The Work of God Along the Way

Greetings All,

Part of my morning devotionals as of late, which has been less than regular if there is any appropriate description due to my failure to find my new routine, has been reading a book by Eugene Peterson (author of The Message) called The Jesus Way: A Conversation on the Ways that Jesus is the Way.  It has been, as expected when you read Peterson, an excellent, enlightening and inspiring book.  This morning's chapter was about David and there was a paragraph that really struck me and I wanted to share it with y'all.  It comes from page 97 and reads as follows:

"The long and short of it is that there is a lot more going on on the way than getting to a destination.  And there is a lot more going on on the way than what we are doing.  There is what God is doing.  Which is why we "wait for the Lord."  We stop, whether by choice or through circumstance, so that we can be alert and attentive and receptive to what God is doing in and for us, in and for others, on the way.  we wait for our souls to catch up with our bodies.  Waiting for the Lord is a large part of what we do on the way because the largest part of what takes place on the way is what God is doing, what God is saying.  Much of the time, disabled or enervated by sin, we can't do what must be done, so we wait for God to do it in us.  Much of the time, we don't know what to do, so we wait until we understand what God commands us to do.  The waiting is not just an indolent "waiting around."  We wait "for the morning, " which is to say that we wait in hope.  We wait while we are being "ransomed, healed, restored, forgiven."  We wait for God to do what we cannot do for ourselves "in the depths."  When he has done it, we are once more on the way."

I loved reading this passage this morning as it reminded me that while we are walking on this path that is our Christian lives, keeping our eyes on Jesus, striving to live in ways that makes it easy for others to believe in Him, we must never forget that we walk this path not in our own power but in the power of God.  It is not a path of pulling up our boot straps and toughing it out in our own power and resources to try and accomplish what we think God wants, rather it is a cooperative journey that God allows us to participate in and on which He does all of the heavy lifting.  It is not what we are doing on the way, rather what He is doing.  We put one foot in front of the other, being faithful and obedience, He has the job of accomplishing.  Let us never forget that on "the way" that is life in Christ that we must never sprint ahead of where God is at work in us, with us and through us.

Your brother in Christ,
Faron