March 4, 2023

Acts 16: 13 On the Sabbath we went outside the city gate to the river, where we expected to find a place of prayer. (NIV)

Remember to always leave a place of divine providence.*

When we walk with God, our plans and expectations are often (or usually) preempted by God’s will. In this story, Luke, along with Paul and his other companions, goes down by the river, expecting to find a quiet place to pray. Instead, they found a group of women and began speaking to them. One of them, Lydia, a business-woman, responded to Paul’s message and she and the members of her household were baptized.

When you look for one thing and instead find something else – something better – it’s called serendipity. God is the master engineer of the serendipitous. I’m sure you can recall times in your life when God stepped in and improved on your expectations. My college career is a shining example of serendipity. Right out of high school, I attended a conservative, traditional Bible college; but after two years, I knew God was leading me elsewhere. In those days, Bible college offered little for young women who weren’t planning a career as a church secretary, church musician, or minister’s wife. Across the country, a new idea in Christian higher education was launched – a Christian “vocational” college – so off I went. The school had been open for one year when I enrolled, so nothing went according to plan – mine or theirs. The degree program I went there to pursue never really got off the ground so my hopes of a career in creative writing were dashed. The serendipitous element of this story is that even though I didn’t get the college education I was looking for, I received real-life experience and opportunities for leadership development that better prepared me for my future than anything a conventional college would have offered. The irony: in my life, I have served stints as a church secretary, a church musician, and a minister’s wife. And now I am finally getting to fulfill my life-long dream to be a writer!

There is nothing wrong with making plans and having expectations but don’t fall in love with them. If you allow yourself to yield to God’s better idea, you may find yourself down by the river changing lives for eternity – and maybe even doing what you always wanted to do. 

If we are intent on achieving only our own plans, we will have no time for His.*