Who's in charge of your day?

James 4:13-17, “¹³ Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, and spend a year there and engage in business and make a profit.” ¹⁴ Yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow. You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away. ¹⁵ Instead, you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and also do this or that.” ¹⁶ But as it is, you boast in your arrogance; all such boasting is evil. ¹⁷ Therefore, to one who knows the right thing to do and does not do it, to him it is sin.”

Slightly convicting, isn’t it? How many times will you have everything planned out to the tiniest detail, without putting God’s will and the possibility of change on the agenda? I know I do it a lot more than I should. Our lives are not our own, we are not our own, and if we think otherwise, we have serious problems. Having a tentative plan is a good thing, but holding fast to that plan isn’t going to get you far in God’s plan. Leave space for wiggle-room and just hang on tight. As James so rightly says, if we know the good things we SHOULD do, but don’t do them, we are sinning. God could take our lives at any second, and I, for one, want to hear the words, “Well done, my good and faithful servant” (Matthew 25:21) at the end of my life.

God calls us to serve. You can’t be focusing on yourself and your plans if you want to serve. Jesus Christ, the Savior of the world, did not come to be served, but to serve (Mark 10:45). Before He went to the cross, Jesus Christ himself said, “my Father, if it is at all possible, may this cup be taken from me, yet not as I will, but as You will.” (Paraphrase of Matthew 26:39)

We should model our lives after Christ, “Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death – even death on a cross! ” (Philippians 2:5-9) 

With Jesus as your example, don’t think that taking time out of your day to do the dishes or talk to a lonely person is truly a sacrifice.

At the beginning of each day, we should be saying, “Lord, what will you have me do today? How can I best serve you?” To sum up, prayerfully make your plans and leave room for Jesus.

In Christ alone,

~Sonia