Acts 18:18-23

Acts 18:18-28
English Standard Version (ESV)

  What's your plan for the next five years?  What about next year?  Next month?  How about tomorrow?
  We all make plans.  We make plans about where we'll vacation and when we'll see people and what our careers will look like and where the kids will graduate and what retirement will look like.  We make plans based on what we know to be true and what we hope to be true.  Sometimes they are plans, sometimes they are dreams, usually they are a combination of both.  We make plans and we save for the plans.
  Throughout Scripture, God gently reminds us not to get too wrapped up in our plans.  God's will doesn't always align with our plans.  Sometimes we are called in different directions.  Sometimes, life happens and things just don't work out like we had planned.  Sometimes that's for the best.  Sometimes... not.
  The warning for us is not to get so wrapped up in our plans that we forget what we depend on.  We live and move and have our being in the hands of God.  We live for his glory, not for our plans.  We must not hold our plans too tightly, for if we have to abandon them, God is still with us, still in our midst.  When plans don't work out, we shouldn't blame God for that -- we should remember that our plans are just plans, and that in the midst of whatever life throws our way, we will trust God's will and look for the hope and peace he brings to every situation.