Day 132: Direction

"Whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow.  For what is your life?  It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away."  James 4:14

Right off the bat, we should remember that our lives are in God's hands.  God has the ultimate say in everything that goes on.

Imagine how great it would be if we could predict everything that would happen in the next year, next day, or even the next hour.  We would be able to plan for absolutely everything.  But, at the same time, we wouldn't have all too much to live for.  We would have all the answers, and we wouldn't have much else to do.

We live where we can't tell what's going to happen next.  So, we work on ourselves so that we can be ready for absolutely anything.  One of the greatest tenets of Jesus' preaching is, "be ready".  But that's all we can do.  It sounds pretty restrictive at the start.

Our lives our precious.  We can't control everything that affects them.  I like the metaphor of the vapor.  It's similar to smoke.  When you look at smoke, it floats in so many different directions, and I'm sure much of that depends on how the molecules of air are moving in around that smoke.  Then, there are also basic traits of heat, such as the circular motion that comes from the source.  Eventually, no matter which way the smoke goes, it dissipates as it reaches higher and higher.  We cannot grab smoke and manipulate it.  All we can do is prepare everything from the source and hope that things go in the direction that we want it.

Right now, our lives are going.  They are going in so many different directions.  You might get a call for a new job offer.  You may receive a message about the death of a relative or a friend.  You might get hungry.  You might do nothing.  The only thing we can do is prepare ourselves.  The way we prepare ourselves for the future involves realizing where we want to be.  This will involve prayer and meditation.  This will also involve lots of study and practice.  If we don't prepare, things will only go in different directions, whether we like them or not.  We can't complain if they don't go in the way we want them to go.  At the same time, we cannot say that everything will go according to plan.  We just need to remember that our lives are in God's hands.  God is working in our lives.