Keep OFF the Beaten Path!

Time to go to work… hop into the car and go! Shopping with the kids… into the SUV and away we go! Planning a visit with the in-laws in the next town is no problem, thirty-five miles is an easy drive, right? Some new pants and a blouse or two is just a quick hop over to Stuff-Mart. Life goes on, same as always.

All our day-to-day traveling needs, regardless of destination, involve transit upon streets and highways. We are very comfortable with this arrangement, so comfortable, in fact, that we often feel we could travel these roadways blindfolded.

If it were not for these wonderful streets and freeways, we would have to blaze new paths every time we needed to go somewhere. It is much easier to follow the existing pathways, isn’t it?

Our spiritual lives are very much the same. Doing what God wants us to do, that which we know to be the right thing, involves our blazing new pathways. We have to ignore the smooth, easy, wide thoroughfare that already exists. Many times this easy roadway, the path of sin, is the one we have followed throughout our entire lives. Great or small, we have all sinned, further "improving" the way "that leads to destruction."

What does the Word have to say about this?
MATT 7:13-14 "Enter by the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is easy, that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard, that leads to life, and those who find it are few." rsv

It is too easy to follow sin’s existing path. It is very hard to leave the trail behind and forge a new one where we’ve never gone before. In times of stress it is much easier to follow the familiar roadways.

So… where are we all going? And what are we doing in this hand basket?

I am as guilty as everyone else. Let your guard down just a bit, hard times, poor health, physical or mental pain, and guess what? Back to the old, familiar ways…

Fight the temptation to go the easy way! Get off the road! Search for the narrow path, the one that is difficult to travel. The reward is beyond measure!

See you soon, in Paradise!