Tell me whatcha want

Remember being a kid?

I don't mean the diaper days, or the eating crayons days, or the "I-think-you're-cute-so-I'm-gonna-be-obnoxiously-mean-to-you" days.

I mean the days when you were old enough to look at the future and think about what it could hold and what you'd do and who you'd be.

When I was in, say, junior high, I didn't know what I wanted to be.
But I knew that I was going to be best friends with my best friend forever.
I knew that I was going to be really smart and respected.
I knew that I would live comfortably.

Where did that take me?
That girl's not my best friend anymore.  I don't go to some Ivy League college.  We're in a recession and money got tight and I don't have some things that other people have.

I can't help but think of James 4:13-15:

Come now, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit"-- yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, 

"If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that."

I'm not knocking making plans and working for something (I think passages like Colossians 3:23-24 make that really clear!) but we have to have a sense of holding our desires loosely so that if God wants to take or change them, we won't be broken.  Submission to the will of the sovereign God of the universe is the only thing that MAKES SENSE!

The heart of a man plans his way, but the LORD establishes his steps

Proverbs 16:9

The LORD will fulfill his purpose for me;

Your steadfast love, O LORD, endures forever.

Do not forsake the work of your hands.

Psalm 138:8

For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.

Philippians 1:21

Maybe that last verse has resonated in your heart like it has in mine.  The declaration of a life wholly devoted to Christ, with no fear for the future. The ability to wholeheartedly proclaim those words is a wonderful thing!

But do we know the verse immediately following?

If I am to live in the flesh, that means fruitful labor for me...

Paul's life demonstrates that this fruitful labor wasn't always what he might have wanted.  There were churches he wanted to visit that he didn't get a chance to prior to his arrest. I'm sure there were people he was praying for who didn't get saved before he died. He traveled constantly, never settled in a home as the pastor of a church.  Does that mean he allowed his labor to be less fruitful because it might not have been what he originally had in mind? No! And neither should we.

Now, the things I hope for my life are very different than the things my 13-year-old self would have desired.  But I want to express that any plan I have is subject to the will of the Lord, and because I am his, I am willing to go anywhere or do anything at any time.

If the greatest things that I desire are NOT 

grad school

marriage

a house

kids

several big dogs

a Hawaiian vacation every summer

a walk in closet

etc

but if the greatest things that I desire ARE 

what God wants:

salvation (2 Pet 3:9)

unity in his church (Phil 1:27)

discipleship (Titus 2:2-8)

sanctification (1 Thes 4:3)

the gospel to spread (Matt 28:18-20)

people who love and obey him (John 14:15)

his return (1 Cor 16:22)

[[to name a few]]

then I will NEVER be disappointed.