Life is a walk. Each day we take steps. Our tomorrow
is determined by the steps we take today.
Everyday we are learning to walk with our
Heavenly Father. He wants us to reach up and take His hand, but He doesn't want
us to ever let go. In fact, His desire that we become more and more dependent
upon Him for every step. That's because He wants to take us to places we've
never been. To heights we cant even imagine. In order to do that, we have to go
through the low valleys, treacherous mountains, rough terrain and narrow paths
of life--places where we could easily get lost or off the track. And there is
definitely no way we can just head off on our own and expect to arrive safely.
We will never know the joy of true freedom until we understand we cannot take a
single step without His help.
But its up to us to take the first step. If
we don't, we will never learn to walk with Him. We can be so afraid of
taking a wrong step that we fail to take any step at all.
God didn't part the waters of the Jordan River for the Israelites
until they first put their feet in the water [Joshua 3:15-16]. That's because
God always requires the first step to be ours. In order to take that first
step, we must look into the face of God, reach up to take His hand, and say,
"Lead me in the path You have for me, Lord. From this day on I want to
walk with You. I take this step of faith and I trust You to meet me here. Align
my heart with Yours."
Once you've taken that first step, God will
show you other steps to take. He will teach you how to walk in the light of His
truth, revelation and love. You'll discover ways to avoid the things that
separate you from Him and all He has for you. You'll learn to walk away from
fear, depression, condemnation, loneliness, loss, unforgiveness and disappointment.
You'll understand what it means to walk through the dark times of your life
with the comfort of His presence as your only light.
I know what it's like to walk without His
light. Before I born again as a Christian, I wandered around in a confusion of
drugs, alcohol, occult, practices, unhealthy relationships, trying to find an
escape from the emotional pain I endured daily. I was desperately struggling to
live, but was moving closer to death with every decision I made and step I
took. I experienced it all, but nothing worked and I became desperate. As I
carefully planned my suicide, I knew I didn't really want to die. But
I couldn’t live with the pain anymore, and I had no other way to stop it.
A close friend saw my hopelessness and showed
me that I had been crying out for love, acceptance, purpose, fulfillment, peace
and joy, and that these things could only be found in one place. When I prayed,
"Jesus, come into my heart. Forgive me for not living Your way and lead me
on the path You have for me," I knew I had found that place. It was at His
feet. I felt hope for the very first time. It was the initial and pivotal step
on a journey that would transform my life.
No matter how far away from God you've gone,
when you surrender your life to the Lord, a path is carved from where you are
to where you are supposed to be, and He puts you on it.
This is the miracle of His power. If the path
you've been on is crooked, He will make it straight. If you are headed in the
wrong direction, He will turn you around. If you are going around in circles,
He will correct your course and cause you to arrive at your destination. The
simple act of giving your life to Him will immediately put you in the correct
path and aim you in the right direction.
The moment i made that decision, I felt a
major course-correction happen. I didn't know where I was headed, but
I saw a light at the end of the long, dark tunnel of my life and I started
going toward it, away from the life I had known. The road was not smooth and I
fell a number of times, not because God let go of me, but because I let go of
Him. But every time I reached out for His hand, He was always there
to help me get back up and on the path again.
God wants us to depend on Him for every
breath that we take.
Learning to walk with God is a process. And just when we
think we have it all figured out, God leads us into a new place where our old
tricks won’t work. In fact, it may seem like we're learning how to walk all
over again. And in a way we are. We enter unfamiliar territory and are soon
reminded that, on our own, we stumble. Yet when we take His hand, we fly! God
wants us to soar far above the limitations of our lives and ourselves. He wants
to take us to a place we have never been before and can’t get to from where we
are without His help.
If you have been walking with God for some
time and you suddenly feel like your life has come to a
halt, don't be alarmed. Most likely, God is adjusting your way.
Having God correct your course doesn't necessarily mean the one
you were on was incorrect. But it does mean that something needs to change to
get you headed in the direction God wants to take you. And
it doesn't matter how young or old you are. As long as you are
breathing, God will have new paths for you to take and exciting things for you
to do. It’s best to trust His leading and get on with it. This is what a walk
of faith is all about!!
So, when God telling you to move in a certain
direction, let me give you two words of advice: DO IT!
Refusing to walk according to God's leading will get you
nowhere. Oh, you will arrive some place all right, but if it is not where God
wants to bless you, it will still be nowhere.
It doesn't matter what your
situation is at this moment. Wherever you are God has a path for you that is
filled with good things. Draw close to Him and you'll find it. Say, "Show
me the way in which i should walk and the thing I should do" [Jeremiah
42:3]. He will do that and, if you carefully follow as He guides you, He will
not let you get off the path. With each step He will reveal more of Himself.
"Your ears shall hear a word behind you saying, "This is the ways,
walk in it" [Isaiah 30:21]. So reach up right now and take God's hand. He
promises He won’t let you fall.
(some quotations are from Stormie Omartian)