Now, listen to me, you that say, "Today or tomorrow we will travel to a certain city..."  15b  "If the Lord is willing, we will live and do this or that."

    The novel coronavirus has taught us many lessons.

    The one lesson that stands out is not to take things for granted.  As we take baby steps into the 'new normal';  it holds before us that we can never take those normal ordinary parts of daily living for granted - going grocery shopping, going to work, the kids going to school, visiting family or they visiting you, going to your Doctor's (medical) appointment, going to church, a coffee or tea at Timmy's, taking the children to the apparatus at the local play ground, lunch or dinner with friends at your favourite restaurant, going to the Bank without having to stand in line, and the list goes on.

    Some folk start their day either with a written or mental 'to-do' list and just assume that as the day unfolds the things before them will get done without ever thinking otherwise.  And yet as James reminds us in verse 13a that although it is good plan our days and our lives let us not be presumptuous to think all our plans made by us will automatically fall into place without ever giving a thought to what God's will is for us in our plans.

    Quite simply, are our plans, what we shall do and when, where we shall go; are they within God's plan for us?  And at the very least do we give a second thought or prayer towards this end before going forward?  As James puts it in verse 15b - we will do this or that, go here or there, OR NOT, if it is God's will for us.  To not put our plans within the Plan and Will of God for us, is to make us very inflexible in life, and one might say even stubborn both to God and others; for ALL our plans do not always turn out to our liking.  In the Lord's prayer we pray " Thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven", a prayer that we are to live out in the course of our daily lives.

    Yes!  How we have taken things for granted!

    In terms of putting our plans either for the day or for our lives in line with God's will for us, the first verse of the hymn "Have Thine Own Way Lord!" comes to mind - "Have Thine own way Lord!  Have Thine own way!  Thou art the Potter, I am the clay!  Mould me and make me after Thy will, while I am waiting, yielded and still."

    I close with the first verse of a poem which has as its title the poem's first line -

    Just to let Thy Father do what He will:

          Just to know that He is true, and be still.

Just to follow, hour by hour, as He leadeth;

          Just to draw the moment's power, as it needeth.

Just to trust Him, this is all.  Then the day will surely be

          Peaceful, whatso'er befall, bright and blessed, calm and free.

Forward together according to His Will,

          Rev. Wayne