Plans are pretty much my bread and butter.
I tell my family when we’re discussing plans, ‘I’m happy to
do whatever, but I need to mentally prepare.’ I’m a planner. Spring something
on me at your peril.
And my whole job is dealing with people’s plans. What
subjects do you plan to take at A Level? What university course do you plan to
apply for? What grade do you need? What career are you planning for yourself?
Let’s put a plan in place to help you get there!
And now my inbox is brimming with the emails of students
whose plans feel as though they have been ripped up and tossed into the air by
school closures and cancelled exams. And I’m on my hands and knees with my
students trying to pick up those tiny shredded pieces of plans that are
threatening to be swept away by a Covid-19 wind.
When I can’t rely on the world to be certain and reliable I
turn to my faith. Not that the path of a follower of Jesus is paved with
certainty and reliability, far from it. But my faith is where my peace comes
from because of verses like Jeremiah 29:11: ‘For I know the plans I have for
you declares the Lord. Plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give
you hope and a future.’
As a teenager myself going through joys of exams, university
applications and friendship dramas, my bedroom wall was plastered with verses
of promises like this one. The world is scary and uncertain, but God promises
‘hope and a future.’
However, as I’ve gotten older, I’ve noticed that this verse
does not promise all it seemed to promise to me as a youth. The wording here is
careful. This verse does not say ‘I know your plans’. It does not promise
guaranteed delivery of the things I want for myself.
‘I know the plans I
have for you.’ God is in control
here. He is the one who holds the blueprints of the plan, not us. And it is
undeniably hard if we have to watch the unfolding of the worldly plans for
ourselves that we have built up, and refined, and stuck into the front of our
folders because that’s what Ms Wood suggested we do in a tutor period
presentation to keep ourselves motivated (!). But God has plans for us that
transcend our worldly desires. And they may not be clear to us now, or for a
while, or maybe not even in our lifetime. But I trust in God’s word, that they
are plans that will prosper us and give us hope and a future.
‘Therefore I tell
you, do not worry … Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your
life?’ (Matthew 6: 25-27)
To all those of us who are looking ahead and wondering and
worrying about what tomorrow, or next month, or next September might look like,
your feelings are valid. Talk to your friends, talk to your family, talk to
your teachers. But remember that God knows what tomorrow, next month, next
September and all of our 'nexts' look like. And he doesn’t want us to worry. Easier
said than done? Absolutely. But that’s why they call it faith.
Prayer
Father God,
Please surround us with your comfort and love at
this time. Thank you for the plans you have for us, and that they are plans to
prosper and not to harm us. We pray for the strength we will need to adjust to
the current climate of uncertainty and the courage to trust in your plans for
us.
Amen
Challenge
Write down your worries on a piece of paper. Share your
worries with God or just give yourself a moment to think about them. Then
scrunch them up tight or rip them up and throw them away. Tomorrow will happen,
whether or not we worry about it.
Written by Alaina Wood
Head of Sixth Form at Bluecoat Aspley
No comments:
Post a Comment