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Sometimes I get the feeling Google Maps is getting a little annoyed with me. She gives me directions, and I’m pretty sure I’m following them. Then the next thing I know, she is correcting me.
“Rerouting,” she says.
The first time she sounds remarkably polite and patient. And the second time too.
But the third time? The fourth? Maybe I am imagining it, but I swear she starts muttering insults by the time I get turned around.
Life can get pretty confusing at times, can’t it? We think we are on the right path, exactly where God wants us to be, and then to our surprise, He interrupts us: “Rerouting.”
That is why I am so glad God gave us his word. It’s the best guide out there for navigating this crazy world.
I once read an amazing story about a woman who knew the truth about the power of God’s Word to lead the way during the darkest and most confusing of times. She was a missionary, and she had been imprisoned in one of the brutal Japanese prisoner of war camps during World War II. When the war finally ended and the Japanese concentration camp gates swung open, the newly liberated prisoners slowly began walking away from brutality so severe they no longer had the strength even to lift their heads.
Except for one person. Her face was still vibrant and alive. The spirit of this woman, the missionary, had endured because she had a secret weapon: a contraband copy of the Gospel of John. Each night, with her blanket pulled over her head, she risked death by reading a small passage by flashlight and memorizing it. Once she committed a page to memory, she sneaked it to the bathhouse and let water run on it until it dissolved down the drain. She ended up memorizing the entire gospel, and God’s Word guided her through the darkness of those bitter years of suffering to the freedom awaiting her on the other side of the prison gate.
I pray you haven’t suffered such harsh circumstances and never will, but I hope you have experienced the guiding power of God’s Word in your life. So many times over the years, God has spoken to me by bringing scripture to mind. Each time it happens, I am so thankful I’ve spent time in his Word, reading and rereading certain passages until I have committed them to memory.
I also treasure the comfort and strength God brings through memorized Scripture when I can’t sleep and my heart is troubled. On many nights I have drifted off to sleep by going through the scriptures stored in my mind. Like the psalmist, I have found that when my “soul is weary with sorrow,” God will “strengthen me according to [his] word” (Psalm 119:28).
One of the greatest gifts you can ever give yourself is to hide God’s Word in your heart. He is forever speaking through his Word to bring comfort and strength to your soul.
So don’t worry too much about the moments when life gets confusing, and you hear God whisper his words of “rerouting” to your heart. Just stay close to his word. It is full of solid direction for your life. The destination is just ahead.
Five Minutes in the Word
The Lord went before them by day in a pillar of cloud to lead the way, and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light, so as to go by day and night. He did not take away the pillar of cloud by day or the pillar of fire by night from before the people. Exodus 13:21–22 NKJV
You, Lord, keep my lamp burning; my God turns my darkness into light. Psalm 18:28
The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. John 1:5
By your words I can see where I’m going; they throw a beam of light on my dark path. Psalm 119:105