Plans Change. God does not.
I am a planner. I create to-do lists and feel so accomplished when the ‘boxes’ on my list get checked off. I have goals I want to accomplish every week, month, and year and I carefully plan through all of the steps that need to happen to see those goals accomplished. For a “plan person” like myself, what am I supposed to do when God decides He has different plans? For many of us, its often the time that we decide if we really believe that God is who He says He is. When our plans are uprooted and our life is turned upside down we are faced with a decision. A life-changing decision.
We had found out a month or so prior that I was pregnant. The first ultrasound was scheduled and my husband and I had planned to bring our (then) 3 & 5 year old with us to see the ‘baby in mommy’s tummy.’ We thought it would be a great way to help them visualize God’s miracles, and give them a picture to know what they’d be praying for over the next several months.
Everything went great during the first 15 minutes of the ultrasound. Everything until the tech said 4 life-altering, deer-in-the-headlights, make your stomach curl words.
“Oh! There’s two heartbeats!”
Two Heartbeats… As in, more than one. (In case you were wondering…MOST babies only have one heartbeat.) All the blood drained out of Steve and my’s faces as we heard those words. I immediately began to feel nauseated and couldn’t speak. So, in the stunned but best way he knew how, my husband laughed and begged, “You must be joking??!”
She wasn’t joking.
You know those ‘out of body’ moments you have sometimes? Where you feel as though you’re suddenly floating on a cloud somewhere and have left your body behind? Yeah…that was me. Except that I wish I was on a cloud somewhere and not in the ultrasound tech’s bathroom vomiting and crying uncontrollably because of the news I had just received.
(It really wasn’t my best moment.)
Let’s just say that Steve struggled a bit also. He nearly walked out of Target with our kids, completely forgetting to pay for the cokes and popcorn he had gotten to keep them appeased while I finished my appointment.
Bless his heart.
All of our plans had been thrown out of the window with those 4 shocking words and now the HUGE test to trust God for who He promises to be was really beginning.
Have you ever noticed that God rarely decides to accomplish His mission using the plans of His people?
He chose a teenage virgin to bring our Savior into the world. (Luke 1:26-38)
I don’t know her personally, but I’m pretty confident it wouldn’t have been Mary’s plan to be pregnant before she was married to Joseph, and I can just bet that it was NOT her plan to have her very first, tiny baby baby, surrounded by animals in some dirty cave. This was a far cry from the nurseries I’ve seen ‘pinned’ on Pinterest.
He chose to use a young boy to fight a mighty giant proclaiming victory over the Philistine army. (1 Samuel 17)
David was just delivering lunch and checking on his brothers when he showed up to the battle standoff. It was NOT his plan to fight the GIANT without any kind of armor, and only with a few rocks and his trusty sling.
He chose to use a tiny supply of fighters to defeat and win the battle lead by Gideon. (Judges 6-7)
There is NO WAY Gideon wanted to go into battle with only a few hundred fighters, some loud noise and only a handful of weapons. And separating out the army based on how they drank water from a stream? I’m certain that’s NOT how Gideon would have chosen to run the selection process.
He chose to part the RED SEA for the Israelites to escape the Egyptian army. (Exodus 14)
I’m sure that NO MOM ON THE PLANET wanted to walk through a huge sea carrying her babies and holding the hand of her preschooler knowing that the Egyptians were right on their heels. Can we just picture that for a moment? “Hey Mom! Look at the fish over here!” “Keep walking baby.” “Mom, look at the cool shells we’re walking on! I want to collect them.” “Please don’t stop — keep going sweetheart.” “Mom, I have to go to the bathroom.” “You’re really going to need to hold it this time….try not to look at the water on either side of you.” Mom, I’m tired of walking.” You get the picture….
God’s plans are rarely our plans, but His plans are ALWAYS best.
Have you ever found yourself like me? Hopefully you weren’t huddled in a bathroom somewhere when you recovered from your plan-change, but have you ever felt like the rug was pulled out from underneath you because everything would be forever different than what you had planned?
Thankfully the heroes I listed above didn’t ‘stay’ in the bathroom. Mary accepted the plan change and embraced it, promising to serve as “the Lord’s servant.” David decided he was going to fight Goliath and trust that God was always in control. Gideon believed God was who He promised He was, and took only 300 men into battle to fight and defeat the thousands fighting against them. And those Israelites ran across the Red Sea only to turn around minutes later to see the Philistine Army engulfed by the waves crashing in on top of them.
Our plans change, but our God does not. That’s what I learned that day, and am trying to embrace every day. Everything was going to be different than I had imagined or planned, but God was still the loving God that I had always believed I could lean on. He had not forgotten me. He was not surprised by the ultrasound tech’s announcement, and even now He could still be trusted.
He CAN still be trusted.