“The best laid plans of mice and men (can go wrong).”
Robert Frost’s famous line from his poem, “To a Mouse” is an apology. Yes, an apology. A farmer had a grand idea to plow his field. A mouse had his own plan to build a nest in that same field. Thus, the apology. All the hard work of the mouse was for naught. The nest, they say, is history. To sum up the saying’s meaning: No matter how well you plan, there is no guarantee of success.
History is replete with not-so-sound plans gone awry. Someone thought it was a good plan to build the unsinkable Titanic for $7.5 million, only to under-equip it with 32 lifeboats instead of 64. The price of the extra lifeboats—$16,000.
Many thought the cause of The Great Plague of London of 1665 was cats, so someone in the Department of Good Ideas had a plan—eradicate the felines. As it turns out, rats were responsible for the spread. By killing off the cats who kill rats…well, you get the picture.
Then there was the Superconducting Super Collider, deep in the heart of Texas. The purpose of the tunnel was to experiment accelerating protons and anti-protons until they collide to create large amounts of energy. Ten years, 14 miles and two billion dollars later, the project was shut down. It appears the only thing it accelerated was throwing good money after bad. The underestimated cost of the world’s most expensive hole in the ground—$22 billion.
The best laid plans of men (I am inclined to give the mouse a break) can go wrong. Not so with God’s plans according to Jeremiah 29:11:
11 'For I know the plans that I have for you,' declares the LORD, 'plans for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope.
While His plans might not sound sound, they are.
First, God’s plans are sound plans because of their purpose. God’s purpose of His exile of Judah was to give His people a hope and a future (Jeremiah 29:5-7):
5 Build houses and live in them; 6Take wives for your sons …7 'And seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the LORD on its behalf; for in its welfare you will have welfare.'
Here is the context. God’s people had strayed. He exiled them to Babylon to correct their course from idolatry back to faithfulness and blessing. It may not sound like a plan. But His end goal is to have you in a better place. Don’t run. Settle in, live and learn..
Second, God’s plans are sound plans because they are certain. There is a definitive end-time to his corrective judgments for His people.
"For thus says the LORD, 'When seventy years have been completed for Babylon, I will visit you and fulfill My good word to you, to bring you back to this place. Jeremiah 29:10
Sound plans are time-based, not open ended. So it is with God’s plans. He is sovereign, controlling when things best reach their intended positive end. Your restrictive circumstances are not forever. That’s why the Solomon could write in Ecclesiastes 7:8: Better is the end of a thing than the beginning and patient in spirit is better than the proud in spirit.
In your exile—your restrictive place—be obedient and patient in it. Settle in, plant, take, live, learn from it. A better future is coming. Sounds like a plan.
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