Unbelievable!

Have you ever had a day when you have a list of things you need to do or a list of items you are planning on purchasing and then...your list doesn't get accomplished and when you went shopping you couldn't find one single item on your list!!  How can that be? It  can be so frustrating and unfulfilling. How do you handle it? I came home and told my husband all about it! He is a wonderful listener and most of the time he is very sympathetic. If you are one of my friends or know me at all you know that I am very organized and I like to have lists and be able to check things off my list and complete my projects...IMMEDIATELY! So, I have two different lines of thinking when this happens to me. One, I have to learn to be flexible. God wants to use me and there may be times that I am going along with "my" plans and I may have to realize that God has better plans for me. He can use me if I am willing to let Him. The other thing is that God is always there to hear me-He knows when I am disappointed and frustrated and I can talk to Him anytime and anywhere. This Bible passage is a long part of one of Paul's letter to the Corinthians but it is a great example of a change in plans. Paul was a wonderful servant of the Lord. He was traveling to many different cities to share the gospel and yet he ended up with a lot of detours and roadblocks. But they only strengthened his faith in the Lord and allowed him to share with even more people. I can use him as a godly example. Is my reaction like Paul's? 

O Corinthians 1:12-2:4

12 For our boasting is this: the testimony of our conscience that we conducted ourselves in the world in simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom but by the grace of God, and more abundantly toward you. 13 For we are not writing any other things to you than what you read or understand. Now I trust you will understand, even to the end 14 (as also you have understood us in part), that we are your boast as you also are ours, in the day of the Lord Jesus.
15 And in this confidence I intended to come to you before, that you might have a second benefit— 16 to pass by way of you to Macedonia, to come again from Macedonia to you, and be helped by you on my way to Judea. 17 Therefore, when I was planning this, did I do it lightly? Or the things I plan, do I plan according to the flesh, that with me there should be Yes, Yes, and No, No? 18 But as God is faithful, our word to you was not Yes and No. 19 For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, who was preached among you by us—by me, Silvanus, and Timothy—was not Yes and No, but in Him was Yes. 20 For all the promises of God in Him are Yes, and in Him Amen, to the glory of God through us. 21 Now He who establishes us with you in Christ and has anointed us is God, 22 who also has sealed us and given us the Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee.
23 Moreover I call God as witness against my soul, that to spare you I came no more to Corinth. 24 Not that we have dominion over your faith, but are fellow workers for your joy; for by faith you stand.
2 But I determined this within myself, that I would not come again to you in sorrow. 2 For if I make you sorrowful, then who is he who makes me glad but the one who is made sorrowful by me?
3 And I wrote this very thing to you, lest, when I came, I should have sorrow over those from whom I ought to have joy, having confidence in you all that my joy is the joy of you all. 4 For out of much affliction and anguish of heart I wrote to you, with many tears, not that you should be grieved, but that you might know the love which I have so abundantly for you."
As I live one day at a time, things will not always go my way. I won't always have the perfect picture! But I can still honor Christ in all that I do and be willing to let Him lead and follow Phil 4:11:
"for I have learned in whatever state I am, to be content"

1 Timothy 6:6
"Now godliness with contentment is great gain."
(no picture tonight-because there wasn't anything to take a picture of-because I couldn't find any of them!)