S05E053, Best Laid Plans, Andy B 2 Minute Video
There’s a rather crude phrase in the UK about how P&*$ Poor Planning Produce P*£% Poor Performance. (You can interpret those symbols for whatever works best for your innocence!)
The basic point is simply that if we don’t put in the effort to plan something, it’s likely to go wrong. And planning poorly usually results in poor outcome.
As humans, as parents, as friends, as children, as employers and employees we’re regularly planning something. Even if it’s our next break for a cup of tea!
Meanwhile, never planning for anything is a very bad idea on a number of levels. But, it is also a bad idea not to plan so much you’ve sorted the next thirty years of your life, without considering how you’re gonna do it.
We can dream that dream house. But if it’s on the other side of a ravine, we need to build a bridge first before fitting our bespoke kitchen units and game room!
In fact, the bible reminds us not to make plans for tomorrow – because we simply don’t know what tomorrow will bring, or where we will be.
Another angle on this is that we can assume as human beings that when we’ve done something and it goes wrong, that we must have failed somewhere. We live in a blame culture, so it’s only natural for us to blame ourselves.
But, here’s the thing. Sometimes those mistakes can be the greatest opportunities too!
As Christians we’re not Superman in disguise - we don’t have super human powers to avoid troubles and issues. No matter how much planning you do, something can go wrong that you have no control over, and could never have planned for.
And that’s why we’re called to live one day at a time - not one week, nor one year at a time. A lot can happen in a few moments – just speak to the survivors of any horrific accidents.
That’s why it’s best to plan, but to plan lightly – and, see what God might do that’s even better. God’s given us vivid imaginations and He desires us to use them.
Just don’t take failure personally straight away because, sometimes, there’s no way for us to prevent disaster. Which is why we’re called to live in peace – by trusting on Jesus, and not taking on life in too large a portion!
And, because no matter how the big mess may be, God is always ready and willing with a mop and bucket to help us clean it up, and make it even better than before.
Just a thought...
Andy B
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Transcript
[00:00:00] So another Andy B Two Minute Video. Welcome!
[00:00:11] So I've been thinking today about when things don't go planned. Now, last week, on Wednesday, we had a massive, massive change for the BerryBunch. We had a brand new website launched BerryBunch.Org.
[00:00:25] Most of that went pretty well!
[00:00:27] We've changed our social media platforms. We've, we've changed the URL the www.BerryBunch.org bit. That's all been changed everywhere.
[00:00:37] The website's propagated. That just means that everybody in the world can now access that website through the correct domain name, BerryBunch.org. But not everything went absolutely as planned.
[00:00:49] Sometimes it doesn't matter how much preparation or planning we do, it can go wrong. So I've called this one When Things Don't Go As Planned, because we [00:01:00] planned very well. We double checked. We contacted various people and something's gone wrong.
[00:01:06] So we have a WordPress blog. We've got about 200 people who have signed up to that, and I suspect we're gonna lose all of those subscribers because they will lose access to our WordPress blog.
[00:01:17] I was told by WordPress. Yeah, no problem it'll, it'll switch over. Just let us know when you need it to be done and we'll move your existing current subscribers across to the new replacement WordPress blog. Only they haven't. And the reply time's 2 to 3 days. I think there's a good chance we'll lose, lose those subscribers.
[00:01:37] But you have to look at problems in life one of two ways. You either look at it, oh, well, woe is me? It's all gone wrong. It's the end of the world. What we gonna do?
[00:01:44] Or as I sometimes manage to do, we look at it, well, God's brought us this far. Maybe this going wrong isn't all as bad as it could be. Now, hopefully, we'll get those subscribers moved. It won't be an issue.
[00:01:56] But what did I do? I phoned a friend, well, I phoned six actually. I emailed [00:02:00] them.
[00:02:00] We've got the Council of Elrond for the BerryBunch and I'm part of the UK Christian Bloggers, and we asked them to let their subscribers know about our new blog and our new website. Because we share quite a few of the same people. It's, it's a really good community.
[00:02:13] When things don't go as planned, what is your go-to response?
[00:02:18] Is it to throw your hands up in the air and, oh, that's it. It's the end of the world. I'm, I'm pretty good at that one myself, I'll be honest!
[00:02:24] Or do you do what I actually manage to have done on this occasion, the right thing for once and ,ask some people for some help.
[00:02:32] When things don't go as planned, don't assume you've got something wrong.
[00:02:36] When things don't go as planned, go to God and ask Him what to do next. You might be surprised by something even better!
[00:02:45] Just a thought.
Andy B, 06/02/2023