Man proposes, God disposes. That is what the Bible says and I am sure, we all agree. On Thursday last week right before I flew to Jakarta, I got a text from our sister Lisa that Tante Evi’s mom had passed away. Lisa and my mom went to the funeral service that morning. God decided that it was the best time to call her home.
Before I left for Jakarta, I remember scanning through my schedule. I didn’t know how but suddenly I saw a list of people to see. My heart just sank with guilt because I realized that I only had a brief time to spend with my family. Well, from the day I landed until the day l left Jakarta I was sick with a bad case of flu.
Because of this flu bug, I had to cancel all my appointments and I ended up staying home with my mom and Santy the entire weekend. Lisa came to visit bringing food—lots of it—even though she herself was not too healthy either. But, truly I had a good time of rest. I don’t know whether I had to thank or blame this flu bug.
We can make plans but it is God who determines whether or not He will make these plans happen. The truth is we can only bring our appointment book before God. You see, our appointment book has to conform to that of God. It is He who will keep or cross out some old appointments and replace them with some new ones.
If we think that God’s appointment book for us must be bigger and fuller with appointments, well, we are wrong. God’s appointment book is in fact thinner. His list of the important people we must see and the activities we must complete is unbelievably shorter than that of ours. Most appointment times He has already reserved are actually for Him to spend time with us.
Pastor Paul