The Worst-Case Scenario

Is anybody else out there a worst-case scenario thinker?  I don’t mean like a total pessimist-whiner, but just the kind of person who prepares for the worst in a sort of practical way.  It’s not that you expect it to happen necessarily; it’s just that you know what can happen and want to be prepared.

I was schooled to be this way by my dad.  (But he’s different – he does expect the worst to happen.)  My dad feels that anyone who doesn’t think this way is an idiot.  He has tools in his car to break out the windows in case of emergency.  Everywhere he goes, he carries a plastic basket full of various items he may need at any time.  I can't even tell you how many flashlights he has.  So I know to be prepared at all times.  And I think through situations ahead of time to anticipate disasters or emergencies.  I may be dismayed by something going wrong, but I’m rarely surprised.  

Over time, this “thinking ahead” mindset extended to feeling like I needed to be prepared for any eventuality:  any persecution, any sorrow or loss, any torture that may come in the future.

But I decided this was wrong-headed.  I don’t know how any of us can be ready for any of those bad things.  Who can stand to live with all the bad possibilities ever before them?  And doesn’t it cast us into grief and despair ahead of time?  And maybe for nothing?  

God said,  “Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.“  Matthew 6:34   KJV    Or to put it more simply: “So don’t worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today’s trouble is enough for today.”  New Living Translation

Worrying only gives us an illusion of preparing for or preventing bad things.  Instead, we live in what we have today.  I don’t know what may lie ahead for me, but I know that God will equip me or carry me through any bad eventualities.  However, he won’t equip me until I need it.  So I cannot prepare myself emotionally or spiritually for what is not real yet.  He will do that for me when the time comes.  My part is to rest in the assurance of his plan.