The other day I was on my way to see a friend and thought about a passage from the Old Testament where God tells a prophet “not to return the same way you came” (1 Kings 13:9). Thinking that was a good idea because of the traffic, I decided to go one way and return another. This little adventure ended up being over 90 miles (we are not talking just around the block here.)
The prophet in the story didn’t follow the instructions to the letter and he was killed, for disobeying the word of the Lord. Now I had no fear of that because this in no way was instruction from the Lord…just something I was doing. Yet I did want the Lord to teach me something from what I was doing.
I thought that I had come up with a plan, but when I started to work it, I realized that I should have used the map and not driven just from memory. Everything came out all right and I was able to complete my trip with out using the same roads twice. But what was I able to learn?
The first thing: when we are traveling we need a plan and a good map. It’s like the Christian life. When we start on our journey we need to know where we are headed and how to get there. The Bible is the best map to have. It’s something we need to learn to read for ourselves and not relay on past experiences to make the trip.
Second: when we make this trip, don’t always do the same things over and over again (as that is a bore) and don’t go back to where you have been before. You miss so much that way.
When we are on life’s journey we are not to go back to the ways we lived before. There is so much out there to enjoy...why would we even want to?
Last of all, and most important, I was on a mission and completed it with success. As we travel through life following the Lord and His leading, when we come to the end it will be a great success when we hear “Well done my good and faithful servant.”
