Planning ahead

James 4 : 13 - 17

You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes

When it comes to mundane things, I am excellent at planning ahead. I have in my mind a date planner at least for a week or two ahead.......This comes about by necessity - as I 'help' the three guys at home (husband and two sons) who all seem to have a poor and vague concept of schedule. I guess all these years, I have been helping to remember their schedules. Well, for one thing, I had the two boys' tuition and other classes to remember and there was always a need to juggle it all with the fewest trips out dropping off and fetching. Maybe all mothers have this ability!! Anyway, maybe it is time my mind can have a rest after all these years......since one son is already at university and the other has only this last year of regular school.

James warns about a more significant type of planning....in fact plans about business and making money!! Plans that easily lead to boastfulness and pride, like the rich man in the gospel, planning to build more barns to store his harvest. Alas, the rich man died before his plans were fulfilled. And James reminds us that humans are like mist that vanishes. The author of Ecclesiastes says "All is vanity" - the Hebrew word for vanity gives the sense of 'vapor' or 'mist', of something temporal and fleeting.

Whether in terms of big things or simply the mundane, our plans are in a sense not ours to own, just as our lives belong to the One who holds the master plan. As good stewards we should plan where we can, yet with much humility, and often a tentativeness, knowing that there is a Master Planner behind it all.