Journal ~ JamesSample

 GETCHA HEAD IN THE GAME 

“The sun will come out

Tomorrow

Bet your bottom dollar that

Tomorrow

There'll be sun!”

Wait a moment. We don’t really know for sure. We can't ever safely bet on the future. The mystery of the tomorrow is just that: it's unknown. No wonder we, as a species, are obsessed with the idea of time travel. So many books and movies and comic books and television shows have focused on the idea of time travel. Most of us would not spare a second in hopping into the Delorean if the opportunity ever presents itself. We want to know what is unknown to us.

James, ever poetically, compares our lives as “nothing but a wisp of fog, catching a brief bit of sun before disappearing.” (Oh joy. That sounds uplifting.) But it’s true. We can make travel plans and business plans. We plan to embark in a new business partnership. We make goals for ourselves and timelines for our professional and personal lives. We even go to the point of, at times, boasting in our plans.

Even though we have no idea what the future holds.

“Lord willing.” No, James wasn't trying to start a trend of people saying “Lord willing” every time they talk about plans they’ve concocted. It’s much more than just words. The idea is for us to live in submission to God's will. I like how Eugene Peterson translated this in The Message Bible, “Make it a habit to say, ‘If the Master wills it and we’re still alive, we’ll do this or that.’” Place God as the Master. Give him the controls. Let him take a look at our drafts of our plans and, if he says for us to move forward, we move forward. Let us live under the authority of Christ, and let us move in accordance to his will. Only then can we have true peace in facing what is to come.