I was recently talking with someone I used to work with and they we asking how things were going since my change of direction in becoming a minister. It got me to thinking about my journey to here. I had been quite happy working my way up through the ranks of the Council and getting into a fairly significant position. The next step up seemed obvious but for over a year I was knocked back time and time again. I became frustrated and angry. I must be a hundred times worse for those who have recently lost their jobs and the security and safety of their family is being threatened. We are in a time when if you don't have money people think they can't do anything - I think people who came through the War and the immediate post-war period could teach us all a thing or two, but I digress. None of us knows the future that we will meet around the next corner of our lives. It may be a time of richness and blessing, peace and rest or it might be a time of hard trial and energy sapping endurance. It was very hard for me to see in my past experience how this blocking of my career could be in God's plan. Had he not said in his word that he "had plans to prosper" me, that certainly wasn't happening. The problem was that I missed the start of that promise, the "plans" that God had for me. I had to abandon my plans for my future and my family's future and discover His plan for me and mine.

As we move closer to Easter we are reminded that that particular plan of God cost Him dear. It was not the easy path he chose, but it was the best for us. It secured for all who put their trust in Christ a new route to the Father and an assured acceptance even amid our fractured faithfulness.

God has a plan for each of us - but we have to be able to see that it might not be the one we expected or even sought. But by travelled the road of faith with every twist and turn we will find God's providence and blessing, comfort and strength to only when we need it but every moment if we seek it. I'm sure many people hold reservations about what the future holds for our church with the building project and all that. From our perspective it seems such a monumental undertaking. God will provide! He will provide the right people at the right time. He will provide the opportunities we need to make this happen. But they won't just fall into our laps we have to go out and faithfully seek God's plan in every aspect of the project.

I know the building team are just as frustrated as everyone else about the slowness of progress, but who knows this might be a part of God's plan to get us praying more, working together more and supporting one another more to be the church - the Body of Christ - to one another now. In my story I had to give up the security of a full-time job with prospects (at least I thought so) and each year I kept a spreadsheet of our income from grants and trusts etc. Over the four years of University all our needs were met and we roughly, from all sources including Karen's work, the same post-tax income as we had when I was working and we got through that time debt free, unlike many students today. I believe God makes the way possible when His people are faithful. We should take courage from the verse at the start of this piece; God's plan is for our future, a future with hope and purpose.

May we all discover the plan of God for our lives as we journey with Him in faithful hope even when we don't know what is round the corner.

Stuart