“Planning for the Future”

DATE: June 21, 2026 Sunday AM

INTRODUCTION.

As believers in Christ, Christians, Disciples of Christ we are called Holy.

We are set apart and to live different than the rest of the world.

James has been showing us how we are to teat people different than the rest of the world.

Our actions are different that the rest of the world.

We are to talk different than the rest of the world.

Our decision making (wisdom) is to be different than the rest of the world.

Now our planning for the future is to be different than the way the world plans for the future.

When making your plans you need to seek God, who knows the future, for direction, be willing to change, and obey His leading.

James4:13-17.

James 4:13–17 NASB95

13 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.” 14 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. 15 Instead, you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and also do this or that.” 16 But as it is, you boast in your arrogance; all such boasting is evil. 17 Therefore, to one who knows the right thing to do and does not do it, to him it is sin.

With life short and uncertain, how can we plan for the future?

I would like to give you three steps for making plans for the future.

MESSAGE.

1. Seek God, who knows the future.

(13-14)

“Come now,” - a strong rebuke (21st Century Biblical Commentary, p69.)

It is not wrong to plan - it how we plan that makes the difference.

Do we rely on our own knowledge or on the knowledge of the One who knows the future.

The complexity of life. (13)

many decisions in life.

The uncertainty of life. (14a)

James 4:14 “14 Yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow. . . .”

we do not know all that life has to offer or holds.

Proverbs 27:1 NASB95

1 Do not boast about tomorrow, For you do not know what a day may bring forth.

God is Omniscient - All Knowing.

Jeremiah 29:11 NASB95

11 ‘For I know the plans that I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope.

The brevity of life. (14b)

James 4:14 “. . .You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away.”

God is eternal.

God has no begging and no end.

Time is created and God is outside of the creation because He created it.

Man is temporal.

Vapor - typical of what will pass away (BDAG)

The book of Job has many illustrations of life being short.

Job 14:1–2 NASB95

1 “Man, who is born of woman, Is short-lived and full of turmoil. 2 “Like a flower he comes forth and withers. He also flees like a shadow and does not remain.

2. Be willing to change your plans to line up with God’s plans.

(15-16)

Proverbs 16:9 NASB95

9 The mind of man plans his way, But the Lord directs his steps.

3. Be obedient to God’s plans.

(17)

No that you have learned this you must follow its directions.

Sin of commission.

doing.

To know not to do something and do it any way.

Sin of omission.

not doing.

To know to do something and not do it.

Humble yourself.

2 Peter 2:20–21 NASB95

20 For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world by the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and are overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first. 21 For it would be better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than having known it, to turn away from the holy commandment handed on to them.

One said it this way “ Intentions are not actions. When God prompts believers to do something good they should obey with a sense of urgency. The time is NOW.” (NKJV SB David Jeremiah)

CONCLUSION.

The problem here is Pride.