The Plans

The Plans

“I know the plans I have for you,” says the LORD. “They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope.”

Jeremiah 29:11

Some things sound too good to be true, don’t they? And, as the old saying goes, “When things sound too good to be true, they usually are.” In contrast, though, if we knew the plans the Lord has for us, we would likely be surprised at how wonderful they are.

The Bible is full of passages about God’s plan for his people, assuring us that his plan is for our good, not for evil. It also says that his plan cannot be stopped. And yet, we are usually so busy making our own paltry plans that we fail to see the bigger, better plan God already has in place for us.

The story is told of a wealthy man who wanted to build a luxurious hunting lodge in the Northwoods of Wisconsin. After having his plans drawn up by a famous architect, he dispatched them to a local carpenter with instructions to go ahead and build the lodge according to the blueprints.

Only a few days had passed when a postcard arrived at the rich man’s house from the carpenter, saying, “The plans are all wrong. I can’t do anything until you get them straightened out.”

In a hurry to get the lodge finished, the rich man sent a letter posthaste, assuring the local workman that the plans were correct and to proceed as ordered.

By return mail came the following postcard: “I don’t aim to saw a plank until I get them plans straightened out. Why, if I was to build that lodge the way it’s laid out here, you’d have two bathrooms!”

Dear God, we know that you are the great Architect of our lives and that we can count on your blueprints to be right and true. Help us to build our lives based on your plans and not our own. Amen.