and enviable] is he.”

Vision, then, is necessary to both survival and growth as a nation and individually, as a church or as a business. On every level of life, without vision (revelation), hope perishes and progress is squelched. This may seem to directly contradict the advice we studied in Proverbs 27:1: “Boast not thyself of tomorrow; for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth.” Remember the emphasis in that verse is of boasting, bragging about what tomorrow holds. This in no way precludes our having prophetic vision, which means that we plan and work toward goals according to God’s redemptive plan. Vision, in biblical contexts, is God’s visiting His people with concepts that work. The song writer had the right idea: “I know who holds the future, and I know who holds my hand.” With this knowledge and assurance, vision will become reality.

Recall some notable visions from both the Old and New Testaments. Moses saw the burning bush, aflame but not consumed. From that vision, Moses received God’s assignment to deliver the Israelites from Egyptian bondage. On the Mount of Transfiguration, Peter, James and John saw the Lord’s glory. Later, Peter saw in the vision of the clean and unclean animals that the gospel is for every person regardless of race. All learned that such a mountaintop experience as the vision provided was prelude to their going back into the valley to work in the highways and hedges of life. Vision inspires us and equips us. Vision instructs us and motivates us. And, as the writer of Proverbs observes, “Without vision, the people perish.” Let us pray for renewed vision and power to “work the works of Him who sent Me while it is day; the night is coming when no one can work” (John 9:4).

c Ethelene Dyer Jones; Monday, August 2, 2010

Friends Are Good to Have

“Faithful are the wounds of a friend, But the kisses of an enemy are deceitful. Ointment and perfume delight the heart, And the sweetness of a man’s friend does so by hearty counsel. Do not forsake your own friend or your father’s friend, Nor go to your brother’s house in the day of your calamity; For better is a neighbor nearby than a brother far away. As iron sharpens iron, So a man sharpens the countenance of his friend.” (Proverbs 27:6, 9, 10, 17, NKJV).

Several references are made in Proverbs to the value of friends. Go back a few chapters and read in Proverbs 17:17a: “A friend loves at all times.” And in Proverbs 18:24: “A man who has friends must himself be friendly, But there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.” Think of your friends, or more specifically a “best” friend. We used to have a saying when I was young, although of incorrect English, to specify a very special, extremely close friend: “______is my ‘bestest’ friend.” To place the superlative form at the end of the adjective indicated “above all others.” Friendship is such an important human relationship that Jesus taught about it within the context of His teaching on love: “This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends. You are My friends if you do whatsoever I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all thing that I heard from My Father I have made known to you.” (John 15:12-15, NKJV).

Like iron applied to iron to fashion and sharpen it, so a friend can hone, cheer, encourage and help another friend. It is a good thing when one spouse can say of another, first and foremost, “He/she is my best friend.” Many great writers have penned words on the value of friendship. Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote, “A friend may well be reckoned the masterpiece of Nature.” He also wrote, “The only way to have a friend is to be one.” Today, think of some dear friends. Thank God for them, and pray for them by name. Better, still, contact one and tell that person how you value his/her friendship. But above all, value your relationship with Jesus Christ, the Friend above all friends, the One who “sticks closer than a brother.”

c Ethelene Dyer Jones; Saturday, July 31, 2010

Guard Against Self-Praise

“Let another man praise you, and not your own mouth; A stranger, and not your own lips. As in water face reveals face, So a man’s heart reveals the man. The refining pot is for silver and the furnace for gold, And a man is valued by what others say of him." (Proverbs 27:2, 19, 21, NKJV).

All of us at times, unless we guard against it with diligence, like to boast about what we do or what members of our family do and have become. I will admit that I am guilty of this, and often catch myself having to back away from too much boasting. The writer of Proverbs warned that self-praise is anathema, or a curse to the one who practices it. If there is good to be said of us, let it be said by others. Disregard the old saw, “If one does not toot his own horn, it shall not be tooted.” A braggart is seldom taken seriously by those who listen to him.

Moreover, just as we learned the Greek myth of Narcissus who looked into the water and pined so much to see his own reflection that he was turned into a flower, we should guard against egocentrism. When we, like silver and gold, are refined in the crucible of life and develop good character, we will not need to applaud our own worthiness. Others will take notice of genuineness in a person and comment on it. And we should remember, too, that we are not what we are to give self-praise; neither are our deeds to be paraded for self-glorification. Humility and giving credit to God are marks of true Christian character.

