Got a good planner?

I have always loved going Back to School .... it meant New School Supplies!!!  i loved spending time picking the Pretty Folders, the Color Coded Notebooks for each subject, trying out new pens and pencils, and of Course!!!  a fresh box of crayons with those perfect points! SWEET!!!!  and once all the basics were covered i would stand in front of the  Planners for hours (it seemed) and negotiate my way thru each one, trying to determine if there was enough space for recording asssignments and social events and commitments and ballgames and work schedules and any thing Else i could dream up ....  and now, as a parent of grown cihldren in college i still find myself wanting to buy notebook paper every august/september ... and i grin from ear to ear as i listen to rachael weigh the pros and cons of planners ...

the major difference between rachael and me is that she actually USES her planner!  she colors in it and records all Kinds of details - - assignments, church commitments, sorority mtgs, accomplishments for the day .. and each day is decorated and commemorated in a special way - with a special adornment .... it's her life story as told thru daily notations and highlites!

i wish I was a planner ... i've bought all the books and they are stacked in the corner over there .... i sit back and admire rachael for being what i'm not ... and she pulls it off with such grace and charm ... i am, quite simply, rather unorganized ... and at this stage in the game .. i'm SO okay with it all!!!  However, i often find that to be my 'excuse' for NOT being more pro-active with things ... i Forgot about that potluck dinner our sunday school class was having.... oh well!  i'm not worried about the reading assignment our pastor has asked of us .. i'll get in somehow (at the last minute while bubba's driving us on the way to church sunday morning) ....  i'll listen to my Bible on tape at the red lite - -doesn't That count for 'quiet time'? ....

Excuses are endless (and i've gotten pretty good at being rather nonchalant about it all) but as i read this morning about being Dependent on my Father i'm convicted about my ambivalent attitude.  I realize i shouldn't plan Him Out of my day by making endless to-do lists ... but i also shouldn't NOT include Him because of my Lack of planning either.  Make sense?   What if He took the approach and said to me  "Ginger, your failure to plan does not constitute an emergency on My part" when something in my day catches me off guard?

Look what Acts 17: 26-28 discloses:  "From one man He made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and He determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live.  God did this so that men would seek Him and perhaps reach out for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us.  For in Him we live and move and have our being. "  It would appear that God has each of us planned ... He is never caught off guard.  and there's nothing more i enjoy than being able to enjoy time spent with someone who KNOWS where we're going ... remembers where we've been ... and can point all all the landmarks along the way!

i Love this picture of rachael from this summer as she sat atop Table Mountain and took in all of God's creation while in South Africa ... however i can't help but pray that this would be My perspective of each and every day that God allows me to wake up and praise Him .. Planning to be surprized and amazed by Him, Planning on Depending on Him for guidance thru each and every moment of His created time table .... Planning to only have His Plan in mind ....  Planning to lean on Him ....  Lord i'm amazed by You .. how You love me!

 "I am in my Father, and you are in Me, and I am in you.  Whoever has my commands and obeys them, he is the one who loves Me.  He who loves Me will be loved by  my Father, and I too will love hiim and show myself to him."