Anita Ojeda It’s easy to drift through life and wake up and discover yourself entrenched in middle-aged with little to show. You CAN find relief for life drift. Start with a plan.
What’s Wrong with a Life Plan?
“You shouldn’t have a life plan because God tells us that he’ll order our steps,” a family member counseled me when I told him about spending time making a life plan a few years ago.
“I see what you mean,” I answered, “but if you refer to that verse in Psalm 37, you might want to read the whole chapter. Besides,” I assured him, “I wrote my life plan to align with my relationship with God and what I know about him.”
He nodded his head, still looking dubious, and the conversation turned to other topics.
Psalm 37:23 does say,
“The Lord directs the steps of the godly. He delights in every detail of their lives,” but it also says a lot of other things, too.
King David
For most of my life, I’ve suffered from life drift. Other family members think I’ve had goals and aspirations and I’ve made things happen in my life. Not so. I’ve had vague ideas and hazy dreams and a lot of them have turned out well. As a teenager, I knew I wanted to serve God, and I kind of fell into teaching as a way of serving.
Once I created a life plan, I realized I had wasted a lot of time on unimportant things by just drifting along. I had fallen prey to mindlessly going through life, feeling overwhelmed and underachieving.
God delights in our accomplishments–and the more we plan, the more we can accomplish for him. #goals #fmfparty Click To TweetCommit Your Goals to God for Relief
The first part of Psalm 37 talks about what happens when we commit everything we do to the Lord: he will help us. If we don’t spend time thinking about our plans and our purpose, we won’t have a lot to commit to God.
Planning and long-term goal-setting don’t come naturally to me, but during the last two years, I’ve sought relief from my life drift and discovered that I CAN plan (and achieve). I can set short-term goals and long-term goals, and adopt good habits.
When I ask God to act as my planning partner and commit my ways to him, I can serve him better and more efficiently. I can burn the dross out of my life and make time for my best yes. It’s not presumptuous or ungodly to make plans and set goals. God made us to create, serve and achieve.
He delights in our achievements like a good, good Father. What a relief! Self-care means acknowledging that God planned for our existence and honoring his plan with a plan for our life so that we can fulfill his purpose for us.
Self-care means acknowledging that God planned for our existence and honoring his plan with a plan for our life so that we can fulfill his purpose for us.—YAAAAAAAAAS! Visiting from FMF!
Yes so much to this, so many times I have been told that God laughs at my plans. Yet this has just left me feeling unfulfilled, lacking in purpose. The more time I have spend in scripture the more I have realised that God wants me to plan, to find a purpose and to commit this to him. So yes I’m late to this understanding but I’m also finally ready to do this.
I can’t imagine you flailing along but I do appreciate the confession! It’s great to have a plan but always being willing to change it in obedience to Him! #10
Thank you for reminding us Who to make our plans for and with! I have lots of plans….follow-through not so much. I’m guessing that’s because I’m trying to do it on my own. Your words always inspire and encourage me!
My life once had a master plan,
but then it all derailed,
and I could not understand
why, God-ordained, it failed.
Left upon the desert plain
of broken hopes and dreams,
I asked the Lord through my pain
what it really means.
And then His answer, sure and kind
and filled with loving grace:
“You had too much on your mind,
and could not see My face;
I know this was too high a cost,
but I could not bear to see you lost.”
Yes, allowing God to direct our plans is always best!
So thankful that God is in control of our plans!
I love your post anita:) great challenge for me right now as i sometimes feel like i’m sliding…even in the middle of trying to set goals for my writing. i’m looking forward to the february challenge. hoping to get back to FMF too, but i’ve had to do some focusing and had to leave some groups for the short term to get some work done. i guess that’s all part of setting goals.
you have given me food for thought. 🙂
Amen!
I needed this reminder. My word for the year is STRETCH. I think that, perhaps, my personal goals have been too “safe”, too simple. I think I need to rethink things and actually sit down (with God’s guidance) to make some more concrete plans for me personally.
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