People go about making their plans, but the Eternal has the final word. Even when you think you have good intentions, He knows your real motives. Whatever you do, do it as service to Him, and He will guarantee your success. Proverbs 16:1-3 (The Voice)
Have you ever wondered why you’re not more successful? Why your plans don’t work out?
I have. I have ideas that never seem to get off the ground. A story will start to bloom. Characters emerge with the flaws and foibles of real people, plot ideas percolate. Then the thing drops flatter than an egg on the kitchen floor. And just as messy to clean up.
That happened to me recently. I had what I thought was an excellent idea for a story. And I enjoyed writing it. I loved the main characters, and the secondary characters were unique and vibrant. The plot twisted in just the right way in just the right places.
And it flopped. Agents weren’t interested. Beta readers didn’t care for it. One even said it wasn’t me.
But I loved it, and I didn’t want to let it go. Then I listened to my wife. She pointed out where I wasn’t writing like I usually wrote. I had gone off track. She, as usual, was so right. I had gone off track. Way off track.
I followed her advice and spent time with God. And he agreed with her.
I had made my plans, but he had the final word. I wrote with what I thought were good intentions, but he revealed my real motives. And they weren’t to glorify him. My motives were to glorify me. I saw myself breaking new ground and writing edgier fiction. But that wasn’t what he wanted from me or for me.
I was no longer walking the path he had for me. And I couldn’t succeed. He made sure of that. It took him a while to convince me. He did get through to me, and I have repented of my pride and arrogance.
The manuscript is destroyed now. It needed to be. I needed to cleanse it out of my electronic, mental, and, most of all, systems.
I’m in the process now of waiting on him to show me his path for my writing. There’s a lot of work to be done. I need to complete my heart change so that my writing is a service to and for him. I need to return to what he has called me to do. When I do that, he can come alongside me and lead me to success.
How do you handle God’s interruptions of your plans?
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