Daily Devotion – Our Plans vs. God’s Plans
“The plans of the heart belong to a person, but the answer of the tongue is from the Lord … The mind of a person plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps.” – Proverbs 16:1, 9 NASB
The Bible encourages us to plan but also warns that the planning process has limits. In fact, in the space of a few verses, Proverbs provides two perspectives on planning, using two different Hebrew words.
First, the “plans of the heart” do belong to us. The Hebrew word here refers to making arrangements and preparing. It can be easy to try to arrange our plans based on our thoughts and desires to achieve the results we want.
But the Bible reveals that God wants us to realize that our understanding has limits. We can make plans without seeking Him or considering His insights. Ultimately, we must trust Him to guide us.
The second kind of plan involves weaving or fabricating, as we seek to weave events together to produce the outcome we desire. But in the end, we must realize that God directs our steps. We can be frustrated unless we depend upon Him. We must realize that all our efforts are futile without His blessing.
Today, remember that God gave you His Word to be a lamp to your feet and a light to your path (Psalm 119:105). He is with you, right now – ready to give you wisdom. Seek to be a good steward, wisely using the time and opportunities He provides. Always remember the limits of your plans. In the end, trust Him to direct your path.
Prayer
Father, I commit these projects to You: _______. I seek Your plans. I trust You. Give me Your peace. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Extended Reading
Proverbs 16
//Inspiration Ministries//
Meditation of the Day – Christian Life is a Retreat
“Christian life is a retreat. We are ‘not of this world’, just as Jesus Christ is ‘not of this world’ (John 17:14). What is the world? It is, as St. John said, the ‘lust of the flesh’, that is, sensuality and corruption in our desires and deeds; ‘the lust of the eyes’, curiosity, avarice, illusion, fascination, error, and folly in the affectation of learning, and, finally, pride and ambition (1 John 2:16). To these evils of which the world is full, and which make up its substance, a retreat must be set in opposition. We need to make ourselves into a desert by a holy detachment. Christian life is a battle … We must never cease to fight. In this battle, St. Paul teaches us to make an eternal abstinence, that is, to cut ourselves off from the pleasures of the senses and guard our hearts from them … it was to repair and to expiate the failings of our retreat, of our battle against temptations, of our abstinence, that Jesus was driven into the desert. His fast of forty days prefigured the lifelong one that we are to practice by abstaining from evil deeds and by containing our desires within the limits laid down by the law of God.”— Bishop Jacques-Benigne Bossuet, p. 17-18
Verse of the Day – Live Soberly
Minute Meditation – A New Beginning
It seems that we need beginnings, or everything eventually devolves and declines into unnecessary and sad endings. You were made for so much more! So today you must pray for the desire to desire! Even if you do not feel it yet, ask for new and even unknown desires. For you will eventually get what you really desire! I promise you. It is the Holy Spirit doing the desiring at your deepest level. Therefore you will get nothing less than what you really desire, and almost surely much more.
You are the desiring of God. God desires through you and longs for Life and Love through you and in you. Allow it, speak it, and you will find your place in the universe of things. Now let me tell you something: You cannot begin to desire something if you have not already slightly tasted it. Now make that deep and hidden desire conscious, deliberate, and wholehearted. Make your desires good and far-reaching on this Ash Wednesday of new beginnings. You could not have such desires if God had not already desired them first—in you and for you and as you!
Remember finally, that the ashes on your forehead are created from the burnt palms of last Palm Sunday. New beginnings invariably come from old false things that are allowed to die.
—from the book Wondrous Encounters: Scriptures for Lent
by Richard Rohr, OFM
//Franciscan Media//