Power Plan
God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases Him. Philippians 2:13
My devotional this morning had some great points I don’t naturally think about when considering how I do God’s will. In the Lord’s Prayer we’re told His kingdom will come if His will is done, by us, ultimately creating heaven on earth. How do we actually do His will?
Most days, I get bogged down in reports of the mess we’ve made here on earth, and it’s easy to be discouraged about how much I can actually contribute toward God’s plan for “heaven on earth”. That seems like a huge undertaking and I feel really small and insignificant in the grand scheme. And on those days I am inspired and have ideas and want to get engaged in what I believe would be doing His will, I never seem to follow through; the logistics seem overwhelming, I worry about the time involved, whether it will have meaningful impact amidst all the distraction, etc. The list goes on and I find myself standing still, stuck in a rut of doing nothing and feeling worthless.
From my reading I realized that God does not really depend on or need my ideas or my human strength or or how I see the logistics of executing His plan. Obviously, God has had that all worked out from time infinitum. I don’t need to know what to do or even, more importantly, to even have the desire or ambition to do something. All God needs is a conduit; just like an electrical wire, willing to allow His power, His plan, His energy to flow through me into the world. In reality, I have no power in myself, just as the wire is empty and useless until the current is turned on. But like each of us in God’s plan, the wire is still important to the end goal. If the energy, the current, has no way to release and distribute its power it can’t accomplish its mission; the light doesn’t illuminate, the appliance does not run. God needs conduits, wires, us, connected to Him for the flow of implementing His plan to the world; he needs many wires, all of us, available and open for the current to run from Him through us and out to the world. Each of us must simply be the open the circuit and let His will flow through. We need no preconceived ideas or thoughts as to what will come through the wire and go out into the world.
Someone else relates our frustration, hesitation and inaction as getting caught up in the “cursed hows”; we believe WE must have a perfected plan of action, all figured out, and we lose hope in the complications of “how” to accomplish these plans. All WE really need to do is believe and accept that God already has the best plan and we need to just be the wires for His energy and ideas and logistics to flow from Him, through us, into the world. Our faith is evidenced in the belief that He’s got this, He’ll do it all. We need to relax, let go, and just be the ever-important and necessary wire.
This is a bit unsettling to my “control-freak”, responsible way of being, but just maybe, this is why I haven’t been as effective as I’ve wanted to be. Why I haven’t followed through on so many things; innately, maybe I knew they weren’t part of His plan? Perhaps I’ve been trying to manage and control the current vs simply being the wire, letting the energy of God’s will flow through me. Sounds much easier, less exhausting, and more productive in theory; I’m giving it a try.
"Man plans and God laughs"
It’s always a great thing to be challenged by God through his Word. Thanks for sharing your thoughts. I pray it’s going well for you.