Tired and spent, 2024 left town long ago and paved the way for 2025 to appear with its fresh face. With that comes this compelling question: “Who will we be one year from today?”
I am NOT talking about what we will have “achieved” or “accumulated.” The question is WHO we will be as a child of God and what we will DO for him and his Kingdom.
It’s abandoning what the world covets–ACHIEVING SOMETHING—and moving full-speed toward BEING SOMEONE God is pleased with and blesses.
With that in mind, we need to ask God what kind of person he wants us to BE one year from today. Where he wants us to focus our ATTENTION. And what FRUITS he would have our faith walk produce.
All of this boils down to four words—GOD’S WILL, NOT MINE.
The starting point is to break our grip on the future–dreaming about it and trying to manufacture it on our own. A fixation on 2025 and beyond in this manner is a dangerous incubator for worry and fear. And it completely LEAVES GOD OUT.
We end up playing a game that labels our future-oriented planning as “SEARCHING for God’s Will.”
But are we really searching for God’s Will or just attempting to find a fully-revealed roadmap for our life?
In most cases, it’s looking for that elusive roadmap. It’s elusive because it’s an illusion. If we knew the future, we would think there was no need for God going forward.
We search for God’s Will as if it’s LOST. But God’s Will—who we will be one year from today–is only lost if we equate it with a prescribed pathway punctuated by achievements and accomplishments. That is NOT God’s Will.
We are not supposed to wait on God’s Will for our life like it was a BIG BANG REVEAL. God’s Will for our life is found on our walk with him, listening for direction and discerning his wishes for how we will serve him.
That’s why I ask God for help in: 1) Ditching my own will; and 2) And finding clarity and peace about praying for and responding to HIS WILL. What about you?
“For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” Ephesians 2:10
“Listen, you that say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will travel to a certain city, where we will stay a year and go into business and make a lot of money.’ You don’t even know what your life tomorrow will be! You are like a puff of smoke, which appears for a moment and then disappears. What you should say is this: ‘If the Lord is willing, we will live and do this or that.’” James 4:13–15
