PICKING THE RIGHT PATH
Psalm 16:11
"You have made known to me the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand.
Deer season ended two and a half months ago already. In 7 more months it will start up again. This past week my grandson Micah went out and started looking for some shed deer antlers. He had a great few days of shed hunting and it reminded me of 5 or 6 years ago and he and I did some late winter shed hunting. We checked out some trails and bedding areas around one of hunting areas.
We walked through some very thick swampy areas that pulled at your coat sleeves and nearly took my glasses off several times. At one point Micah looked at me and said, "grandpa, this is like the Christian life. When we stay on the right path we do OK, but when we get off the path things becomes very difficult."
There was a lot of wisdom in those words. When we follow the path the God has laid out for us, He takes care of us and watches out for us. When we walk away from the path that he has laid out for our lives that's when we run into the snags and painful situations. The going gets extremely tough.
In Luke 15, we can find the story of a father whose son chooses to leave the path the father has planned for him. The father has hopeful plans for his son, but his son has his own ideas and makes a plan of his own for life. So, the father reluctantly lets his son leave. It's not what the father wants and it hurts him to allow this, but the father also knows that he can't force his son to choose his plans. He knows his son will have to make his own decisions. But still the father hopes his son will choose the path of the father's dreams for him.
Whenever I read this story of the prodigal son, I can just the father standing in front of his home, looking down the road and wondering where his son is and what he's doing. I imagine that his heart literally aches for his son.
Then one night the father's heart rejoices, for a long way off he sees someone approaching. His long lost son has returned! He can't run fast enough to meet and to embrace his son.
This is the story of our heavenly Father and how He loves each of us. There's nowhere we can go that His loving arms cannot reach us and rescue us with His love.
First our Heavenly Father wants us to choose His path in life. But wherever we've wandered from that path, the Father longs for us to return. He's always ready to embrace us with open arms and a heart bursting with love. He has good plans for our lives that can be trusted.
Romans 8:38-39, "For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord."
Have you wandered from the path that your Heavenly Father has chosen for you? We all do at some time in life. Run back to His open arms, He is anxiously awaiting your return.
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