Of course there are times when we need to tell about our own accomplishments. Maybe you are seeking a job and need to submit a resume. This is an opportunity to give your preparation for the job you seek. You give your training and experience. You give your philosophy of work and why you think you are qualified to assume the job for which you apply. A resume, even though it is in a sense a “self-praise” document, should be honest and straightforward, not padded and expanded. The persons you give as references (with their permission, of course) will be the ones to certify your resume and express their opinion about your character, work and aptitudes for the job. We should face honestly any words about ourselves. If training, experience and action cannot substantiate the information about ourselves, we should never give it. In presenting ourselves to others, an adage comes to mind: “What you see is what you get.” And another closely related is “What you do speaks so loudly I cannot hear what you say.” If another praises you falsely, with too much emphasis on qualities that are questionable, gently correct the errors. Humility and honesty go farther in assessing character than claiming self-importance.

c Ethelene Dyer Jones; Friday, July 30, 2010

Tomorrow Is Uncertain

“Do not boast about tomorrow, For you do not know what a day may bring forth.” (Proverbs 27:1, NASV).

Tomorrow is uncertain. We should not count as definite what we plan to do for we do not know what that elusive “tomorrow” holds. Eugene Peterson in The Message Bible renders the verse: “Don’t harshly announce what you’re going to do tomorrow; you don’t know the first thing about tomorrow.”

It is hard to draw the line between being boastful and concerned about tomorrow and being so lackadaisical that we set no goals for the future or make any plans whatsoever, allowing whatever may to come, as in the song, “What will be, will be.” In that case, why plan to get an education? Tomorrow may not come, so why would we have a need for preparation? Why, then, did the wise man who wrote this proverb warn us to beware of boasting about tomorrow? The emphasis here seems to be on the word boast. We cannot say with assurance that we will do a certain thing or accomplish specific goals on the morrow, for, behold, today is the time we have. Yet, even in today, we can work as though tomorrow will come and have faith that God, who controls all of time, will work out His will in granting us the days allotted to us.

Horace, a great Italian philosopher who lived from about 65-8 B. C., had probing concerns about tomorrow. He stated: “Drop the question what tomorrow may bring, and count as profit every day that Fate allows you.” He is also responsible for the often-quoted “carp diem,” which we translate “seize the day”. The quotation containing this Latin phrase, translated, reads: “While we’re talking, time will have meanly run on; pick today’s fruits (or carp diem), not relying on the future in the slightest.” The idea is to seize today. It is here for us to enjoy, to gain benefits from, to live wholly in. One of my favorite quotations along this line is Psalm 118:24: “This is the day which the Lord hath made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.” I quote this nearly every morning upon awaking, thanking God for another day of life. Jesus taught about the folly of earnestly seeking to lay up treasures upon earth because of the uncertainty and brevity of life (Luke 12:16-23). See also in His “Sermon on the Mount” where he taught: “Therefore, do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.” (Matthew 6:34, NKJV). James, too, wrote on this theme: “Some of you say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go to some city. We will stay there a year, do business, and make money.’ But you do not know what will happen tomorrow! Your life is like a mist. You can see it for a short time, but then it goes away.” (James 4:13-14, NIV). Someone has wisely observed: “Today is the tomorrow you worried about yesterday.”

To close out thoughts on avoiding the uncertainties of tomorrow, I end with an original poem:

One Day at a Time

If we could but the secret find
Of one day at a time,
We’d borrow not tomorrow’s fears
And neither look behind
To yesterday’s regrets and tears,
Nor rue today’s firm tread,
But fill life full of love and joy
And happiness instead.

In our concern to push ahead
We grab and gulp and pine,
Not understanding precious peace
Of one day at a time.
Lord, grant us patience thus to live
And give us grace to find
The sheer delight of present tense,
Of one day at a time.

-Ethelene Dyer Jones (c1984)

Lord, may we live fully for You today. “Today is the first day of the rest of our lives.” Amen.

c Ethelene Dyer Jones; Thursday, July 29, 2010