Tuesday, January 4, 2011

Straight Walk

Verse for Today: Tuesday, January 04, 2011
Psalms 107:7 - He led them by a straight way, to a city where they could settle..

The world offers crooked ways for people to attain quick gratification of their desires and plans. But the end of the crooked way is destruction of their souls. While people tread the crooked way, the world will try to give them false hope that they are on the right path. The way will be made very attractive and there will be all sorts of false evidences to prove that it is the right way. But only when the traveler reaches the end of the way, the truth will be revealed to them, and then it will be too late to get back to the right way. Our Lord offers His people the straight and right way to travel on their pilgrimage. There won't be any gimmicks to attract people to His way, but they will be told the truth. Not only that, there are often difficulties also on His way. These difficulties are the tests for the travelers to see to it that they demonstrate faith in order to make progress. But all along the way, tremendous help and support are rendered to the sojourners. The Lord Himself walks with them, and His Spirit indwells in the traveler to guide on the way based on the written Word of God. The Spirit and the Word speak to the conscience of the traveler to show them the way and warn them about possible dangers of detours and shortcuts which are ultimately crooked. But if we do not want to slip away from the straight way, we need to be tuned to the Lord, His Spirit and His Word to receive His guidance. The straight way indicates the way of truth, honesty and integrity to the Lord and His Word. Double minded people cannot travel on the straight way until they correct their motives, priorities and past mistakes through repentance. We need to learn to hold on to the Lord and to lean on to Him as we walk the straight path. Unless we have the desire to follow the path of the cross where our Lord trod, we won't be able to walk the straight way.

Dear friend, are you walking the straight path trod by the Lord? Are you on the way of the cross? It is a way of suffering, persecution, mockery, despising and ridicule. But it is the right way which leads to the right city which is the eternal city of God. Our journey ends when we reach that eternal city whose maker is our Lord Himself. We need to walk relentlessly and totally focused on the city which is our destination. We are not to settle down here on earth, but walk through it. As we walk along, the Lord has made all His resource available for us to meet our mundane needs. He also gives us His peace, grace, mercy and love to fortify us as we walk along. The world will try to distract us from our walk by making us to get entangled with the affairs of this world which is the Vanity Fair. We are tempted to take rest in the temporary asylums of possessions, positions, prestige and prominence which the world offers to slow us down and to pin us to the gains that the world offers us. We are often tempted to make a lot more possessions than we need to live for God's glory, and once we are trapped, we would not know where and when to stop. So we struggle hard to make more and more and slip slowly away from the straight path of faith. But all the while we would probably go on as smart hypocrites with our 'churchianity' so that people would still think that we are spiritual people. But when we slip away from the straight path, the Lord is grieved and so is His Spirit, and we loose our focus and spiritual goals and stop using the spiritual resources God has made available to us. Let us today, come back to the Lord today. Let us examine our ways and get back to the right path so that we will not miss the mark and the city that is prepared for us. Let us renew our commitment to settle down only for the city whose maker is our Lord and let us strive to walk the straight path with Jesus.

Psalms 27:11 - Teach me Your way, O Lord, and lead me in a level path because of my foes.

Thought for Today
The easiest way to tread the straight path is to walk with Jesus on a daily basis.

No comments:

Post a Comment