"Just what is God's plan for my life?"

How many of us have asked ourselves this question, this question that searches to the very depths of our heart, looking, seeking, wanting an answer more than anything besides, and then returns empty handed. If you have ever been hunting for something, or have ever gone fishing and have come back with one of those looks on your face akin to despair, you somewhat understand the feeling of frustration which now accompanies this question. It is a question I had asked myself, it is a question I could never answer myself, a question that produced only uncertainty, because I was asking the wrong person.

Asking the wrong person... So many times this is the very root of our problems. God is standing there, waiting for us, waiting for us to ask Him, to seek his face. He who has infinite knowledge, He who has the answer to all of our questions, is right there before us. Ask Him! "Lord, what is thy purpose in my life?" Aha! Now we are asking the right Person, now we are looking in the right place. But now, are we looking for the right answer? Are we asking God for a blueprint of our lives? Hardly! That would take all the fun out of the Christian experience! Just imagine, just for a moment, try to imagine, that you know all what God's plan is for your life. You would never need to talk to Him again!! Oh no, we could never do that, it would spoil everything completely. Rather, what we need to do is to let Him lead us, to let Him take our hand; to trust that we don't need to worry at all about what we're going to do. God has one plan for all of us that you and I can grasp right now, and that is to trustingly follow Him.

This is one thing that people commonly seem to have a problem with. "Follow Him?!? You mean I can't plan my own life? No thanks man." But… here is where the biggest mistake of all is made, an assuming that God is going to do something scary, a fear of the unknown. Really, if you have these same heart tremors I'm not surprised at all. It is something that we all experience when we aren't quite sure we want to give up our own will. But just stop here for a moment and let reason conquer the unreasonable. How much do we see? What do we know compared to God? We have plans for our life. God has a plan for our life. Who has the better? What if you want to be a plumber or a police officer or the president? We all have dreams like that, we all want to be someone or do something, and God knows all that. Yes, He knows our deepest heart longings, yet greater still He knows what is best. God created each of us as personal individuals, he knows. And if God really and truly does know, we can trust Him with our lives!

Trust... this is the alternative to fear. Now we are left with what it has all boiled down to, fear or faith. In fact at this moment I think it would almost fit to put the typo I just made, which is, 'fear of faith'. You know, even though both of those words have an uncanny poetic similarity to each other, there is so stark of a contrast between the two that not even the illustration of black vs. white would do justice to the difference. Fear or Faith, one gives us a lifetime of stress, worry and pain; the other gives us an eternity of peace. On paper the difference is so clear, but in our hearts we are so often tempted to fear. Why? The Prince of fear… that depraved serpent who instilled his likeness in Adam and Eve, is the answer. By that fallen nature we are filled with fear. Since the beginning of sin, fear has filled the universe. It has been placed in every living creature. Only He who is "perfect love" can cast out all fear. Only when He dwells within us can all fear be cast out. Satan will try to fill us with fear; he will try to muddle our minds. There is not a doubt about it. But when we are filled with fear, we know exactly where to go to find peace. Fear can only last as long as it takes for us to fall to our knees, only as long as it takes to trust God. Fear entered the world at the beginning, and it will remain until it is overcome by faith.

Here we are... making choices, choices that will affect us throughout our life. We have the opportunity to place our ship under the guidance of our Savior. We have the opportunity now, to let God lead us, to trust Him that He knows this ocean and that He has traversed the waters before us. We have this opportunity, this wonderful opportunity! Come along with me and let us let Him guide our ships, not only on the tempest, not only on the starless nights, but even when we are sure we know the way. In fact, that is the time when we need Him most. There is something that seems to happen a lot to those excellent navigators, when they are sure of the way, when they are positive about their position. Something happens, and they lose the way. Lost in the deep... we see so many of these young pilots today, sailing their ships hither and yon, hunting, searching for a landmark, trying to find their way, asking themselves, asking the wrong person. They are being blown closer and closer to the reef, their veins bulge, their muscles are sore, their sails are tattered, but their mouths remain silent. Daily, ships are smashed to pieces on the rocks, daily captains lose their lives.

"Oh Lord! Use me! Use my ship; use my ship to guide some weary pilots who have lost their way, help me guide them to Thee."