James chapter 4 challenges us to stop boasting about tomorrow; ‘13 Now listen, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.” 14 Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.15 Instead, you ought to say, “If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.” 16 As it is, you boast in your arrogant schemes. All such boasting is evil. 17 If anyone, then, knows the good they ought to do and doesn’t do it, it is sin for them.’
This passage seems to speak directly to business leaders. We write our business plans and ‘arrogant schemes’, thinking in the infamous words of Dell boy from Only Fools and Horses; ‘Don’t worry, Rodney. This time next year, we’ll be millionaires!‘
It is common place in business to write a business plan. This can be a sensible way of ensuring we move systematically towards our business goals. It can however, also be an arrogant boast about the future. This passage reminds us that we have no control over what lies ahead. Instead we must take responsibility for what is in our control; what we do today. We believe God’s way is about determining what is the right thing to do today. As Christian business leaders we need to focus on recognising the difference between the right and wrong courses of action in each situation. The key question we must ask is ‘what is the Lord’s will?’. We have found that when we do this we cannot help but end up in the best place.
Let us commit as Kingdom Entrepreneurs to focus on today and let God take care of tomorrow.