Category Archives: God’s plans for us

The Journal: His Plans or Mine?

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Toward the end of summertime a year ago, I had just finished unpacking after our move to Michigan that June. Because of Nate’s painful back, most of the shoving, rearranging and emptying of boxes had fallen to me, but we were both so pleased to be in our new peaceful setting with a smaller house that the work had been a joy.

By the end of that summer, we’d settled in and were looking toward Nate’s back surgery in September. He was working as much as his pain permitted, and I had an empty calendar, an enormous blessing after having been swamped with seven children and unnumbered volunteer commitments for the better part of our marriage.

That August (2009), my journal read: “The calendar squares of past years have had so much writing on them that some had to have flaps of paper taped on them because everything happening that day couldn’t be written tiny enough to fit on one square.”

In our new situation, I didn’t look at my calendar for days at a time, a true luxury. Life was becoming manageable: “Last week was the very last giant garbage pile in front of our cottage. This week we have only one big can and nothing standing next to it for the first time. So here I am, ready for a new phase of life.”

I had no inkling my “new phase” would be nursing a terminally ill husband, followed by getting used to life without him. At the end of that same entry I wrote a prayer: “I wait at your feet, Lord, for instructions, opportunities, your revealing of the path I’m to walk. Whatever it is, it’s all up to you. I want only to hear you clearly and make the choices that are within your will. Open my hearing to know for sure.”

I only had to wait a few days to “know for sure.” And there certainly was no ambiguity about “the path I was to walk.” But like countless other people thrown into crisis, every move we made, every decision weighed, every hour spent was with a desire to just get through it. There wasn’t time to think any more deeply than that.

But that’s the thing about following God’s lead. He’s done the thinking for us. He’s made the plans. He’s inspected the future. And according to what he’s seen there, he shows us the best way to go. We can either follow or go off on our own. It isn’t that we can’t think for ourselves or use the brain God gave us. It’s that the very best thinking we can ever do is incomplete and therefore not as good as God’s.

When my “new phase of life” arrived, it was something I never would have chosen. But God ordered my path, and so here I stand, gradually adjusting to being without Nate. It’s probably time for me to pray that same prayer again: “What’s next, Lord? What are your instructions? Your opportunities?”

The future looms, and God has already thought through my best options. Without doubt, he has important plans for me, and I intend to follow his lead.

“When you received the word of God… you accepted it not as the word of men, but as it actually is, the word of God, which is at work in you who believe.” (1 Thessalonians 2:13)

FFF

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There’s no friend like an old friend, and 45 years of friendship definitely qualifies.

Nine of us college pals are here at the cottage for a few days, 405 years of accumulated friendship and good times. We met at Wheaton College in the mid-sixties and lived in off-campus housing together senior year. That’s when we really became close, sharing all-night study gigs fueled by a brand new product, Diet Rite Cola. Looking back at pictures, you’d think we spent all our time fooling around rather than hunkering down over books.

One day Kathy decided we needed a pet and came home with three goldfish in a bowl. She named them Figgy, Figgy and Foo, and although the fish didn’t last very long, the name stuck. Eleven of us became the Figgy Figgy Foos, or the Figs, or just plain FFF.

In the 43 years since graduation, we’ve been diligent about getting together, meeting every three years for a three day weekend in different homes. The decades have shaped our lives in cities across America and one in Germany. We’ve ended up becoming a missionary, a dean of students, a pastor, an editor, a social worker, a computer consultant and several school teachers. Coming together every three years takes effort… completely worth it.

The longer we live, the more interesting our gatherings become. We’ve taken divergent paths, and when we come together to catch up on three year’s worth of stories, the conversation is rich. Email has made it easier to arrange our reunions, and today we even spent a few minutes huddled over a laptop watching our favorite YouTube video clips, howling with laughter. Wasn’t it just yesterday we learned what the letters PC meant?

And that’s what old people do. They reminisce and say, “It seems like yesterday.”

How can it be that we all went on Medicare this year? Why is it that many are retiring? How come we’re talking around health issues? Can we be that old already?

Tonight, as we got sore stomachs from raucous laughter playing “Catch Phrase,” we had as good a time as in our college days. Age didn’t matter. Longstanding friendship did.

Although having fun has been our consistent theme, we’ve had to get serious, too. Two of our number have already died, both from cancer. And now Nate, too, is gone. Although he wasn’t a Fig, he was an adjunct member just like the other husbands are, and he is missed. We’re well aware time does run out on earthly friendships and want to make the most of the ones we have left.

When the 11 of us left the college campus in 1967, none of us knew how long we’d remain pals. And tonight we concluded that although laughing and being goofy has kept us wanting more, the core reason for Fig-unity is our shared belief in Jesus Christ. He’s the constant, the one who is present at every gathering and most important to us as individuals. He’s the glue that holds us together.

We can’t deny we’ve gotten old, but we don’t mind, because God is the one keeping us going, and he is timeless.

“For in him we live and move and have our being. As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’ ”(Acts 17:28)

“It takes a village.”

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I love Hillary Clinton’s book title, because that’s true for all of us. We need each other. None of us gets life right by ourselves, and seeking counsel from mentors is wise, even scriptural. Four centuries before Hillary wrote her book, John Donne put the same idea in different words: “No man is an island.”

Because of Cousin Jan’s visit here from California (yesterday’s post), I’ve been reminiscing about her mom, my Aunt Joyce, who mentored me for 39 years. I clearly remember when it began. I’d just arrived in California as a college sophomore for a second happy summer of living with my cousins. A mob of us had finished lunch, and everyone had left the table except my aunt and me.

She said, “I know you had a great time here last summer, but you can’t be sure it’ll be the same this year. It could go either way.”

I nodded and took it in, thinking about her words long after I’d left the table. Her counsel had been practical and sensible, and in offering it, she’d put a welcome mat between us, inviting me to come to her any time. Over many years, I took full advantage of the offer.

Aunt Joyce faithfully prayed for me and offered counsel until she died in 2005, at the age of 92. Most of her guidance came in handwritten letters which I’ve saved, and I’m looking forward to reopening them one at a time every so often, in order to gain additional wisdom from this godly woman and friend.

It’s possible the miles between us actually enhanced her mentoring. Neither of us had to clean house or make muffins when we “talked”. Our calendars were not clogged with get-togethers, because most of our communicating took place through the mail. But the bond was stronger than distance and bridged several generations. Before she died, she’d begun mentoring our daughter Linnea and was spending large chunks of time praying for each of our family members.

The beauty of mentoring is its non-threatening, non-pressured atmosphere. Aunt Joyce wasn’t my mother, a police woman or a preacher. With all restrictions lifted, she could be herself (the wise aunt I admired), and I could be myself (openly seeking without being judged).

We see biblical mentoring throughout Scripture: Joshua mentored by Moses, Mary by Elizabeth, Barnabas by Paul and of course the twelve disciples by Jesus. And just like I still have Aunt Joyce’s letters, all of us are privy to biblical mentoring through the pages of our Bibles.

When I lost my earthly mentor, she left a void no other woman could fill, so I asked the Lord if he would be to me what Aunt Joyce had been. Although he often uses “the whole village” to bring us through, he’s also just fine with doing it all by himself.

“For this God is our God for ever and ever; he will be our guide even to the end.” (Psalm 48:14)