(To listen to the podcast episode for this blog post click here).

We can trust God to lead us now and in the future; and it is reassuring that God has plans and a purpose for each of us.  So as Christians when we look at planning, we look at planning in the context of God’s will for us. 

In the way God approached creation, He has also given us an example about how we can organize things in a sequential way.  In Genesis 1 we see that by the time God created the human race, He had already organize the earth so that the earth could sustain life (Genesis 1:29, 30). 

God created on:

• Day 1 – light (Genesis 1:1-5),
• Day 2 – the air or the atmosphere (Genesis 1:6-8),
• Day 3 – plants, trees on the earth (Genesis 1:9-13),
• Day 4 – light for day and night – the sun, the moon and the stars (Genesis 1:14-19),
• Day 5 – birds and creatures of the sea (Genesis 1:20-23),
• Day 6 – land creatures and the beginning of the human race. (Genesis 1:24-31)

At the end of day 6 God had completed His work and He rested from all of His work on day 7 (Genesis 2:1 and 2).

So when we plan, we can organize the activities, so that the activities completed before support the activities that are completed after. Similarly, when a house is built, the foundation is constructed before the walls. 

Also as we recognize that time is a continuum, though we live in the present, time is constantly moving ahead. So even if we are in the present, we are benefiting from what we did in the past and also we can be organizing what we will do in the future.

Even if we don’t think about it consciously, the things that we do today will affect what we do tomorrow.  So the question can be:

How can we live in the present and not become overwhelmed with thoughts of the future?  How can we work toward ensuring that our actions today will positively affect what we do tomorrow?

One day as I was driving, I was reminded that the reason I was able to drive the vehicle was because I had acquired the skill to drive the vehicle in the past.  If I had not gone through the training and experience of going for my driver’s license and passing the driving test before, I could not have driven the vehicle when needed.  So at that point I was benefiting from decisions that I had made in the past. In addition I was also driving with the knowledge of where I was heading.  My scheduled destination from where I was at that time was about 15 minutes away – 15 minutes into the future. 

So I was living in the present with the understanding of the future goal having benefitted from past decisions.  The knowledge of my future goal affected the road that I took.  Also though I had plan for a future outcome, I was also enjoying the sights and the experiences of the journey.

So as we grasp these three aspects of our lives – the past, present and future – we can live in a way to minimize stress and reduce or even eliminate overwhelm. 

Also when we are thinking of completing a task, do we remember or recognize that there is also a preparation stage?  Do we remember that after we have completed the task, there is also the packing away or the cleaning up phase/stage?

The performance or implementation stage is generally visible, so many times when there is thought of how long an activity takes, there is the consideration for the time that it takes to do the task.  But when thinking of the time to complete anything, we need to include the:

• preparation and the setup time;
• actual implementation and action; and
• time after to pack up and clean and even do an assessment of what went wrong  and what went right; especially if we are going to do the same thing repeatedly.

Persons may overcommit because they underestimate or forget about the time needed for the preparation and for the pack away phases.  So using planning journals and having schedules can help in this regard.  Even though we may not use these tools in a detailed way every time, just having them and having gone through the thought process can even help us to be more realistic in our scheduling and can even reduce the time required to get things done. 

It can also help for future activities, because we wouldn’t have to be constantly thinking through how to perform repetitive activities.  In addition, there may be things that can be done ahead of time, and by getting those things out of the way, it can reduce the stress that we go through, especially when we have time constraints.

Planning can enhance our lives; and the good thing is we don’t have to plan alone.  We don’t have to plan without God’s help or without His guidance.

Planning also helps us to identify any warning signs so that we are able to proactively recognize any conflicts in our schedules and planning will also help us not to overcommit.  For example, we may have expected a project to be done in one week, but after reviewing our schedules, we may decide we need to extend the activities over two or three weeks instead.

It is also important to recognize in planning and organizing that our workload is not only related to the occupational aspect of our lives, but we need to consider every aspect – that is our home life, our community focus, be it our outreach programs, our personal development pursuits etc…   All of the activities we engage in require our time, our effort, our mental processing; and would require us to identify what is to be done and when in order of priority.

Though it may be more challenging to put into practice what is written down, planning and writing things down is still a good place to start.  And over time as you get into the habit of assessing how the plans went, this will help you in the future to make the necessary adjustments.

In all of our planning, we still need to recognize our human limitations.  We recognize that planning can never accurately predict the future, nor does planning prevent us from facing unexpected circumstances.  But we prayerfully submit our lives to God and ask Him to fill us with His wisdom to be active participants in the lives He wants us to live.  As we partner with God we submit to Him – not letting the fear of the unknown cripple us, but allowing our trust in God to empower us.