According to Plan or Rolling with the Punches??

And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: "The daughters of Zelophehad are right in what they are saying; you shall indeed let them possess an inheritance among their father's brothers and pass the inheritance of their father on to them." Numbers 27:6-7

According to Plan or Rolling with the Punches??
By Rev. William Dohle

Four weeks or so before we left on our big vacation this summer, we sat down to make a plan.

We needed to know where we would stay and how much we'd need to bring. We decided to stop in Amarillo, Texas. We decided to stay in Ontario, California when we traveled there. We already had our reservations for Disneyland thanks to my parents. And we decided to stop in Lincoln, Nebraska on the way home.

For the most part, everything went according to plan. We had no unexpected stops or bumps in the road. Besides a rainstorm that God saw us through, the roads were great!

That hasn't always happened that way. One trip we took out to Utah from Colorado turned into a nightmare! We were traveling to a friend's wedding. There was a massive blizzard in Wyoming, so bad that you couldn't see the road in front of you. I was drifting off the road, both from exhaustion and from the snow. We stopped at the worst motel we've ever stopped in and prayed we could get out the next morning. Thankfully we did and we made it to Utah, just twelve hours before the rehearsal! It was a mess!

Plans have a way of doing that to you. Either they work out just as you thought they would. Or they don't and you have to roll with the punches.

God's plans work very much the same way.

Take the daughters of Zelophehad in the book of Numbers. Zelophedad was son of Hepher son of Gilead son of Machir son of Manasseh, son of Joseph, a member of the Manassite clan. He planned on having a son to pass down his inheritance to as well. Unfortunately he only had daughters. Five of them in fact. Mahlah, Noah, Hoglah, Milcah, and Tirzah.

Now in his journey across the wilderness to get to the Promised Land, Zelophehad died. He didn't plan to die. He just did. And he died leaving no sons to carry on his name.

Now this is a problem for ancient Israelites. After all, the SON takes the name of the father and inherits all the father's estate. (We have this same thing happen in America as daughters take the last name of their husbands). But he had all daughters. He didn't plan on having all daughters. He didn't plan to die. It just happened.

So the daughters go to Moses, Eleazar the priest, the leaders, and all the congregation, and say: "Our father died in the wilderness; he was not among the company of those who gathered themselves together against the Lord in the company of Korah, but died for his own sin; and he had no son. Why should the name of our father be taken away from his clan because he had no son? Give to us a possession among our father's brothers."(Numbers 27:3-4)

Now what should Moses do?  They hadn't planned for this to happen. They planned on every family having at least one son to pass the family surname and estate onto. This sort of thing didn't happen.

So Moses brings it to the Lord. And the Lord rolls with the punches. "The daughters of Zelophehad are right in what they are saying; you shall indeed let them possess an inheritance among their father's brothers and pass the inheritance of their father on to them."

In other words... plans have changed, Moses. We've gotta roll with the punches here!

This event brings me to a curious question. Does God have rigid plans for us or does God roll with the punches??

Did God plan on Zelophehad having no daughters?
Did God plan on Zelophehad dying in the wilderness?
Did God plan on this issue being brought forward to Moses and the Israelites?

It seems to me that, despite all that we might think, God's plans aren't rigid. They;re actually pretty flexible.

And that fits what we read in the rest of Scripture. In Jeremiah, God assures his people that he still has plans for them.

"For I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give you a hope and a future." (Jer. 29)

In the book of Romans we read about God's plans too.

"For we know that in all things God works for good of those who love him, those who he has called according to his purpose." (Romans 8:28)

God's plans, you see, are flexible enough to roll with the punches, to take whatever comes. God doesn't plan on you losing your job...but that loss can turn into gain when you find something else in a new chapter of your life. God doesn't plan on your marriage falling apart...but the death of that relationship can lay fertile ground for other relationships. God doesn't plan on someone dying...but that doesn't stop them from being with God or their memory from living on.

God's plans are flexible. Even when ours are not.

We are like Moses, stuck in the plans we had before the unexpected. Moses did right. He went straight to God. When the unexpected happened, when these five daughters came with their request, Moses knew to go to the Flexible One, the One whose plans are that we have a hope and a future, who wants the best from us. So Moses goes there and finds a new plan and a new way of living.

Maybe we could say that God plans on death and resurrection. Things dying and something else new taking its place. He planned the world that way in nature. New things grow where the old things have died. Maybe those are his plans for all of life.

Maybe that's what "plans to prosper you...to give you a hope and a future" really mean.

The plans we think God has are just temporary details. His true plan for us is shown in Jesus Christ where through our death God gives us new life.

Give us eyes to see, God, what your plans are for us and faith to trust that, even when our plans fail, you still give us life. Amen.