Listen to advice and accept instruction,
that you may gain wisdom in the future. Many are the plans in the mind of
a man, but it is the purpose of the Lord that will stand.
This spring marks five years since I completed graduate
school. It feels like just yesterday I was spending hours every week
pouring over text books, writing papers and finishing class projects. In
those five years I have come to learn (sometimes the hard way) that it is good
to ask for directions from those who have been down the path before you. As a project manager, I am responsible for working with a team to determine
what work will be done, develop a plan to complete the work, and then carry out
the plan and introduce the new technology. There are important lessons
learned on each project and this is a job that definitely teaches a team about
the dangers of making assumptions. Sometimes during a meeting I know that
the team will be annoyed or frustrated because I will ask the same question in
different ways, but this is part of the wisdom that has been shared with me by
my peers. From time to time, we work on plans and think that we
have come up with a foolproof way to make something work, only to have it fall
apart in testing.
I always think that the second part of this verse matches
with the often seen sign, “We plan, God laughs”. I know that is meant to
be tongue in cheek, but there are so many times that we plan and plan because
we want something to be perfect. Sometimes we are close to what God has planned
for us, other times, he needs to share his wisdom to get us back on the right
path, still other times we are completely off course and God lets us learn a
lesson so that next time we won’t make the same mistakes. These lessons,
give us wisdom to carry forward on our own to accept instruction and also helps
us to share our experience with others. While we don’t want to “wallow”
in the past, it is good to know what we won’t do again and to have a plan to
repeat things that have been successful.
As I was writing this devotion I reflected on the lessons I
have learned throughout life and the times that I refused direction and wisdom
and insisted on forging my own path. While I have certainly learned a
lot, I have grown to have a lot more respect for wisdom and guidance and the
need to slow down and pay attention in moments where my plan and God’s plan are
not aligned.
Prayer: God who has guided us in all our lessons, help us to know
when to ask for advice and wisdom, when to recognize that a lesson has been
learned and to place value on those things that work well and are worth
repeating.
Christi Moock
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