Goal Planning or Presumption?

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 vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, "If the Lord wills, we will live and do this and that."

                                                                                                                                       -James 4:13-15

I believe it is a fair supposition that most people in the world do not heed the above admonition. Why? Because they presume on their lives - that they are going to be around to fulfill all their dreams and desires. Please do not get me wrong, I realize everyone is not arrogant when it comes to planning their lives for the future and how they desire for it to go, but I am talking about those that believe that just because they "spoke positivity into the universe" that the universe will return that "positivity" back to them. There is no such thing. Others refer to this as good and bad karma; a brainchild of Hindus and Buddhists. 

Anything anybody does whether they realize it or not is 1) a gift from God or 2) an allowance by God. Anything that is good is a gift from above (James 1:17). God provides good gifts to all despite our sinfulness.

So, back to the idea of goals. Goals are good because it allows us to challenge ourselves so we can work hard to meet certain benchmarks we have set for ourselves. It is wise to plan for the future even though we do not know what the future holds. For me personally, the best type of goals are short term goals not long term. The writer James is warning all against arrogance and presumption on our lives because we do not know what the day will bring. That is why he said we should say, "If the Lord wills we will do this or that."  The opposite of that is arrogance which is evil.

Where do you see yourself in five years?

That question irritates me. Why? Because I do not know what is going to happen an hour from now let alone five years! To me, this is boasting even if it is not with malicious intent. God says this type of boasting is evil. So, how would one answer it? I would answer it this way, "Lord willing If I am fortunate to still be around, hopefully, I will be doing..."

For me, that would be the best reply - it submits our wills to the will of the Father. To ignore God in what we do is once again is presumptuous and evil.

For those of you that believe you can of your own corrupt will plan your life are in for a divine reckoning from God. While it is never wrong to plan ahead, it is indeed evil to do so ignoring the Lord in the process. We are not the ones that cause the night and day to come, so who are we to determine how long we are going to be here? If the Lord will we will do this or that.

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