Plans, Bananas and Dessert

   "Failure to plan is a plan to fail".

   "Life is uncertain, eat dessert first"

   "Don't even buy green bananas"

   "Hold your plans in your hands, lightly"

   What do these sayings have in common, or do they? They all talk about the future and my attitude toward those coming times.

   We all do it. We plan. We make to-do lists. We speculate how things will be. We project ourselves into a future that we envision and think how we will handle those situations.

   As I walked this morning, my mind ran to things that I had on my schedule the next couple of days, things that I felt I needed to do to keep my world in some kind of order, so I could make sense out of my life.

   Then I thought back to some days earlier, much earlier, when I looked forward in time and thought how my life would be at this stage. I thought of how I would still be healthy and able to do all the things I could then do. I thought of how my family situation would be and how we could continue to interact and have fun together. I even could get specific with sports that I played and how I would continue them in future times and still be able to do them reasonably well.

   It was like I said to myself, "these times will be so good, my body will still be able to do all of this and my schedule will be free of time constraints, and it will be great".

   Well, in a lot of ways that is true. I do have a good life, but some of the projections of a youthful mind are not too realistic. I move much slower. My eyes are not as good. My mind says move toward that tennis drop shot, but my body does not get the message or act on it very quickly. My perceptions of how things would be are off base.

   So how do I approach the future? With Uncertainty? With Fear? With Confidence?

   Truthfully, with all of the above at certain times, but mostly with the truth that God has that future all in His hands, and that my trust is in that fact.

   My kids all know that one of my favorite things to say is that "It will all work out", and, in truth, it will.

   God is in control, His will will be accomplished, and my life is in Him, today and tomorrow.

   Thank Goodness!

   The sun rises and the windmill turns with the unseen breeze. God's Hand in it all.

   But, get ripe bananas, eat dessert first, just in case….It will work out..