Know Where You're Going?

My wife and I like to go for car rides. When we first got married, we’d just take off in the afternoons, alternating who'd get to choose which way to go at intersections. There wasn’t much danger in getting lost as we did this. We were in the Walla Walla Valley in southeastern Washington State, and we could always get our bearings by looking at the Blue Mountains. These form the eastern border of the area. Since the valley is all agricultural, we never had trouble finding the “Blues”.

When we moved to Ohio, where I attended university for my doctorate, we continued our roaming practice, although we had more trouble keeping our bearings. However, I quickly developed a good sense of the placement of major highways, and we never did get lost. We did find ourselves to be quite some distance from home several times, however.

We have sort of continued this practice down through the years, although to a much lesser extent once the children came along. But when they headed off to college, we began it again. Only a few years ago, we took off early one Saturday afternoon, headed sort of northward, partly on Interstate, and partly on side roads. About nine o’clock in the evening, we stopped for gas, and I suggested we’d better head for home. As we took stock of things, we realized we were closer to her sister’s house in Maryland than we were to our house. I will only say that her sister lives a little more than 600 miles from us. After considering the possibilities for a short while, we called her sister and asked her to put the key under the doormat. When you’re not paying close attention to where you’re going, you can get quite a ways from home without too much effort.

There was a Bible character that did pay attention to where he was going. He always had a good guide along with him. One day, after walking for some time with the guide, the Guide said, “Hey, Enoch. We’re a lot closer to my place than yours. Why not come home with Me tonight?”

Of course, that’s probably not exactly how it happened. But the scriptures do say that Enoch walked with God, and God took him (home). Can you imagine knowing God so well that whenever you went out for a walk, He was there to walk with you, ready to converse, ready to teach, ready to be a friend?

But, wait a minute! He is always there, walking with us, ready to converse, ready to teach, ready to be a friend. The problem is that, like my wife and me that day a few years ago, we’re simply not paying attention. All you and I need to do is to desire and acknowledge His presence, and we’ll have a traveling companion for life – both lives in fact: life on this earth and life everlasting. Hard to beat a deal like that!

Would you like to fill ‘er up?

Dr. G