You don’t have to see to the unforeseen when you serve a God who sees it all.

I like to say that I’m not a “paralyzed worrier,” but a “prepared worrier.” I’ve spent a lot of time planning for things most people never even think about.

Fire plans
Husband dying plans
Child dying plans
Burglar plans
Job loss plans
“Anyone I care about dying” plans

Really, for almost every conceivable scenario—even those so remote they’re rated at less than 0.01% chance of occurring—I have a plan. (And yes, of course I have the stats to back that up.)

Living Through the Unforeseen

The truth is, I’ve lived through a tragedy or two. I’ve been exposed to the unforeseen time and again. And when you’ve been blindsided like that, it plants seeds of anxiety in you. Suddenly, you start striving to “see it all” so you can “avoid it all”… or at least not be caught off guard.

Your mind never stops racing.

Devastating surprises leave you with one resolution: I never want to experience that again. The shock. The panic. The desperate, out-of-control, “please-God-don’t-let-this-be-true” kind of moment. You subconsciously decide that to never be shocked again, you’ll never be caught unaware.

So you prepare. And prepare. And prepare. If “it” happens, you’ll have seen it coming, you won’t be blindsided, and you’ll know just what to do. You believe it will somehow hurt less if you’re not caught off guard. And deep down, you convince yourself that if you prepare well enough, maybe—just maybe—you can stop the bad stuff from happening in the first place.

When Life Revolves Around Fear

That’s when your life begins to wrap itself around examining, predicting, and preventing every imaginable hurt to yourself and the people you love most.

We have an innate desire to protect ourselves from brokenness. But here’s what I’ve realized upon reflecting on every “unforeseen” I’ve ever endured: the God who sees all had already prepared the way.

He placed people, circumstances, and provision right in the middle of those events so that—even in the depths of brokenness—I would never be broken beyond repair.

“Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?” — Matthew 6:26–27

The Reality of Worry

Here’s the fact: every shock I’ve encountered was never the one I had planned for.

And no tragedy I’ve meticulously planned for has ever actually happened.

How much joy has been stolen in all that anxiety? How many moments have I missed out on—robbed from my family, avoided altogether, or wasted—because I was fretting over the multitude of things that never came to pass?

Has my anxiety, terror, and preparation added one single moment to my life? Or to the lives of my loved ones?

God Already Sees What We Cannot

I don’t have to prepare ahead for every conceivable emergency or disaster. The unforeseen is always in plain sight to God. And no matter what happens, He is already there—fully present, fully prepared, and fully equipped with His perfect provision.

He always has been. He always will be.

And that’s not only true for me—it’s true for you, too.