Planning Series

PLANNING: IF YOU DO NOT KNOW WHERE YOU ARE GOING, YOU’RE GOING TO END UP SOMEWHERE ELSE

“To man belong the plans of the heart, but from the LORD comes the reply of the tongue. All a man’s ways seem innocent to him, but motives are weighed by the LORD. Commit to the LORD whatever you do, and your plans will succeed. The LORD works out everything for his own ends-- even the wicked for a day of disaster.” Prov 16:1-3 (NIV)

Big Idea: Wise people have a sense of what God wants and have made plans to achieve them. Wise people know where they are going and have plans on how to arrive there.

God has a purpose for every person. Discovering this and fulfilling it the essence of life.

Most people do not have any plan with their lives. They go through life without a clear picture of what God wants. They have no idea of their God-given destination. This reminds me of a story I read about Albert Einstein.

Albert Einstein

Some years ago the great thinker was on a train bound for New York City. As the ticket taker came walking through the car, Einstein reached into his pocket to retrieve his ticket, but could not find it. He frantically searched his coat pockets, turned his pants pockets inside out, but still could not produce the ticket.

The ticket taker said, ‘Don’t worry, Mr. Einstein, we all know who you are. Forget about it.’ About 20 minutes later, the ticket taker came back through the car, and by this time Einstein was on the floor searching everywhere for the lost ticket.

Again the ticket taker tried to reassure Einstein by saying, ‘I told you not to worry about the lost ticket. We trust that you purchased one, and that is good enough for us.’

Einstein looked up at the railroad employee and said, ‘Young man, this isn’t a matter of trust but of direction. I need to find the ticket because I forgot where I am going.”

Do you have a clear sense of where you want to go in life? Are you headed toward that destination, moving away from that destination, or simply standing idle? The first foundational secret for wise living is simply this: Wise people have a sense of their God-given destination and have made plans of going there. Wise people know where they want to go in life and have a plan for getting there.

The Cost of Doing Nothing

No body arrives at their destination in life by accident. The only thing that arrives at its intended destination by accident is airline luggage. In fact, without a plan, we tend to drift away from our dreams.

Sadly, not many people are into planning. Most people in Asian hope in good fate. They just accept whatever comes. In one of recent seminars, a brother brought out a disturbing observation. He said, “Most Overseas Filipino Workers who have broken families” came to Hong Kong and work here for many years did not have a plan. They just came to work to support their family. These wives leave their husbands for years – 2-20 years seeing them only for a month every two years. The longer a wife stays away from home, the more likely that she will end up with a broken family.” (Mr. Rolly Estrella, Omsbudman member, Philippine Consulate in HK)

Finish atheist who left his farm to the devil

Recently I read a story of a Finnish atheist who stated in his will that he wanted to leave his farm to the devil. When he died, the legal system was dumbfounded over how to honor the request. Finally, after weeks of deliberation, the court decided that the best way to carry out the farmer’s wishes was to permit the weeds and briars to taker over the farmland, to allow the house and barn to remain unpainted and eventually rot, and to let the soil erode and wash away. The court declared in its ruling, “The best way to let the devil have possession of anything is to do nothing.

The best way to allow Satan to destroy your dreams is to do nothing. Continue to live with no action plan, and you will never arrive at your desired destination in life. Why? There is a law that works in the natural world that is also operative in your life: the second law of thermodynamics. This principle, simply stated, tells us that the physical world is decaying and that the direction of all creation is downward, not upward. Everything eventually runs down. Everything is decaying.

“Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.” 2 Cor 3:16 (NIV)

Have you ever wondered why a garden left untended eventually becomes overgrown with weeds? The answer is that everything in the world is decaying.