The Path
The sovereignty of God
is, sometimes, a hard thing to accept.
We would like to think that He rewards good behavior and years of
service with worldly gifts and that He punishes bad behavior and dereliction of
duty with a withholding of them, but He does
not. The truth of the matter is that
there are shortcuts to be
had, and many of them pay off. They
yield “pots of gold” that aren’t to be found along the path of God’s way.
But, at what cost do these… “pots of gold” come? They serve only to lead one further and yet
further from the path of God’s way. And, what of those who stay on the path of God’s way? Do they not have it easy following God’s way?
Not necessarily so. Some die a
martyr’s death. Many live lives of
poverty. They are ridiculed for adhering
to the confines of “The Path” as it meanders through lavish wide-opened spaces,
apparently for no reason whatsoever.
Those who line “The Path” or who have left it to… “take a shortcut”
sneer at those who adhere to it, “Hey, idiot, why don’t you just come this
way? The grass is lush and green. The ground is solid, smooth, and level. There’s no
reason to stay on that silly path and walk way around, nearly in a circle, over
there just to get over here. Come
on! This way’d save you fifty, a hundred, or even a thousand steps. Come on!
Take the shortcut!”
So, thinking to
yourself, “You know, he’s right,” you take that short cut. You take those company office supplies home for personal use. Besides, they owe it to you. You look a
little longer than you “need” to at that girl as she walks away. You eat that extra helping of food… because
it’s so good and you
deserve a little luxury. You take a
friend’s prescription medicine because you’ve no time to go to the doctor,
it’ll save you some money, and, besides, you’ve done a thorough analysis of your condition and have determined that
you do have the exact, same medical condition and situation as your friend. The “doctor’s” always right. You convince yourself
that there is no reason to… stay
on that silly little path and go a thousand steps out of the way, when you
yourself can see that it just goes right over there, a mere step or
two from where you now stand.
Well, as you are
crossing over the lush, green grass, you notice something else. You, temporarily, abandon your “walk” to go
and check it out. Having done so, you
console yourself to return to “The Path” when you run into some old friends who
tell you of a neat little pool at the bottom of a waterfall that they are going to go take a dip into. This sounds inviting, so you partake. I mean, it’s a hot day, you’ve been faithfully
“walking”, and surely God wouldn’t mind if you took a little dip in a cool pool on such a
hot day, right? As your dip ends and you
say farewell to your friends, they invite you to a barbecue. “Uh, well,” you begin.
“Come on!” they
insist. “We ain’t seen you in forever;
besides, you gotta eat something, don’t you?”
“Yea. I guess you’re right.” So, off you go… again. Six or seven beers later, an old girlfriend
arrives, and boy, is she looking good
these days. You get to talking to her,
and before you know it, you’re lost on
Of course, not all those who take shortcuts wind up in such a
fix. Just those who awaken and realize that they’ve…
gotten off the path of God’s way. Many a time, shortcutters never awaken to
feel the weight of “what they’ve done” burdening them – urging them back to
“The Path”. Instead they allow the weight of their guilt
to push them further and yet further from the path of God’s way. These… “unlucky dreamers” stay lost in a
drunken stupor, roaming from one “lucky” find to the next – one happenstance to
the next. Their lives become… directionless though they might not be eventless or…
rewardless. These events – these rewards
though are like the “rewards” of cheese in a mousetrap. They serve only as bait to lure their victims
into a false sense of security before the “Snap!” occurs.
Sometimes, though,
there is no “Snap!” Those who successfully negotiate the trap
without springing it are lured into an even deeper sense of security. They, mistakenly think
that… “the gods are smiling upon them” for they… “got away with the cheese and didn’t get caught.” Though some rats may learn to steal the
cheese without tripping the trap, they’re still rats. They’re still gonna live a rats life, and
they’re still gonna die a rat’s death.
The only difference is that one “rat” is just wandering around, lost, in the wilderness just over the rise from the path of God’s way, and the other “rat” is feeding on the
crumbs left alongside “The Path”.
So, why stay on the path of God’s way? Why not just strike out
across the lush, green grass and go your own way? After all, there’s no guarantee of an easy
time or “pots of gold” along the path of God’s way. Things look, all in all,
the same whether you follow Him or whether you
follow your own way and “roam
from one lucky find to the next – one happenstance to the next.” So, why stay on… the path of God’s way? Why stay on the road, when the terrain is
such that it’d be just as easy to
“drive” from one point to another across the grass and save yourself some time,
distance, and “gas money”?
Heaven, my friends,
really is a choice. There is
little difference between the lush, green fields and the path of God’s way that meanders through them save this: “There is no meaning in life
as one picks his way ‘from one lucky find to the next – one happenstance to the
next’. Life is a directionless jumble of
gluttonous times of plenty, or it is a directionless wandering of want. There is neither less want nor more times of
plenty along the path of God’s way. There’s neither less pain nor more pleasure,
but there is one thing that God can give us as we adhere to His path that no path of our own can ever give us,
and that is… direction.
There is a sense of
accomplishment, of purpose, and meaning that comes with the meandering path of God’s way.
It cannot be explained. It must
be experienced, and the only way to experience it is to walk it. So, take your shortcuts. Go find your “pots of gold”. Save yourself those fifty, hundred, or a
thousand steps, and when you tire of your wasted wanderings in the wilderness, whether rich or whether poor, you come. Join those who walk the
silly path of God’s way and see if you don’t find what you’ve always searched for – direction, meaning, and a sense of purpose!
The Eternity...
there is no “End” to... “The Path”