Divine Appointments: When they don’t line up with your plans

If you’re anything like me, you like to make plans. I don’t mind a good, spontaneous activity once in a while, but I like to have a plan that includes the steps to get there.

If I’m taking a trip, I want to have my travel and lodging plans laid out; I want to have my packing checklist ready.

But there was that time a hurricane completely upended my travel itinerary. The bonus was spending time with precious friends who rescued me.

Then there was that time my husband and planned to move a hundred miles from my part-time work. We even had two different destinations in mind in opposite directions from our current home base. This was before folks could do so much work remotely. But I had a plan to travel to Orange County a couple days a week to work. To our disappointment, God nixed those plans, only to throw me into a situation that required full-time employment where we already lived. A hundred-mile commute would not have worked well.

No doubt Saul had his travel plans all worked out. (Acts 9) He knew which road to take (the Damascus Road), what to take with him (letters from the high priest), and what he was going to do when he arrived (murder Christians!).

I can’t help but think his mind must have been in chaos when suddenly on that Damascus Road he was confronted with a bright light, and he fell to the ground.

When something stands in the way of your plans, do you fall apart? Or do you fall on your knees as Saul did?

We may not hear an audible voice like Saul, but we can stop, fall on our knees, and ask God for direction. He may not answer as clearly as when He told Saul to go into the city. Even then, Saul was blind, and God told him to obey before He told him what to do next. Instructions would come after his act of obedience.

God changed Saul’s travel plans so that he might be saved and by that, gentiles would hear the gospel. A Divine appointment indeed.

When your life is interrupted, you don’t know what’s next, and you’re afraid, consider that this new direction, new plan is God protecting you or it is a divine appointment He wants to bless you with. Just be prepared that He may ask you to obey before He gives you the entire plan.

Lord my God, you have done many things — your wondrous works and your plans for us; none can compare with you. If I were to report and speak of them, they are more than can be told. (Psalm 40:5 CSB)