Day 7: 50 Days All In

 

This time of year people are working towards the goals and dreams they have made with their New Years resolutions. Many have started new ways to lose weight or tone their bodies. Maybe they have plans to strengthen their relationship with their spouse or children. They even make a commitment to reading their bible.

 

Commit to the LORD whatever you do, and he will establish your plans.

Proverbs 16:3

 

Any of those resolutions in themselves are not a bad thing. We work hard to improve ourselves, then make ourselves feel better about who we are. But when people make resolutions there are three main thoughts that need to be implemented to ensure that you are all in to complete the goal. The desire to change, making a plan and following a plan.

 

The desire to change comes from our view of ourselves. We decide that there is something that needs to change and we make a conscious effort to make the change.

 

Then we make a plan. Or do we. We have the desire, but we require the commitment. Plans take work. One can commit to losing unwanted weight but without a plan, things quickly fall to pieces.

Then, of course, we need to follow the plan to make it reality or it is just another exercise video sitting on your shelf. Commitment to executing the plan is the hardest as it may take sacrifice.

 

King Solomon writing here in Proverbs 16, sees in his wisdom that in everything we do we should commit to the Lord. He doesn’t say in whatever religious activity you do, or whatever important thing you do. He writes ‘Commit to the Lord whatever you do’. We often read words like this in the bible and skim over them assuming the writer doesn’t mean what he says. Why would God care about whatever we are doing? Isn’t he to important for the little things? I will commit to him the big things, but I can handle the small things, why should I bother God.

Of course, this is not the case. God cares about everything that happens in your life. If I read this that some of our plans are not that bad. If we are all in and living a life close to God, then what we are planning is most likely already in line with our faith. The second part of what Solomon tells us is that God will ‘establish your plans’. This tells me that God lets us make plans and when we commit to Him, lining up with what he has for us, he will establish them.

Living all in and in a close relationship with God will bring us to the point where whatever we are planning God will establish them for His glory. It does require that we be all in, sold out to Him. Trusting that when we are committing to a plan we may not have all the resources to complete the plan, but trusting that God will provide what is needed.

Today whatever plans you are working towards, have you committed them to God? If not is it because they don’t line up with your faith? Commit your plans to God, let him work with you to establish them and propel you to follow the plan. Maybe, just maybe God is waiting for you to propose the plan, commit it to him so he can establish the plan for you.

 

Father, we know that you have plans for us, plans of all sizes, we thank you that you allow us to sometimes make our own plans and commit them to you. Help us to weigh our plans in view of your word and commit them to you. Propel us forward so that we can be all in with our relationship with you. Let our plans come to play and let us see many people come to know you through the love you have for us. Show yourself through our obedience in following you. Use us to reach this world as we go all in. Amen

 

Day 24: 50 Days of Passion

Road trips can be a great way to see where you live or the country you live in. If you have ever taken a long road trip there can be two types. One where the trip is planned out to the minute and only stopping where scheduled or the see something and go their kind of trip. The first kind has its advantages for an organized person a routine and plan are needed. But the second kind are the ones who are free to experience what the country truly has to offer. I purpose in our road trip with Christ our we have a final destination, but we need to be open to stopping and experiencing whatever comes our way. Not sin but the opportunities and experience we may not think are where we need to be. The ‘why God am I here” times.

 

“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.”
Isaiah 55:8-11

 

Our plans tend to be 2 dimensional when Gods plans are always 3 dimensional if even describable. He sees so much more then we do, from beginning to the end, what our choices will impact, to who we will interact with, and the consequences of inaction.

If Paul had thought that Gods only plan for him once he was arrested and appealed to Caesar, that his only mission was to convert Caesar, then he would have missed out on everything that God used him for on the journey there. Paul impacted untold numbers of people because he saw past his own plan, and kept looking bigger. He shared his experiences with the local churches never expecting that his words would change the lives of untold millions.

John a fisherman, working the nets all his life, was called by Jesus to follow him. He joined the road trip not even knowing what the destination was, barely knowing who he was going to be traveling with. Yet John took the step of faith and grew so close to Jesus that he is referred to as the one Jesus loved. He had a connection with Jesus that we can have to. If someone had told John that day that he put his nets aside that he would one day be isolated on an Island for his faith would he have reconsidered? John’s visions of the end times in Revelations are only given to him because he experienced Jesus in everything.

 

Do you know what God’s plan for you is? Has he told you to go, or do and your so focused on doing that, that you are missing opportunities to grow and share? I am not saying to not follow the plan, what I am saying is that becoming narrow focused may make you miss out on the whole plan. Maybe you don’t know the plan, well as John was told to be a fisher of men that is also a starting point for you, and Mark 16:15 is the basic plan for all believers. Will your life and what you do only impact those around you, or could it like Paul impact generations to come.

 

Jesus, open my eyes to see your plan for my life, expand my view so I can see the opportunities to share the love of you. If someone reading this is wondering what the plan for their life is I ask that they start fishing for men, sharing your love to those around them. Give them the courage and passion to share their faith. Let none be discouraged by their experience but use them to grow. If anyone reading this hasn’t made the choice to surrender their life I pray that even today, they will make the choice to follow you Jesus. Amen

 

How is God using you? I would love to hear about it.