“Mann Tracht, Un Gott Lacht” is an old Yiddish adage meaning, “Man Plans, and God Laughs.” Despite our most careful planning, the Road of Life is unpredictable. If we have learned anything from this year of COVID-19 we have certainly learned the truth of this ancient proverb. This was to be the year of celebrating our 40th wedding anniversary with a Rhine River Cruise. When we booked and paid for the special trip at the beginning of the year no one in our country had heard of CORONA or COVID-19. Heck, I had never even heard of the previous 18 COVIDS! I guess they never got out of hand until number 19 came along. Now we have to do our best to stay married to try again next year.
In all seriousness, there have been far more serious changes
to plans due to the deadly virus than our trip.
People have lost loved ones, health, jobs, etc. We do not know how the world will be on the
other side of COVID but we know it will not be the same. There will be permanent scars.
Proverbs 19:21 says; “Many are the plans in a person's heart, but
it is the LORD's purpose that prevails.” I do not believe that God necessarily has a
purpose in disease or disaster. I have
long studied and proclaimed that we live in a “sin-scarred” world where
bad things happen sometimes for no rhyme or reason other than we live in a
fallen world. The earliest teaching of
the Bible declares that deciding to do ‘what
we choose’ instead of obeying ‘what
God said’ brings disastrous consequences.
Before man’s disobedience there was no recorded sickness, storms, death,
destruction or even a heat wave. So,
over the years when I have been with families dealing with tragic sickness,
tragedy or death, I have never said; “You
know God has a purpose in this!” That is not what Proverbs
19:21 says. It tells us that God’s
purpose prevails no matter what our thoughts, plans or actions may be. So, what is God’s purpose when things do not
go as we planned?
I will explain and finish this thought in a few
moments. But first let me set the
stage. We do live in an imperfect world
and we all have our flaws and shortcomings.
I recently told my wife that anything made by man will eventually break
or malfunction. Who knows what we were
talking about? I was probably making
another excuse for something I broke but anyway…the point is that even when we
try our best things probably will not work out as we planned.
I confess that early in my ministry I would be planning a
sermon and the thought would pop into my head that this is exactly what a
certain person needs to hear. Inevitably
that particular person would be absent that following Sunday. So, much for my plan! I also have memories of working all week to
have a message that would come to a great climax to make the critical point. As I would get to that crucial place in the
sermon either a baby would begin crying or someone would begin coughing loudly. Now everyone would be watching the baby or the
coughing victim. Again, so much for my
plan!
Over the years I have participated and led many overseas
mission trips. I would always give an
orientation as many participants had never been overseas. I told them to memorize two words that would
become helpful at some point; “BE
FLEXIBLE”! I learned that no matter
how well I planned something unexpected would always happen and being OCD, I
planned excessively. My largest group
was a team of 53 volunteers going to Romania.
We had people from 24 churches over different parts of the state. The plan had team members flying from 5
different regional airports to Atlanta where we would all meet at the gate for
our flight to Romania on the same plane.
I had many trips under my belt and was not worried about the
logistics…until I was ready to board my flight for Atlanta. I was informed that weather had delayed
several flights in other cities. We
wound up scattered on several flights over the Atlantic Ocean. When I landed in Europe, as I was rushing to
the desk to find out where and when the rest of the team would arrive I was
repeating my mantra…BE FLEXIBLE…BE FLEXIBE.
I did manage to get all 53 people together for our mission work in
Romania and safely home but not as I planned.
While it is good and practical to make plans, we need to be
aware that God may indeed be smiling as He sees the big curveball that is
heading our way. Again, I do not believe
that God may have always thrown the curveball.
As stated previously, we live in a world of uncertainty and chaos that
is primarily due to our own limited wisdom and poor decisions as a human race
explained in Genesis 3. While God may
not always cause the disruption in our plans He may let it happen. Now back to Proverbs 19:21, no matter how
many and how diverse our plans may be God has a purpose that will prevail.
I think often of the Apostle Paul. Paul was following God’s leadership preaching
and wound up in jail. The normal
response might be, “This is the thanks I
get! Why try?” However Paul changed
his thinking. This was not what I planned but how
can God’s purpose prevail here? He
no longer had to worry about gathering an audience. He now had a ‘captive’ audience with the
guards as he explained in Philippians 1:12-30.
When we change the way we look at things, the things we look at
change. Rather than becoming
discouraged, disappointed or frustrated when our plans are not working look for
God’s purpose in the day or the moment.
He always wants us to practice patience, kindness and love no matter how
our plans have blown up or what the situation may be. That may sound simplistic but that is always
His purpose. When we seek to have the
most loving response no matter what happens His purpose will always prevail and
we will find His joy.
