When God Interrupts Your Plans

Solomon captures the tension every marketplace leader experiences: we make our strategic plans, set our career goals, and chart our professional course—and then God redirects our steps. The question isn't whether God will interrupt your plans; it's whether you'll recognize His interruptions as invitations to greater Kingdom assignments you never could have planned yourself.

The Kingdom Truth

God's interruptions to your carefully laid plans aren't obstacles to your success—they're invitations to assignments bigger than you could have imagined.

This principle transforms how we respond to unexpected career changes because it shifts our perspective from disruption to divine redirection. In God's economy, the closed door you didn't expect often protects you from the wrong path, and the detour you didn't plan often positions you for the right assignment. Your job is to plan wisely and hold those plans loosely, trusting that God's interruptions are actually His directions.

Devotional

Kate had the next five years mapped out with precision. Make partner at her consulting firm by 35. Build her client portfolio to seven figures by 38. Launch her own firm by 40. She had executed phase one flawlessly and was right on schedule for partnership when her managing director called her into his office.

The firm was restructuring. Her promotion was being delayed indefinitely. Worse, her biggest client was being reassigned to a colleague who had the right political connections. In one conversation, her five-year plan imploded.

For weeks, Kate wrestled with anger and confusion. She had done everything right—delivered results, built relationships, sacrificed personal time. How could God let this happen? She prayed for restoration, for justice, for her plan to get back on track.

God had different plans.

Through the frustration, a persistent thought kept surfacing: a nonprofit she'd volunteered with needed strategic help. They were growing rapidly but lacked the business infrastructure to scale effectively. Kate had dismissed the idea multiple times—she was a for-profit consultant, not a nonprofit administrator.

But with her career plan in shambles, she finally paid attention to what felt like divine nudging. She offered to help the nonprofit develop their growth strategy. What started as a side project became an obsession. She saw how her consulting expertise could multiply Kingdom impact in ways her corporate work never could.

Within six months, Kate made a decision that shocked everyone: she left consulting to become the nonprofit's COO at half her consulting salary. Her former colleagues thought she'd lost her mind. Her family worried about her financial future. But Kate had discovered something more valuable than her five-year plan—she'd found her Kingdom assignment.

Three years later, that nonprofit had tripled in size and was transforming communities across multiple states. Kate had trained dozens of marketplace leaders to bring business excellence to Kingdom work. She had more influence in the nonprofit world than she ever would have had as a partner in her consulting firm. And when she looked back at that painful "interruption," she saw it clearly: God hadn't ruined her plan; He'd rescued her from it.

This is Proverbs 16:9 in the marketplace. We plan our course with the best information and intentions we have. But God sees what we can't see and knows what we don't know. When He establishes our steps differently than we planned, it's not because our plans were bad—it's because His plans are better.

The interruption you're facing right now might be the greatest gift of your professional life. The question is: will you fight to preserve your plan, or will you follow God's redirection to something greater?

Reflection

For Your Heart:

Are you holding your career plans so tightly that you can't recognize God's interruptions as invitations?

For Your Work:

What unexpected change or disruption in your professional life might actually be God redirecting you toward a better assignment?

For Your Legacy:

Looking back on your career, when have God's interruptions proven to be His greatest blessings?

This Week's Challenge

Identify one area where your plans have been interrupted or disrupted recently. Instead of fighting to restore your original plan, ask God: "What are You inviting me into through this interruption?" Take one step toward exploring that possibility this week, even if it feels uncertain.

Let's close in prayer.

Heavenly Father,

Forgive me for clinging to my plans so tightly that I miss Your invitations. Give me the humility to recognize that Your interruptions are often Your directions, and the courage to follow when You redirect my steps. Help me trust that You see what I cannot see and are guiding me toward assignments greater than I could plan for myself.

In Jesus' name, Amen.