I’m not sure what it is about being a senior (in high school or college) that suddenly gives everyone around you the ability to criticize whatever life choices you’re making.
“Are you sure that’s a good idea?”
“How are you going to make any money?”
“What are you going to use that degree for?”
“What’s the five year plan?”
Honestly – I have no idea. I don’t know where I’ll be next year, let alone in five years.
And that’s a scary place to be – especially for me. I’ve always been a fan of the Five Year Plan. I once erupted into inconsolable tears over a B+ in 5th grade spelling…until I was informed it wouldn’t end up on my college applications. I am a planner, a to-do list maker, and a worrier. I attach too great a meaning to insignificant failures, I interpret any minor sign of disapproval as catastrophic in nature, and I value perfection in all the wrong places.
So this place I’m living in right now – graduating this year, having taken a 180° in post-grad plans halfway through my junior year, and still not having a solid idea what this will look like in a few years – is terrifying. It’s my natural inclination to run from these places and jump right back into the comfy arms of a nice, pre-planned course. No bumps, no unexpected turns, no choices to make along the way.
And yet, I’ve been learning how to live in this uncomfortable place; this place of constant trust in the God who is writing a better story than my plans ever could.
But it seems no one else got the memo that I was trusting Him and penciling in plans as He leads.
The pressure no longer seems to come primarily from the nagging voice in my head. Instead, it feels like it’s closing in on me from the outside.
The weirdest part is that it comes so often from other Christians. It usually sounds something like this – “Well, sure, you should trust God with your life. But aren’t you…taking that a little too far?” It seems the Five Year Plan has become like so many other cultural artifacts Christians so unquestioningly adopt – we don’t even realize we’re doing it.
Jesus told his followers to stop worrying about what they’d eat or wear (Matthew 6:25-34), and we think trusting Him with things as secondary as our vocations or geographic location is “taking it too far”??
It’s time to bury this monstrosity known as the “Five Year Plan.” It’s time we stop pretending that how tightly we hold on to it is anything but a lack of total and complete reliance upon Him. It’s a crutch – a justifiable way to rely upon our own plans over His.
Can He inspire a Five Year Plan? Sure. I think He’s leading me in a direction that I can plan loosely for over the next few years. But I know that He works in mysterious ways that I rarely understand. I know He delights in proving my self-sufficiency wrong just so He can be the Lord of my life again and again and forever.
So I’ll pencil in next year. I’ll dream of the next five. But I’ll trust Him more than my own plans, I’ll believe Him more than the lies, and I’ll have so much faith in Him that there’s none left over for anyone else – including myself.
So I’m killing the Five Year Plan. It’s going in the grave – right along with my fears of the future, my lack of faith, and all the voices that tell me I should reconsider how seriously I take His call to follow Him. And thankfully I serve a God that rose from the grave to make sure it all stays there.
Letters from the exile 