Tomorrow

“What are you doing tomorrow?” This is a question we ask each other all the time. We have to make plans, after all. Planning is a necessity given these things: the need to use our God-given abilities well (Matthew 25:14-30), the need to work to take care of ourselves and our families (2 Thessalonians 3:10, Ephesians 4:28), our desire to be faithful workers in God’s kingdom (1 Corinthians 15:58), as well as the pace of life in the twenty-first century.
I do not disdain planning for tomorrow. I take care to do that very thing. I have a little book I keep in arm’s reach all the time called a “Day-Timer.” Mine is a pen and paper device, though these days many people use electronic versions of the same thing (I don’t trust them). It has my schedule and a record of things done and to do in it. If I accidently leave it at home or at the office I turn right around as soon as I realize it and go back to pick it up. I’m in a pickle without it.
I think such a thing is good for a preacher or any person who works with a varying schedule to keep. It allows me to look back on the day or week and review what I’ve accomplished and what still needs to get done. It is a very valuable tool.
There have been times that I have get myself so wrapped up in the details of what I have to do today and tomorrow that I forget another very important Biblical principle: Tomorrow may never come.
Solomon had it this way: “Do not boast about tomorrow, For you do not know what a day may bring forth” (Proverbs 27:2). We remember James on this subject: “Come now, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, spend a year there, buy and sell, and make a profit,’ whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away. Instead you ought to say, ‘If the Lord wills, we shall live and do this or that’” (James 4:13-15).
In the next verse James echoes Proverbs: “But now you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil.” This is a forceful reminder of the essential reality of life: tomorrow is not guaranteed.
Jesus may come! “The day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night” (2 Peter 3:10). I’d love for Him to come the day before I send in my Form 1040, but I have no idea when He is coming. Neither does anyone else, except to say that He can come anytime. We need to be ready (see Matthew 25:1-13).
Our own lives may conclude. We may die. No, make that, we will die. We just don’t know when. The only thing that will intervene is if the Lord comes in our lifetime. I think I’d like to live a good long time and have a fine time doing it, but I know that cannot be the purpose of life.
How do we handle this juxtaposition of the need to plan and work with the reality that tomorrow may never come? I suppose some folks might worry about it and let it make them a little crazy. But God has equipped us with the ability to understand about tomorrow. Jesus said “Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble” (Matthew 6:34).
Paul tells us in Philippians 4:6 “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, let your requests be made known to God, and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.”
Tomorrow comes if it will. If it does, be ready to do its work. If it does not, well, we better be ready. Whether it does or not, trust God

-Bill Irby.

Hobbs Street Herald