WHAT IS YOUR LIFE?

When I was a teenager contemplating my future and possible careers I was arrested by the following passage from James:

“Now listen, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.’ Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, ‘If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.’ As it is, you boast and brag. All this boasting is evil. Anyone, then, who knows the good he ought to do and doesn’t do it, sins.” (James 4:13-17)

All my plans for my life were halted as I read those words and memorized them. My life was like a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes! I do not even know what will happen tomorrow. If it is the Lord’s will, I may do something, but I did not know what that may be. What plans did the Lord have for my life, long or short as it may be? I was in high school at the time, living at home, in a small county town on the west coast of the South Island of New Zealand. Little did I know what trajectory my life would take. If I had any inkling of it I would have been dumbfounded. I would have thought that it was impossible and fanciful. Such is our ignorance of what the Lord can do with a life. We simply cannot imagine what can happen in a lifetime. We are so limited in our vision. So shortsighted in our thinking. So blind to the possibilities that God can do. With God nothing is impossible.

The Lord took a teenager, sent him to university and then led him to graduate school in England, a journey which took five weeks in a cargo passenger ship, stopping at Tahiti, Panama, Jamaica, Florida, Bermuda and finally, London. He experienced three years of study in a prestigious university with numerous trips to Scotland, Europe and the Holy Land. He began his working life in the West End of London where he met a beautiful, intelligent, spiritual lady from South Carolina, who became his beloved wife. After four years enjoying the vibrant and exciting life of London mentored by a world class, famous leader he was led to a post in a New England college where he again worked with another outstanding leader. That led to posts in Florida, then Texas, and finally back to Florida, making many friends on the way. Now facing my 83^rd birthday I marvel at what the Lord made happen with this life that appears for a little time and then vanishes. We do not know what will happen tomorrow. My life is a microcosm of so many lives of my generation. Travel, education, and communication have made the impossible possible. God has a plan for us all if we are willing to prayerfully seek it.

William Cullen Bryant’s memorable poem, TO A WATERFOWL, concludes with this last stanza:

He, who, from zone to zone,

Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight,

In the long way that I must trace alone,

Will lead my steps aright.

I am grateful for the way God has led me over the years. May he do so for you as well. “If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.”