When I was a little boy, we used to go to Kennywood Park, just across the river from our home in McKeesport, which is in the Pittsburgh, Pa Metro Area. I don't remember the name of it, but one of my favorite rides was a car you got in and it went around a curvy track. The great thing about it was that you could actually steer the car and keep it from hitting and bouncing off the sides of the track. On the other hand, if you let go of the wheel the car would just bounce back and forth between the railings of the track.
Life is like that. Be intentional and allow Jesus to steer then we travel a straight course. Take the "I'll-take-my-chances," hands off approach, and we are just like that little car, literally "banging off the walls."
Life is like that. Be intentional and allow Jesus to steer then we travel a straight course. Take the "I'll-take-my-chances," hands off approach, and we are just like that little car, literally "banging off the walls."
"The wilderness," was not God's intention for the Jews. "They wandered in the wilderness," because, as the previous Psalm tells us, "they... rebelled by the sea." The Hebrews could have taken a straight course to the Land of Promise. Instead, they let go of the "wheel," and, "wandered," back and forth, "in the wilderness."
Every time I go through the Bible I see this principle at work: God has given humanity a lot of leeway in our sojourn. Just look at life around you and you see an abundance of ungodly, "banging-off-the-walls" activity. When we rebel, we are like that little car bouncing back and forth against life, or, as the Jews in our text, just going down one wrong path after another. Yet the faithfulness of our Lord Jesus Christ is like that railed track. Every redeemed soul should be thankful that even though we bounce back and forth in our self-will, as we look back on our lives we see the "Railing" of God. He has not allowed us or the nations to go completely off "track." And to those who, as the prodigal, "came to himself," the amazing grace of Father is revealed, "Then they cried out to the LORD in their trouble, and He delivered them out of their distresses. And He led them forth by the right way, that they might go to a city for a dwelling place."
Father, in Jesus' Name, my self-will has too often taken me to the "edge." Thank You for keeping me. Amen.
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Unreached Peoples: www.apfunreachedpeoples.blogspot.com
"Nuclear Iran...Past...Point of No Return: www.apf327.blogspot.com
When Peter, an 18 year old Norwegian, "heard the call to evangelize China, on that day he not only emptied his wallet into the collection plate, but included a small note with the words, 'and my life.'"
"Looking unto Jesus"
Hebrews 12:2
