Not as Planned

God had met me in the woods yet again, speaking exactly what I needed to hear. Nothing about this weekend had gone according to plan, but I learned that was the point of the weekend. I didn't write down nearly as much on this retreat as I had the previous year, I had spent significantly less time in the woods, and God was slowly building on the foundation He had set the previous year.

I sat there on the bench, reflecting on the Bible verses I had read, the events of the past 12ish hours, and I pulled out a few 3x5 cards and wrote this:

July 29, 2017

Things don't always go the way you plan. You get everything ready, try to take care of something else, and then you can't find your way in the dark. It's ok. It's not the end. Stay calm, learn from it, and go back in the morning.

Life is not full of one chance moments. When plans fall through, life isn't over. When something you've worked towards doesn't pan out like you planned, it isn't the end of the world.

Get back to what you know, collect yourself, and go back to clean up. Salvage what you can, scrap what you have to, and move on.

Learn from it. Look back and laugh about it. Life doesn't go as planned, and that's ok. Don't give up.

If I hadn't lost my camp in the dark, I wouldn't have seen the owl this morning.


This quest had not gone at all how I thought it would go. It hadn't gone according to plan, but in that God spoke to me. In that, He taught me a lesson that has proven to be invaluable.

I sensed that it was time to take another walk, and so I packed up, put my pack on, and then decided I would begin to head towards my vehicle via the scenic route. I had a few hours left of my planned time in the woods, and at the moment, God hadn't told me we were done yet. I started walking, and just so happened to need to walk up the hill I really hate, but I got to the top, and when I did, I went to turn left and follow the trail loop that way, but as I did, I got the sense of God saying to go right. this made no sense to me, the direction I was going made more sense, it would eliminate going over the same part of the trail multiple times, and so I ignored the sense and turned left. The sense didn't go away, and so before I got more than 20 feet down the trail I turned around and went to the right. This is where I was being led, and so I listened....


Fight the lion, 1 Peter 5.1-11

TO GOD ALONE BE THE GLORY!