Here and Now.

So, what's your plan?

Are you in Haiti for another year? Another decade? A lifetime?

I can't tell you how often I get these question from both long-time friends and new acquaintances alike.

And just for the record, I really don't know.

It's certainly a topic that flutters through my brain a lot more these days. Even though we're still in March, it seems like thoughts about the next chapter reside in the forefront of my mind. Not just thinking about years down the road, but months. What will I do in the fall? Where will I be? Will this cause mean this effect?

It's a constant spin of uncertainty and expectation. Part of the anticipation is exciting, while other times I feel just plain exhausted. So many variables leave me with far more questions than answers.

This week I came across a different perspective from the book 'Forgotten God' by Francis Chan. The title of the chapter was 'What is God's will for your life?' and it is dedicated to the age old question with a new twist. After all, everyone's searching for it, and even when we think we find it, we're still itching for more. I don't think I will ever outgrow the desire to know what's around the corner.... In where I want to be, in what I will be doing, and how I will be fulfilling the gifts God has given me.

I don't think it's wrong to take time to process long-term plans, however when it becomes the focus of our everyday lives, Francis writes that we aren't being productive with the time we have here and now.

I don't know about you, but I find that quite a staggering truth. When I reflected on it, I began to realize how many times I've neglected to fully seize opportunities and drink in blessings of a day or even a moment because I'm too caught up with my '5-year plan'. I yearn to put all my ducks in a row so that I can get from my point A to my point B. The problem is that when my head is in the clouds of unknowns, I'm missing what is sitting right in front of my nose.

I can't deny that the days ahead hold lots of questions and decisions. Whether I'll be back in Haiti, or in Canada, or somewhere else on the globe is yet to be determined, and that can be a daunting thing. I appreciate your prayers for not just me, but many of us at the mission who are waiting on the Lord for what He has in store for our lives as we look ahead. And yet as we wait on His leading, that we would use these days to serve and pour out day by day, not be bogged down by the questions and lack of answers.

Let's face it, life has and always will be out of my control, but somehow I let my preparatory nature get the best of me. I assume that I've got decades left in my life to live, but not even that is guaranteed. Today is all I have.

I want to claim the truth that the Lord has the bigger picture, but He reveals it to me simply by shedding light on the feet on my path, not a million miles down the road.

My prayer is that in the days to come, I will be aware of His voice and nudging as He ordains the interactions I have with people around me both friends and strangers alike. I pray that I could plug into His plans for my life daily, not what may or may not come years down the road. Most of all, I pray that I would live in the mindset that these are the moments I was made for. May I seize them for all they're worth.