James 4:13-15 Business Anyone?

(James 4:13-15)  "Come now, you who say, 'Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, and spend a year there and engage in business and make a profit.'  Yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow. You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away.  Instead, you ought to say, 'If the Lord wills, we will live and also do this or that.'"

I’ve been silent on the BLOG for way too long now and for several reasons.  I have been busy, I had some health concerns and frankly I got out of the habit.  I named the BLOG “Periodic” as a hedge for the day when this might happen and sure enough it did.  Enough with the excuses….  

Since I’ve last written lots has happened.  One of the most significant is that I’ve changed jobs.  Not companies, jobs.  The opportunity for a new role and some responsibilities that I’ve been hoping for presented themselves and I went for it.  This I shared with you some time ago.  The aftermath has been a whirlwind and reminded me of the verse presented here today from James.  The essence is that you can make all the plans you like but the master planner is still the Lord.

James writes to those who say they are going to go engage in business somewhere and have a plan to make money.  This sounds very entrepreneurial and we as Americans can identify with what James is writing; we do this all the time.  We do it as business men, as business owners and even as volunteers working projects for “non-profits”.  We are all very familiar with making a plan to engage in an enterprise to, “Make a profit”.

James critique is not really against this aspect of the behavior.  What he’s chiding is the expectation and perhaps even the perspective.  He says, “You do not know what your life will be like tomorrow”.  That’s true isn’t it?  Do you know what is going to happen next despite your best planning?  No!  A customer of mine just lost his battle with cancer after making big plans for expansion of his farm management enterprise.  He was sick with the disease as he expanded the operation, unsure of the outcome.  But he knew he was sick and he knew there was a possibility the efforts of expansion and re-organization would not be something he would see to fruition.

How many of us have that perspective?  Not many I’m afraid.  Too many of us go about the business of business as that was the end of it, the purpose and meaning of it all.  Well, for the business perhaps that is true but for the person it is a lie from Satan himself.  While there is nothing wrong with going out and setting up a business and making a profit there is a right way to do it.  The first step in the right way is to understand, “You do not know what your life will be like tomorrow.  You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away”.  The right perspective understands that God alone is sovereign, “If the Lord wills, we will live and also do this or that”.  AMEN!