This Is the Way

On a recent road trip our GPS app suddenly changed our route, suggesting we get off of the interstate. We found ourselves on a state highway with lots of traffic, stopping and starting at the many lights for an extended time. Following its instructions we eventually wound our way through small side streets back to the interstate.

I’m sure you know how we felt. Our original route was fast and easy while the new route was slow and stressful. My companion was sure that we would have been better off ignoring this app and swore to never use it again. But I trusted it and believed there was something worse on the original route than the traffic delay we experienced on the side roads. Why? Because it had proven itself on a previous trip when it rerouted me from the interstate to state highways that took me miles out of the way. The next day I saw an article about a backup on the interstate of several hours caused by a large wreck and was so thankful I had let the app guide me.

Isn’t that how it is with life? We want God to guide us, hoping he’ll keep us on the easy, smooth road. When problems and hardships arise, we wonder if we’ve made a mistake in understanding God’s will. Or we might get angry at him for the hard journey.

Because we can’t see the big picture that he sees, we must trust him that this is the best way forward. The more experience we have following God and seeing him work on the difficult paths, the more likely we are to believe that he leads us the best way to the places he wants to take us. The better we know God and his ways from his story in the Bible, we more easily we recognize his leading.

God knows every route and will guide us as we seek his wisdom for the way forward.