Thank you for the question! It is a great one, and a challenging one. I can’t hand you a ‘recipe’ because any recipe has to be tailored to the individual.
However, what I can say is that, in general terms, God has the same plan for you as for me: a plan to save us from sin and from all the evils that flow from it. His plan is to restore us to His image, so that we can live happily for ever, in harmony with Him, in a renewed world. He undoubtedly has a personal plan for each of us individually, too. What exactly He wants for you in particular, you have to discover for yourself; if someone else told you, you wouldn’t believe them anyway.
I can’t point you to shortcuts; they are dangerous. If I told you, “It’s simple: pray, open the Bible at random, and you’ll find out,” that would be reckless advice—even if somebody, somewhere, once took that shortcut and it seemed to work to help them to pass a test, for example. However, life’s tests are more serious, and carry higher stakes than the ones at school.
Self-reflection and talking with God
Prayer is always necessary, because the answers that matter most to you come when you seek God’s counsel. There is no magic involved. Don’t wait for voices from heaven to tell you what to do! Simply tell God about everything that weighs on you, and He will answer in His own way: through a thoughtful reading of the Bible (no shortcuts!) and often through the advice of people with experience of life and faith. Or He will answer through the events of your life, from which you can draw wise conclusions if you are alert to the signs of His providence in your life and in the lives of others. Or He will give you a sudden idea that turns out to be an excellent one.
If you knew how God wants a human life to be lived as a whole, everything would be simpler. You could draw up a “life plan” and then apply it to the big decisions of life, as well as to your daily routine.
The perfect model and the imperfect ones
If we are to talk about the will of God, the God who has revealed Himself in the Holy Scriptures, then in the Bible we have been given a perfect, ideal, standard Model, along with a multitude of models that are as imperfect as they are necessary. The perfect Model is Jesus of Nazareth, whom we call the Lord Christ. The other models are the heroes of the Bible, the “saints”, from prophets and sages to figures of whom we get only a glimpse, a snippet of a life.
We shouldn’t leave the biblical models to our imagination or to vague memories of sermons and second-hand stories. To understand God’s plan for us, we need to know both the standards God has laid down in the form of commands and precepts, from the Ten Commandments of the covenant to the words of advice in the book of Proverbs and in the epistles, and the way the heroes of faith absorbed these teachings into their lives.
The lives of the Bible’s saints are imperfect reflections of God’s plan for humanity. As you try to understand how the Lord revealed Himself in the lives of people of faith, and how they learned to live with God, the plan that is tailored to you begins to take shape. You learn from the nearly failed project called Solomon; from the Joash project, almost a success but ultimately a failure; from the Paul project, almost a failure at first but a success right up to his death.
We can also learn from the projects, or non-projects, of the people around us, who are no less worthy of attention than the characters of the Bible. The only difference is that we see these living people, whom we meet every day, with our own uninspired eyes, and we often struggle to distinguish reality from our imagination. Even biblical characters, though described by inspired writers, are not fully depicted, and we often make unrealistic assessments, sometimes merciless and sometimes overly generous.
Above all, you will learn from the most difficult project of all: the life of Jesus. He succeeded with flying colours from beginning to end. Valuing not only Jesus’s death, but also His entire life of service and sacrifice, remains an invaluable spiritual benchmark. Only once you have a clear understanding of God’s ideal in Christ, can you create a life plan that you will never be ashamed of.
A life project
Most of us don’t make a life project. We leave it to chance or “destiny”. Or we think it’s too early to think about such things when we’re young. Ultimately, we end up with whatever is left, possibly a huge debt. Or perhaps we just have a simple, biological and psychological project: to help keep the species going and get enough satisfaction out of life, like any normal person. Religion is one part of culture and a necessary ingredient, but isn’t making it the most important thing in life an unhealthy obsession? Mystical delusion? Fanaticism?
A life project is formed during adolescence. When we look at Jesus’s life, we see that He lived only to make others happy. The only plan He made for Himself was to follow God’s plan. He wholeheartedly embraced the plan His heavenly Father had made for Him: a life full of hardship, malice, and challenges, which He turned into blessings for all humanity. From childhood, He took God’s project to heart, learning to go along with His parents’ modest daily plans and, as the years went by, taking on God’s great and unique plan ever more consciously.
