"I don't get it, man! What is God's plan for my life?"

    It took me a second or two to understand that he was actually asking me what God's plan was for him.

    "I really don't know what God's plan is for you. But He has a plan for you. You have to seek it." We talked about how that needed to be done. We prayed over it. A month later he stormed into my office, filled with rage.

    "I GAVE GOD HIS CHANCE AND HE DIDN'T COME THROUGH!"

    I didn't see him for a couple of months until I was called to talk him out of blowing his brains out. A month was all he had granted God.

    "Young man, what is your vision for this church?" Binghampton, New York. I thought I was there to help them through their time of crisis. They were wanting me to be their pastor. The whole thing was doomed from the beginning. The sour looking old lady asking was asking a common question. What was this man's vision for the church. 

    "Ma'am, I have no vision for this church. If I came here my goal would be to help the church find the vision God wants for you."

    That was not what they wanted to hear. They wanted someone to come in with a plan and when they did not like the plan, they had someone to fire and then they could blame their failure on that person. I was not called to the church, and I would not have accepted if I had been called.

    We all want the plan, the vision. But we want it NOW, we want it handed to us, we want it without struggle. Yet, that is not God's way most of the time.

    Let's take Abraham. While his name was still Abram, God gave him a word. Abram was 75 years old. People lived a bit longer than now, but 75 was still a little old to set out on a journey. And Abram didn't know anything about the plan. He just went forth at the command of the Lord and learned it bit by bit along the way. Noah, Moses, Gideon, Daniel and many, many others. In fact, the lesson is drilled home at the very end of the Bible. John says, "Even so, Lord Jesus, come!" He was looking at the events of his day and linking them up with the vision he had and equating that with the end and was asking the Lord to come. And that was 2,000 years ago.

    But what is God's plan? I don't know. But I know how to find out. First, commit yourself to the Lord. And not just the casual stuff. Just going to church, singing the songs and asking for prayer requests is only casual commitment. We need to raise that up. We need to live each day by faith. When I was in school, we had a young pastor wanna-be who had his entire career mapped out on paper. Every five years he would move to a larger church until he had the BIG church. Everything was there, even pay packages. I thought that was kind of neat, but I just could not do that. I knew it needed to come bit by bit. The wanna-be pastor did not make it the first few years after graduation. Commit yourself. 

    After yourself, commit your family. There might be family members who reject the Lord, but you keep praying for them. A lady from up-state New York told me a few years ago that she prayed for her grandkids daily and would dearly love to see them saved. I told her to commit those three boys and let the Holy Spirit work. Something would happen and it might be after she dies. She just wanted to see it, but she committed those boys.

    And then you commit your congregation. If a committed people commit their faith family, there is no limit as to what God will do. But be assured that casual commitment will not bring blessing.   

    What is God's plan?

    Time to find out.