Our plans verses God's plans

There are two ponds on one of my running routes.  Both were originally God made but man tried to rearrange God's plan.  Does that sound familiar to anyone?  Do you, like me try to arrange your day and life when God has his own plans for our day, week, month, year and life. 

The first pond you come across is quite large but it struggles, you see, it there was an original pond there and just as big, but there wasn't a constant struggle for it to remain.  Some wise person wanted to add a drainage system to it.  So they drained, bulldozed, and finally refilled it.  Over the past 4 years this poor guy has struggled.  It certainly isn't as pretty as it was once before. 

In my life I have done the same thing though, tried to reinvent a perfectly good wheel.  Just a little tweak here or adjustment there, thinking somehow I could improve myself, by myself.  Even though I do need improving.  There are, always two ways to improve oneself, Gods way and mans way.  Man's or my way usually result in a painful lesson and it never turns out the way I expected.  The other way (you know God's) is also painful but the results are perfect.  My way the struggles are there because they are effects of my choices.  God's plan,  causes and creates a better and more refined you. Case in point I have now lived in Alabama for almost seven years, I will not say this is where I wanted to be or really want to be.  However I know with all my heart if I had moved anywhere else God could not have worked in my life and molded me into the person He is working on me to be.  I am pretty sure our life would look largely different.

The Bible has several stories about our plans verses God's plan.  I am going to focus just on one since it is the one my five year old, six year old and myself are in the middle of studying. 
   The man's name is Abram and his wife is Sarai (most of us know them better as Abraham and Sarah) did you know God had promised them their descendants would be uncountable, yet they had no children, and gave them a land that was inhabited by other nations?  Gods plan was not an instant gratification plan.  It was not like the begining of this world where he spoke it and it was so.  This was a plan that required, patients, time, faith and a willing heart (willing to be obedient).  After ten years of waiting on God to make this child be born, Sarai thought God might need some help. One God never needs help, two here comes the patient part or the of the lack there of.  I will say ten years is a long time of waiting for something you want really badly, when it is one of you hearts greatest desires.  Her solution...Abram take a second wife (Sarai maid servant) and maybe she could have her son through her, maybe that's what God really wants to happen.  Except it was a "man" plan and not a God plan.  It is not what God intended or desired in fact it brought Sarai more grief and pain than it was worth.   Really isn't that what happens when we know what the end result is supposed to look like or where God is leading us but he is just taking a little too long, so we help God our way instead of his?  Ugh!!! Have you ever thought to yourself how many times will I have to learn this lesson?  To be continued...

The second pond, was there and then bulldozed also.  It is not supposed to be there anymore, it is supposed to be a lot for a house now.  What I have seen in the four years is amazing.  It started as a puddle, then slowly it got deeper, fuller and adorned with only things that God could place there.  Cattails began to grow, long beautiful grass all around it, the sounds of frogs at dusk.  While it may not be as large as the first one, but it has so much more to offer.  It  has a touch no one could ever give it, peace, beauty and grace all reflections of God himself.  In the prime of this beauty, man came once again and tried to rearrange Gods plan, his master piece if you will.  It was in fact mowed and bulldozed or tractored, it was no more.  Notice the it was part.  Within a week rain began to fall, and within in a month the puddle is larger than a puddle,  after the harsh summer of the south the pond remained strong, and now when you run or walk pass you can feed the Canadian geese who like to use it as a rest stop on their travels to the southern hemisphere. How amazing is that? My children have asked why the geese aren't looking for food in the bigger pond.  Simply the smaller pond has more to offer. 

Back to the biblical application....
Sarai, chased her maid servant off, but she came back and bore Abram a son Ishmael.  It is said he was a wild donkey and would fight his brothers.  Ten more years had passed (so that would be twenty if you are counting) and God finally said this time next year your wife Sarah will have a son.  Abraham was now 99 and Sarah was a young 89.  Sarah heard this conversation and now laughs in disbelief.  If you have waited and waited and waited, once it was about to happen wouldn't you kind of have your doubts?  God asked if anything is to hard for the LORD?  Well is it? No of course not! A year later they had a son and named him Isaac.  Which means laughter because God brought great joy to Sarah's life. 
To be continued...

You see even though our wait may be great, or we just don't get the sitting and being still or the growing in Christ.  In fact you might wonder how long is long enough?  Sarah waited twenty years for a son.  A promise God had gave her.  God doesn't change his mind or back out of His promises.  Sometimes it is hard to understand that because as a man, we do.  We do change our mind, we do back out of our promises.  God however does not.  He wants to be perfect for His plan, but his plan is filled with the qualities of the second pond.  Beauty, grace and mercy. His timing brings joy and celebration.  Ours usually causes a ripple effect that continues to wash over us now and then years after the original choice.

Back to Sarah...in her joy she also had pain, remember Ishmael, remember he will be as a wild donkey not getting along with his brothers? Her choice 12 years earlier is still rippling through her life.  She does however dismiss her maidservant and Abraham's first son.  Because God's plan and promise was to be through the son Abraham and Sarah were to have.  Do not fill bad for Ishmael, for his descendants are numerous too and they still fight against their brother Isaac. 

Whether you are working through a first pond situation or a second pond situation.  It is important to remember God's promises and plans will always come about, no matter the length of wait. The faith, beauty and grace that is given to you, is up to how you choose to better yourself.  Will it be by yourself for yourself?  or By God through God, for God? 

Next time you take time to look around at your surroundings remember who adorned them, the same someone who created you.