I love planning – sorting through my work diary, looking ahead as I organise holidays and family gatherings. But I’m challenged by the opening of this passage, addressed originally to wealthy merchants across Palestine and the Mediterranean, as they confidently declare plans for their trading activities (v 13). There is an arrogance in presuming that self-sufficient planning brings success.

Not that planning is wrong, but planning without including God is not only foolish, but is named as sinful (v 17). Thinking back to livelihoods devastated by the Covid-19 pandemic emphasises the fragility of our existence and the importance of trusting in God for our future and not relying on our own insights (Proverbs 3:5).

Life is precious, a gift from God – and only he knows the number of our days. Our response should be one of prayerful obedience, listening to God for our future, being prepared to change direction if necessary, and holding all our plans lightly. Planning can be good stewardship, but only if we place our dependence on God and embrace his sovereign purpose in our lives (v 15).

‘For I know the plans I have for you’.¹ Thank God that he has a plan for your life and that he is working it out.

In this section, James returns to the theme of money, or rather the pursuit of wealth and the temptation to plan without any reference to God.

It would appear that there was a local group of rich merchants who were making plans and presuming that they had sovereignty over their lives (v 13). Not only that, but they were boasting about the autonomy they had to act in this way (v 16). The problem was, as the merchants knew, life is transitory. James uses the metaphor of ‘mist’ that appears and disappears to highlight the brevity of life (v 14). The remedy for this is to recognise that all one’s plans need to be brought under God’s sovereignty (v 15). Of course, ‘If it is the Lord’s will …’ could be used in a formulaic manner by Christians who simply add that to their plans, but James is using it to convince the merchants that God’s sovereignty extends over all areas of their lives. Verse 17 has wider implications but, in the context of the merchants, the verse is a reference to the fact that they know how they ought to act in their business lives but do not do so. This, as James says, is sin. 

If anything has demonstrated the fact that, although we can make plans, God remains sovereign, the Covid-19 pandemic has done so. All our plans had to be readjusted or abandoned as a result. It is important to stress that Christians are not forbidden from making plans, but they need to be submitted to God’s will as a genuine act of surrender to the one who is sovereign. He is the Sovereign Lord who knows the ‘end from the beginning’.² We must submit to him.

‘How do you make God laugh?’, so the saying goes: ‘Tell him your plans!’ Let’s submit our plans to him, recognising the truth of ‘if it is the Lord’s will’. 

¹ Jer 29:11  ² Isa 46:10