In contrast, being self-centred from birth, we can only come up with self-centred projects. The aim is to acquire as many “toys” as possible in order to enjoy ourselves—in short, to be “happy”. Jesus, however, was ready to accept a project with no plan B or alternatives; a project where the only happiness came from sacrificing Himself to make others happy. He did so wholeheartedly, proving that such a life is more satisfying and meaningful than the lives of those who live only for themselves. Such people hated Him so much that they put Him to death, thereby unwittingly yet guiltily fulfilling God’s plan for Him and for humanity.
Following Jesus doesn’t necessarily mean having a ready-made life plan like His. If such a thing exists, we are unaware of it. In theory, God has an ideal plan for each of us, but we often miss it due to our ignorance and frailty. After spending two or more decades carrying out the devil’s plans and missing God’s plans A, B, C, D, and E, a person often ends up missing them all. Another, like the repentant thief, grabs hold of plan Z for a single day—his last—and immediately joins the gallery of humanity’s heroes of faith.
To fulfil God’s plan by imitating Jesus means more than mere imitation. Jesus had a unique life that no one could ever fully replicate. God doesn’t expect us all to be circumcised, to live in Nazareth, to be carpenters, to be homeschooled, to stay celibate, to be baptised in the River Jordan, to go on pilgrimages to Jerusalem, to speak to the world in parables, to heal the blind, and to die on the cross.
Jesus had all the gifts, but lacked many of the privileges that we have today. Nowadays, we have many privileges, albeit unequally distributed, as well as gifts and natural inclinations, which are also distributed unequally. Rather than vainly aspiring to be a great artist or philosopher when you have nothing to contribute to the world because you have never learned to think, wouldn’t it be better to first establish a reasonable and dignified place for yourself in the world and find a way to serve your fellow human beings before discovering your lifelong mission?
Jesus was publicly known as a great rabbi and healer, but He only practised these “professions” for about three years. Until then, for thirty years, He was known as a builder by trade. He built houses for others and most likely helped His brothers and sisters, yet He had nowhere to lay His head. Nevertheless, God’s plan for Jesus did not end at the workshop or at the cross. It went further, to the resurrection and the eternal Kingdom.
Even up there, unimaginably far away, Jesus does not see this reign as the end goal of God’s plan for Him. Just as He lived His whole life to make others happy and was eager to hear from the Father on the morning of the resurrection whether His sacrifice for humanity was enough, so now He is waiting for the day when He can enjoy the company of those for whom He died and share His reign with them. Even amid heavenly splendour and happiness, He still has others on His mind, just like God.
Any real talent or opportunity that comes your way hints that God is preparing you to serve others through that gift for their benefit, both now and forever. However, if you use your talent merely to show off and your career merely to make money, you have missed God’s plan.
During life’s critical moments, when the outcome of a choice can have significant consequences, you may feel the need for God’s plan to be revealed to you by supernatural means. You want to know if she’s the one you’re meant to spend your life with or if he’s the man you should tie your fate to. That’s fine! But God doesn’t usually answer through dice or voices. Sometimes, even the voices of loved ones can be unhelpful. It’s better to get the kind of spiritual education that will make you an ideal life partner, and then you’ll know if someone is truly right for you.
God’s plan for us is not human, focusing mainly on this life, nor is it fixed and static, but adaptable and long-term. David was destined to become a shepherd, but God had other plans for him: to make him king of Israel. Matthew Levi found himself drawn to the vocation of tax collector, a lucrative but despised trade among the Jews. However, God wanted to make him an apostle of Jesus, and succeeded. Jesus promised Judas Iscariot a throne as a judge, but Judas’s petty scheme won out and ended in suicide. Stephen and Philip were chosen as deacons in Jerusalem; by serving well in this role, they became good evangelists and probably prophets too.
Until God reveals something special to you, do the job you are duty-bound to do, no matter how unpleasant. Don’t settle for living only to be served by others. Before you establish yourself in life, establish yourself in eternity in your soul. Enter God’s kingdom today through the gate of repentance, the baptism of faith in Jesus. Learn the basics of God’s will and follow them, and God will show you what to do next. He can reveal His plan to you step by step, but first you need to make a plan for your life.
May God help you! We will meet one day and you can tell me how it went so that I will know that I haven’t written in vain.
In this article, Florin Lăiu explores the challenges and uncertainties that young people face in their search for a spiritual path. He invites them to discover the factors that can lead to a clearer understanding of God’s plan for their lives.