Perfect Chaos

Despite the fact that making plans can be comforting and provide a sense of stability and assurance, the Lord is continuing to challenge me to live ‘in the now’ and not make plans at all. This is a very counter-cultural way of living as we are taught in school to plan everything and as adults we make business plans, holiday plans, things to do lists, shopping lists, and all kinds of other plans to try to give our lives structure.

Living without plans can be a way of acknowledging divine sovereignty and that it is God’s plans that are important rather than our own. While living in the now can be unsettling and even frustrating, it is also liberating and exciting to be open to the reality of infinite possibilities existing in every moment.

There is a passage in the book of James in the Bible that inspired my 2021 book God Willing. It is an important passage in that it reinforces the idea that God controls every aspect of our lives. The passage reads as follows:

¹³ Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”— ¹⁴ yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. ¹⁵ Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.”

(James 4:13-15)

I love this passage which clearly articulates a very high view of divine sovereignty and reminds us that we are clay in the Potter’s hands and that He has total control over every aspect of our lives.

Of course, we can also acknowledge that there is nothing stopping God from using plans we make as part of our lives if He wishes. The important thing to acknowledge is that we have no true freedom to fulfill our plans if we do make them.

Why not challenge yourself to live in the now today by saying a short prayer in which you commit your way to God, acknowledging that it is His plans that truly matter rather than your own?