Devotional: The Straight Path

Okay…so this may be a long one and maybe a confusing one because I’m using the post to process out some things that God has been showing me.  I’m excited because I sense that as I write He will make this clear to me and am in faith feeling prompted that maybe these words will also give clarity to one of you out there!  Or it might totally confuse you and make you think; that’s meditation which we are also called to do (be in places where it’s not clear and we have to figure it out) so either way it’s a win-win!

 

God is so symbolic.  I love that part about Him.  Often in my faith He has used earthly symbols to teach me things about myself and Him.  It’s ironic that I’ve been called the Holy Bloodhound as a nickname and then the dog God gave me last November is a hound.  She gets her nose on the ground and when she’s on the trail, watch out…she won’t be paying attention to much other than the trail.  I so get that way!  This strong instinct of her’s can really get her into trouble (she likes to get into trash when she can).  So a picture of me and sin’s pull on us.  But this post is not really about that but it sets up my whole experience  today.

 

So God sent me on a trail.  Because I have that trail following instinct I’m determined to stay on the path until I find the truth He is sending me after.  Many women over the years have asked how I hear from God.  I love the word because He speaks to me through it.  Here is my randomized attempt to show what He showed me and how I am hearing from him.

 

Right now I am in a time of refining.  A month ago I felt God tell me to look for a new job.  This is strange because I’m feeling settled and happy.  I have a great schedule, I love my teaching partner and teammates, the principal is very supportive, wonderful families.  Truly a wonderful place to be everyday.  Talented staff I’m proud  to work with and learn from.  It seemed against all odds that I got a job there as there were so many applicants and I didn’t have a strong professional network there (could be a whole other post there as well!) yet God’s mighty hand was in it.  I know I was there to be a light and witness and learn to have security in Him.  First grade!  Those that know me understand that I enjoy the bigger kids and have always worked with older students.  What a lesson to be more fun, creative, and flexible.  They are loud and squirrely.  Basically, I had to learn deeply that I can’t control others.  There is this great song by JJ Heller that describes how control is such a false idol.  A lyric from the song that speaks to me is “The cut is deep, but never deep enough for me, it doesn’t hurt enough to make me forget.  One moment of relief is never long enough to keep the voices in my head from stealing my peace.”  This year I’ve sensed a subtle shift of learning these lessons in the deep places through my job.  Though I was prepared to teach, I always had  low grade anxiety.  Part of that was rooted in false beliefs I had acquired at the first school I ever taught at, which was a rough place.  There was one particular staff member that ingrained in me that a “good teacher” would be able to make her students behave.  Now a good teacher has great management, which I’ve been told by every principal that I do, but I can’t ever control anyone else.  Yet I always felt that it was possible, a total lie from the pit!  I think a big thing for me in moving on is learning that I can’t and shouldn’t control people and that my self-worth is not tied up in my job performance, it’s leaning much more heavily on my identity in Christ.  Simultaneously, the place I work has become increasingly hostile to my faith and wondering if my time of influence there is fading. 

 

So a long way to say that I don’t know why but God has a reason.  Yet the bloodhound in me is always looking for the why in everything so off I go on this trail.

 

Sitting down to pray today, knowing I need to spend time with Him but somehow trying to avoid it because I know it’s going to be hard work and cut a little.  Ever do that? I finally decide, ok time to get busy and hear from Him.  Be still enough to listen.

 

I start out with my bible study in Job (which is posted weekly on this site).  Then I felt to get into a deeper place of prayer I might need to use Kenneth Boa’s book Face to Face: Praying the Scriptures for Intimate Worship.  Great resource to guide prayer!

 

Hebrews 12:10-13 just jumped out at me: For they (fathers) disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but He disciplines us for our good, so that we may share His holiness.  All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.  Therefore, strengthen the hands that are weak and the knees that are feeble.

 

The place I am stuck in is uncomfortable because I don’t feel peace but am longing for it.  So blessed in His promise that LATER ON I will feel that peace but I’m in the right place right now.  The discomfort  that trials bring is because we aren’t to get to comfortable, this isn’t our home. 

 

Now to figure out my part in it, the last verse…so here is where I went pretty much straight out of my journal:

 

Hands-used for working and doing

 

Knees-moving forward

 

Path- where I go, a straight path will not disable me

 

One of my limbs is lame and God wants to train me because (in greater context of the passage) I am a true, legitimate daughter and dearly loved!  This is like physical therapy but a spiritual workout instead. 

 

So my questions at this point are how to strengthen and what’s a straight path?

 

I started by looking up the greek and it blew me away.  What I had thought went deeper and in different directions.  So humbled!

 

·         Weak Hands-not my hands but God’s might in power regarding my destiny, the hands that are weak are ones that let go

 

·         Feeble Knees- These knees are week from relaxing the nerves that are used to being so tight.  These knees are not for moving (going forward like I had assumed) but are knelt down, submitting in a state of uncertain affinity

 

·         Strengthen-literally straighten, to make erect set up, rear up, build anew (so has something fallen that I need to rebuild?)

 

·         Straight-not crooked, upright, erect (seems to be high and tall not long)

 

·         Path-a rut in the path made by a wheel of constant use

 

·         Feet-not walking but get this, sitting at the feet of a teacher

 

·         Lame-deprived of a foot, not a hurt foot like I thought, but without one, so  must be deprived of listening

 

·         Out of joint- twisted so much that you turn away or dismiss something

 

·         Healed-wholeness, free from sin, purified

 

So what does this mean for me today and for you as you seek to follow the Lord though the times of the shadow?  When I studied this verse and the richness of the meanings of all the words,  I think the God is telling me that I’m not completely trusting in Him for this new thing He will do.  The limb that is out of joint is my faith.  I need to submit to His plan for me and not work so hard to make it come about.  That I need to submit to the feeling of unease and unknowing and bring the truth to mind that He knows, He is there, He is mighty to bring me where He wants, when He wants, and how He wants. 

 

So I am at a fork in the road.  One way is straight and won’t disable my faith, another is a path where I will be in charge.  His way is straight because it leads to one thing, His perfect plan for me where He is with me the whole way.  Another is hard, empty walking where I am doing it along on weak limbs who will become disable if I keep on pushing.

 

As for me, I will choose the path with God.  When the fears come about not knowing where I am going, I will remember Abraham and just go.  Let me not be like our father Abraham who worked so hard to make the promises of God come to pass that he slept with his wife’s maid and told kings Sarah was his sister!  May I know that He who does a new thing is faithful to compete it. 

 

For faithful is He who calls you and He also will bring it to pass. 1 Thess 5:24

 

I have peace enough for today because a new perspective, not new circumstances. 

 

For you and me, peace for today enough to get through and keep moving in the dark.  Peace promised for someday after the trial is over.  Peace promised forever when we see Him face to face without end.

 

--Rayna