The Rev. Dr. Clay Smith: Schedule ...

My life runs by the schedule. There are things I can't change, like Sunday coming every seven days. I have meetings, lunches and appointments throughout the week. If my assistant, Kelly, ever turns against me, I am toast.

Interruptions happen, of course. When someone dies, you can't say, "Sorry, I have a meeting at that time." You move things around and make it work. If a crisis occurs and takes up two days of your time, people still expect a fresh word from God on Sunday.

Mine is not the kind of job where I can say on a whim, "I'm going to take a few days off, starting tomorrow." I must arrange for someone else to preach, cancel or reschedule meetings and block out time on the calendar well in advance.

I realize most people live this way; I am no one special. Like many of you, I have returned from vacation to find work piled up. I feel like I work more hours the week before and after vacation than in "normal" weeks. Sometimes, I think, "Why bother taking time off?"

Because I manage our family ranch as a side gig, I must make regular trips to Florida to check on things, to check in with people and to work cows. I made this trip recently, intending to work cows with a crew we had lined up two months in advance.

The ranch has received a lot of rain recently. It had been dry, but now everything was muddy. It was supposed to rain on the day we were to work cows. Several folks asked, "Are you going to work cows as wet as it is?" I had moved my schedule around, made space in my life and flown down to work cows, so yes, by golly, we were going to work cows as long as the water wasn't over their heads. We drove around the pasture in my rental Jeep and made it through most places just fine. I thought we'd be OK. Then it started raining again.

Maturity, I think, is realizing you are not the smartest person around. Maturity means listening to people who might know a little more than you do.

Greg, our cow crew gatherer, advisor and wise man about cattle, called me Monday afternoon. He had gone over to the pasture to see how things looked. His heavier pickup truck had gotten stuck at the second gate. I know what this meant: a heavy truck, pulling a gooseneck trailer full of calves, would not make it out. If we worked cows, we would have to hook a tractor up to the truck and pull everything through the mud. Not a good scenario.

Greg said, "Clay, I think if we work cows tomorrow, we will wind up tearing up a piece of equipment, or killing a cow, or getting somebody hurt." I told him I was willing to risk his body if he was. He was silent for a second before I could explain I was joking. We agreed the wiser thing to do was to call it off. I admit I was bummed. I had rearranged my entire week to come down, and now the main reason I was there wasn't going to happen.

The next morning, I woke up to thunder and heavy rain. If we had worked cows, we would have been out in it. The mud wasn't getting wetter, but it was getting deeper. We couldn't have worked calves with the ground that muddy, and I was sure we would have a rodeo getting cows to do what we wanted them to do in this weather.

John Chancellor, the former anchor of the NBC Nightly News, once said, "If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans." That is why James, the brother of Jesus, told us to say, "We will go to town tomorrow if the Lord wills." This led to the old expression, "The good Lord willing …"

What did I do instead? I took care of some paperwork I had put off. I went to the insurance agency to persuade them my brother and sister really were dead. I visited with some relatives and had some good conversations. I stopped in the Pioneer Restaurant (where the elite meet to eat) and ran into half of the cow crew. I bought their lunch. I celebrated my cousin's anniversary. It was not the day I had planned, but it was a good day.

When God interrupts your schedule, remember to ask, "What do you want me to do now, Lord?" God always has some ideas about how you should handle interruptions, crises and vacant time. Remember, nothing catches him by surprise.

That is a good place to start, even if our schedule is full for the day. Pray this: "Lord, this day is a gift. Nothing that happens will surprise you. Please show me what to do. Lead me to rest. I give you my stress."

Maybe this prayer will help you never to feel behind schedule.

The Rev. Dr. Clay Smith is the lead pastor of Alice Drive Baptist Church in Sumter. Email him at claysmith@adbc.org.