Divine Guidance
Dr. John K. Mathew
A traveler in Africa complained to his guide,' there is no road, no path in this jungle'. We have lost our way.
The guide replied, "There is no way. I am the way.".
Our Lord is the Way. God does not furnish us with a detailed road map. The Scripture says, "You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will take me into glory" (Psalm 73:24).
Paul's travel to Philippi was a shift from his original plan and purpose. After visiting the churches he had founded, Paul tried to enter new territory for the Lord by traveling east into Asia Minor and Bithynia, but the Lord closed the door. Everything had been going so smoothly on this second journey that these closed doors must have come as a great surprise.
In His sovereign grace, God led Paul west, into Europe, not East into Asia. In the words of Warren Wiersbe, "It is interesting to speculate how world history might have been changed had Paul been sent to Asia instead of to Europe"
Martin Luther said, I know not the way he leads me, but well do I know my Guide. God's plans are mysterious and are different from ours. But his plans are better for us in the present and the future.
How sweet are these lines of Barbara Ryberg.
"He does not lead me year by year,
Nor even day by day.
But step by step my path unfolds: My Lord directs my way,
Tomorrow's plan I do not know, I only see this minute;
But he will only say, 'This is the way, By faith now. walk ye in it'.
When God draws a bigger picture of our future, He changes our plans and directions which leads to conflict of interest. That was what happened in the lives of the Israelites in the wilderness. It took forty years for them to cross the Jordan.
It has been an easy pass over of a few days. The Lord's guidance is the best direction in our lives.
May it be so in the lives of all of us. "He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside quiet waters". (Psalm 23:2).
