God Has a Plan for Your Life

“I know the plans I have for you,” says the Lord, “plans for your welfare and not your harm, plans to give you a future with hope.” (Jeremiah29:11)

It is clear in scripture that God’s work over the course of history relates to God’s plan for all that God has created.  This is to say that from the very beginning of time, God had a plan for us.  We are told in the Book of Genesis, that in God’s divine plan, God created heavens and earth.  God created the light and the seas, fish in the seas and birds in the air.  

 We can imagine God as a divine architect, thinking and planning and scheming as to how creation would look.  Or we might see God as a divine potter, with clay in hand, making and molding the world according the divine vision, the divine plan God has had for creation. 

And we find in the Genesis story, that as God observed that which had been divinely created, God realized that the plan for creation was not complete, so God decided to create humanity, and not only did God create humanity, but God created us in God’s own  divine image.

Indeed, throughout scripture, we find evidence of God’s divine plan at work.  We are told later in Genesis that God told Abraham to leave where he was, and that God would make Abraham the father of all nations.  God spoke to Moses, and told Moses to go to Egypt and tell Pharaoh to let God’s people go.  We find in Matthew that over 42 generations, God’s divine plan was in effect, preparing the way for the coming of Christ into the world.  And we are told that Jesus arrived in the world in the fullness of time.

I believe we could all affirm that plans are important.  Plans serve as the roadmap, the GPS, for our success.  Plans are critical to us moving forward in life.  Someone has wisely suggested that if we fail to plan, we are really planning to fail. 

HOPE

Recently, I have had a chance to re-read Jurgen Moltmann’s book, Theology of Hope.  Moultmann shares that “Hope alone is to be called ‘realistic’, because it alone takes seriously the possibilities with which all reality is fraught.  It does not take things as they happen to stand or to lie, but as progressing, moving things with possibilities of change.  Only as long as the world and the people in it are in a fragmented and experimental state which is not yet resolved, is there any sense in earthly hopes.”  

I believe that hope is the window that God has given us to see into God’s preferred future for our lives.  In the midst of the apparent hopelessness, nothingness, meaninglessness and lovelessness that seems to pervade our collective reality today, hope lends credence to the promises and possibilities that God has for each of our lives.  So we are encouraged – regardless of the circumstances that confront us - to keep hoping, for indeed we know that with hope - our best days and our most blessed days are not behind us, but ahead of us.

The "Butler" and Hope for Today

A couple of weeks ago, I went to see the movie, “The Butler.” What is most clear to me is that even before Cecil Gaines would become the butler for eight United States presidents – God had a plan for his life.

Raised on a cotton plantation in Macon, Georgia, Cecil experienced family tragedy that could have destroyed him. But he escaped the plantation and finally made his way to Washington, DC, ...and in DC he learned how to serve people. It’s clear that God had a plan for Cecil's life - and God made him into the very best servant, the best butler that he could be.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. reminded us years ago that everybody can be great, because everybody can serve. God made Cecil Gaines into a great butler because he was willing to serve, and Cecil realized that that was his purpose in life, God's plan for him.

In Jeremiah 29:11, the prophet shares these words from the Lord - “I know the plans I have for you, plans for your welfare and not your harm, plans to give you a future with hope.” The same God of Jeremiah and Cecil Gaines has a plan for your life. What is God's plan for you? What is your purpose for living? Where are the places that you see possibility and hope for your life? Where and who have you been called to serve? Never forget that God has a plan for your life, and that your tomorrows are bound to be better that our yesterdays and todays!

In the aftermath of yesterday's 50th Anniversary commemoration of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, and in the midst of global conflict....

LOWLY LIFE

"Lowly Life" by Paul Laurence Dunbar (sometimes life is like this, and somehow we hope and dream on...!)

A crust of bread and a corner to sleep in,
A minute to smile and an hour to weep in,
A pint of joy to a peck of trouble,
And never a laugh but the moans come double;

And that is life!
A crust and a corner that love makes precious,
With a smile to warm and the tears to refresh us;
And joy seems sweeter when cares come after,
And a moan is the finest of foils for laughter;

And that is life!

Obama, King and War

If Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. were alive to experience the 50th anniversary commemoration of the March on Washington and his "I Have a Dream" speech on August 28. 2013, it leaves one to wonder what advice he might have for President Obama with regard to war and global conflict. Based on Dr. King's direct advocacy against war with both Presidents Kennedy and Johnson, and what he said in his sermon "Beyond Vietnam" on April 4, 1967 at Riverside Church, he would likely say to the President that we should seek to cease and avoid war at all costs, and that "the buck stops at the Oval Office."

Obama, King and Just Peacemaking

When President Obama speaks on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial tomorrow at the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, I'm sure he will invoke the memory and dream of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. As we as a nation find ourselves on the brink of more global conflict in Syria, what I pray that the President will be mindful of in his remarks is that Dr. King was a peacemaker and was opposed to war (one of the "triplets of evil"). For, me, Dr. Glen Stassen's (Fuller Theological Seminary) framework for Just Peacemaking (as opposed to "just war") is helpful - 1. Support nonviolent direct action. 2. Take independent initiatives to reduce threat. 3. Use cooperative conflict resolution. 4. Acknowledge responsibility for conflict and injustice and seek repentance and forgiveness. 5. Advance democracy, human rights, and religious liberty. 6. Foster just and sustainable economic development. 7. Work with emerging cooperative forces in the international system. 8. Strengthen the United Nations and international efforts for cooperation and human rights. 9. Reduce offensive weapons and weapons trade. 10. Encourage grassroots peacemaking groups and voluntary associations.