“The biggest hindrance to the plan of God in your life, is your plan for your life.”

We all seem to have a pretty good idea of what our lives are supposed to look like. We always think we know how things are going to work out. We always think we know the right path to take.

However, I’ve found that often in my walk with God, that what I think God is going to do, is not what ends up happening. Where God takes me and what God does in my life is often not what I thought He would do.

I often find myself saying, “This is not what I thought my life would look like right now. This is not where I thought I’d be. This is not what I thought I’d be doing.” Have you been there?

At first it can be a bit disappointing. My plans didn’t work out. What I wanted to be doing, I’m not doing. Where I thought I was going to be, I’m not there. Bitterness can sink in. I start questioning God.

So often in life, God wants to move us from one place to another, but we fight with everything in us to stay on the path we have drawn out for our lives.

However, if we’re ever going to live the lives God intended us to live, we need to surrender our plans to Him and latch onto His plans with everything in us. That will often entail us saying, “This is not what I thought my life would be…”

To do that we will need to realize that God’s plan may not always be what we think it is going to be, but it always ends up better than what we thought it was going to be and better than anything we could have thought up on our own.

Surrender what you think for what God knows today. Be open. Trust Him.

“If God gives you a dream, and the dream comes to life and God shows up in it, and then the dream died,  it may be that God wants to see what is more important to you – the dream or Him. The impact God has planned for us doesn’t occur when we’re pursuing impact. It occurs when we’re pursuing God. At last after a lifetime of striving, God was enough. Not God and impact or God and ministry. Just God.”

-Phil Vischer

My favorite verse in the Bible is Matthew 6:33 – Seek First the Kingdom of God, and all these things will be added unto you. Putting God first really is the key to experiencing life to the fullest, however, all too often we put ourselves first, in the name of putting Him first. “God if I’ll put you first, I know all my dreams and plans will come true!”

Well, what if God has a different plan and dream for your life than you do? Sure, God will give you the desires of your heart, but only when you desires line up with His desires. We’ll only get to that point when we’re willing to let our dreams and desires die.

God is longing for us to get to a place where we willingly lay down our dreams, desires, wants, and plans in exchange for His dream, His desires, His wants, and His plans. The place where God alone is enough. Only then can we really pursue God’s dream for our lives.

I don’t know about you, but I’m sick of trying to do things in my own strength. I’m laying down my dreams, will you?

Thoughts?

Then fourteen years later I went back to Jerusalem again, this time with Barnabas; and Titus came along, too. ² I went there because God revealed to me that I should go. -Galatians 2:1-2

I was in a Q and A session with Keith Moore, and my friend and I asked him how he stays fresh spiritually while on the road preaching all the time. He said, “I don’t do anything the Lord didn’t tell me to do.”

“If You want to make God laugh, tell Him your plans.”

He went on to say that when he meets with Pastors who are “burning out or don’t have peace” he tells them to make a list of everything they’re doing in their lives at that time. Then go down the list and ask themselves, “Ok, when did God speak to my heart to do that?” He said if you can’t figure out a specific time when you KNOW God told you to do that, you should quit doing it.

If you know me, you know that I love setting goals, making bucket lists, life plans, etc. But what I’m realizing with all of those is that they’re mostly my plans for my life.

Psalm 127:1 says, “Except the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain who build it“. I heard someone say they were going to write a book called, “How to miss God and be Miserable!” While that’s funny, it’s so true.

If you’re doing a bunch of things God never told you to do, I promise, you’ll be miserable and you’ll never get the results you’re looking for.

If you’re lacking peace in your life and are miserable more than you’re joyful, you should ask yourself the question, “What am I doing and When did God tell me to do that?”

Then comes the hard part… actually obeying God and quit doing the things He never told you to do. But that’s another blog post for another day.

Thoughts?