Planning in Pencil

If there is anything that I have learned in the last 18 months, it is to plan in pencil. If you had asked me in the Fall of 2019 where I imagined I would be in a year or two, this is not at all what I would have thought, or necessarily wanted. But it is where I am at, and I am so grateful! Even a few months ago, I don't know if I would have considered myself blessed for what my life looks like. In fact, I reflected on that in a previous blog post.

Today, things are feeling different, but nothing has changed except the way I see things. They say the longest journey is between your head and your heart, and boy are they right! Things that I was thinking about and wrestling with last year are now revealing the fruit of the effort, despite my attempts to walk away from it all. Things like the need to be in control, trusting God with my future, discovering the character of God, dissatisfaction with my life.

I am so glad that God does not always give me what I want. In fact, it would be a disaster if he did because I cannot see what is to come! That is what is go great about God. He is Lord over all of time and space, yet he operates in the here and now. He delights in us in our day-to-day. He longs to walk with us through the mundane and ordinary, as much as the struggle and breakthrough.

This last year, and especially the last few months, I have learned that it can be dangerous to hope for the best and plan for the worst. To have set in stone the way things should go and how things must look. I have found that living like that does not leave room for the Holy Spirit to move in my life. While I am setting myself up for disappointment, God wants to transform my heart and my mind. I can become rigid and out of sorts when I don't get my way and miss out on the beauty and the spontaneity of the ways the Lord wants to bless me.

So where do I go from here?

I keep my pencil sharp. I let go of the idea that world is selling us that I have to be in control of my destiny and wrestle success out of each day. That sounds exhausting and colourless. Does this mean I don't have to be intentional with my day? No! But I am not going to let my success, or lack there of, determine my value. My value has already been set - my life has been paid for by the blood of Jesus. The best way that I can honour him is to live my life in tune with the Holy Spirit; a life planned in pencil.