What will the future bring? It’s the same question everyone should ask themselves, which is: What am I going to do? What’s my plan? You can’t just wing it. You must focus on what is within your control. You can’t expect to know what is in your control if you don’t take the time now to consider it. However, not everything is within our control.
“Come now, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit’ – yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, ‘If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.’ As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin.” (James 4:13-17, ESV)
But we are not to just sit back and wait for life to happen to us. As Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius wrote in Meditations,
“Concentrate on what you have to do. Fix your eyes on it. Remind yourself that your task is to be a good human being; remind yourself what nature demands of people. Then do it, without hesitation, and speak the truth as you see it. But with kindness. With humility. Without hypocrisy.”
Take a moment to reflect on the range of possibilities the future may bring. However, do not worry about the future, but prepare for it. Now is the time to reaffirm your principles and think through how you will respond to whatever presents itself.
Consider Matthew Chapter 25. The “Parable of the Ten Virgins” (vs. 1-13) speaks to planning, preparation, and readiness to act. The “Parable of the Talents” (vs. 14-30) speaks to the action of using our gifts, whether many or few, to the best of our abilities. Those who failed to plan, prepare, and act suffered the consequences of their failure. Not a failure while acting, but a failure from inaction.
Roman Stoic Philosopher Seneca (4 BC-65 AD) wrote, “The unexpected blow lands the heaviest.” Conversely, French chemist and microbiologist Louis Pasteur (1822-1895 AD) wrote, “Fortune favors the prepared mind.”
Don’t ignore or dismiss the unpleasant or the unlikely from your mind as you consider the potential outcomes of your actions or inactions. Reflect on all the possibilities. Without becoming obsessive about it, think about how you should respond to things that might happen to you. Anticipate the emotions that might result from these events and plan how you can keep them in check. Emotional responses are seldom the correct responses. Whether in victory or defeat, stay steady, for the only thing truly in your control is how you respond.
“Turn away from evil and do good; seek peace and pursue it.” (Psalm 34:14, ESV)
Like Jesus praying in the Garden of Gethsemane, prepare to meet your responsibilities with virtue. Your job is to be good, to do what is right, and to love your neighbor as yourself. Whatever your future brings, major or minor, you will need the fruits of the spirit.
“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.” (Galatians 5:22-23, ESV)
And how do you obtain this fruit? By simply and humbly asking for it!
“But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.” (John 14:26, ESV)