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The Highway of Life
I desire that my life “go somewhere.” In fact, when I feel
like I’m not progressing, I have a torrent of emotions that arise within me. I
feel shame and anger, lust (the intense desire in the body for knowledge and
delight), which increases my desire to do something. Often negative thoughts about
others, what others have done to me in the past, present or future, fill the
planning center of my mind as the lack of something “good to do” is being
filled by simply “something to do.” In a
nutshell, if I don’t know what God’s will is for me to do, I fill my “to do”
list with whatever arises. I don’t always act on those items, but I am mindful
of the list and actively ponder it.
So, why wouldn't God simply keep me mindful of His will day
by day? Why should we even need to pray for His will to be done? Why would God
allow road blocks, confusion or hindrances to His will into our lives? What
does Romans 8:31 mean if it doesn’t mean all our enemies are as nothing? I
included the Greek so you can offer your own translation, if you desire. By the
way, I don’t think it means “all our enemies are as nothing.”
What then shall we say to these
things? If God is for us, who is against us? Rom
8:31 NASB
ει ο θεος υπερ ημων
τις καθ ημων
I made a short video as a part of my process of understanding
myself and life. For the most part I am a “one way” guy. I think, see myself,
as mainly having one way of dealing with life issues. I know I have a few
others skills, a few ways to try and connect with others. But, when stress or fatigue
is heightened, I resort to a more primitive way of living; I just do what I “naturally”
do. Reverting back to my basic and natural way of dealing with things is not
always Godly. You can watch the video and see some of the options on life’s
highway or you can “get it” just by reading on.
When we are headed for a “road block” we have a varietyof
options. God uses all these options for His good and glory. We are tasked with
working through the process in the Godly hope of gaining wisdom, character and
spiritual intelligence. To walk through the process I asked myself a few
questions.
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| Click to go to video |
Question 1, What are
the different ways we deal with obstacles in the road of life? This is my short list, there are more but I used
a “box” as my mental image to help me ponder the issue. If I had used a 12
sided polygon, I would have more.
- · To, toward
- · From, after
- · Above
- · Under
- · In
- · Aside to Compete
- · Aside to Compare
Question 2, What role do people play in our journey? Once
again I oversimplified the matter by choosing only three, the “flower” who
watches, the “barrier” who tries to stop us and the “assistant” who seeks to
help us. I understand that the same person could do all three for us at any one
event in our lives, but because my mind already had 7 other things to ponder
limiting this list to three was “redneck beneficial.”
Question 3, and the goal of the consideration, “What is God
doing?”
Go with me on a little side trip. It is 1975 and I am in a
truck slipping through the Black Hills on a hunting trip with my Dad and
brother. What is truer, is that we should be hunting but what we are actually doing
is “driving around” looking for deer. Dad is in the control panel, in more ways
than one, if you get my drift. He is driving very appropriately for dry roads
and high visibility. The only problem is that the roads are covered in ice, and
it is snowing heavily. We are on a decent and headed toward a sharp curve. I
tried to find the exact corner on Google maps and paste it into this section,
but I got lazy and stopped searching. I inserted a random picture of the area,
hoping it would add some pleasure to the reader and not offend those who
actually know the spot I am talking about.
But back to the truck, the road, the ice and snow, and more
importantly, what God is doing. What God is doing is actively, as lovingly as
possible, as wise and is divinely able, working in the lives of people so that
His kingdom comes to earth through the transformation of people. In the case of
the truck that day, God was working in the driver and the passengers, leading
everyone involved into new dimensions of understanding that God supplies all we
need for life and Godliness.
seeing that His divine power has
granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true
knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence. 2Pe 1:3
NASB
What unfolded next was my Dad going “in” the box. Dad was
going to go through this situation, not able to skirt it. The event would
surround his emotions, activity and mindset. Dad was going to get surrounded by
the event. Ricky, who we now call Rick because of his increased maturity, was
going to go to the side, as was I. Rick was going to go on the comparing side,
the side that judges the actions of the others by what they could do, by their own
thoughts about what they could do or could have done. I was going on the other
side, the side of competing. Maybe it was because I was close to the steering
wheel and naturally felt (not all of my natural feelings are good, remember)
that I should take over, take the wheel. Competing with Dad for the steering
wheel resulted in another road block (box). Now we had the accident and the
issues of “who’s in control,” “who’s supposed to shut up and go along for the ride,”
“who’s going to be responsible now that they intervened?”
Time does not permit me to go on and tell of the others 15
to 20 some boxes that we approached that day. It is enough to say that life is
like dominoes stacked neatly in order until someone bumps the table. You can
blame the fall for the one who bumper the table or the one who stacked them on
the table in the first place, it all depends on how you approach that box.
The point I was to arrive at today is that God uses our
daily life as His tool for discipleship. We so often forget that. We also
forget that we have a verity of ways to approach the boxes of life. God is
seeking to develop us fully, into people who can handle a things according to
His will and not our basic nature. I am going to supply a like to DallasWillard’s “Golden Triangle” so those who desire can “study on.”
Here are the takeaways for today.
- 1. My life is how God is discipling me. God is not fixing my life; He is fixing me and using my life to do it.
- 2. God wants me to have a verity of ways of going through the road blocks of life. The development of a verity of ways empowers me to connect and minister to others. If I remain small in my approach to life’s events, I remain small in my ability to help others. My growth is not for me alone, it is for God’s good.
Hay, you may not know it but Jesus and Baseball is a great book on daily life and discipleship.
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