WHERE IN THE WORLD ARE YOU GOING?

Lucy, one of my best friends for four years now, has helped me keep the roads hot between Houston and Mississipi for the past three weeks (has it really been only three weeks since Mike and I gave up teaching our beloved Starting Point class?). We’ve driven down I-10 to see my parents on the Mississippi Coast and we’ve cruised the back roads of East Texas to Jackson, Mississippi to see my grandson, my two older daughters and their husbands.

Lucy isn’t much of a conversationalist, and she never joins me for lunch or asks me for a drink when we stop for gas. Nevertheless, she is trustworthy, well-spoken, has a brilliant sense of direction, and is the voice on my GPS system. For four years now, she has warned me when “the next exit is on your right,” she has admonished me to “take the next legal U-turn if possible,” and she has reassured me to “continue on the current route.”

On our latest return trip to Houston, Lucy got a little confused. She isn’t always in on the latest construction projects that pop up on I-10, and newly formed roads have been known to throw her for a loop.

I had stopped at what turned out to be a forlorn gas station. After pumping a small fortune into my tank, I headed for the entrance ramp to resume my 8-hour trip on I-10 and discovered why the gas station had been so deserted. The I-10 entrance ramp had been barricaded, and apparently Lucy and I had both missed the memo. There were no detour signs to indicate an alternative ramp, and I couldn’t find any other vehicles that appeared to be looking for a way out.

First I drove right up to the barricades, hoping a gap would appear that would allow me to get back onto the highway. No luck. So, I turned around and headed down a side road, thinking I would find a detour sign. There wasn’t one. Then, as only someone with absolutely no sense of direction could do, I got lost. Not only could I not find an entrance ramp, but suddenly I couldn’t even decide which way to turn to get myself back to the interstate.

I panicked.

With my heart racing, I combed the streets on the GPS screen and pushed the “Voice Guidance” button over and over, begging Lucy (yes, out loud) to speak up and rescue me. I considered calling Mike, but my pride kept my cell phone in my pocket. There were streets marked all over the GPS map, but I had no idea which one to choose.

Then, I came to my senses.

I needed to go west.

Taking a deep breath, I reached for the zoom-out button and watched as a blue line stretched from my point of origin in Mississippi all the way to Houston. With a wider perspective, I could see both my beginning point and my final destination. I could also see that I was not headed west. With all the calmness my directionless self could muster, I pointed my car in the direction of Houston. Within minutes, I had found the service road that served as a temporary ramp onto I-10 (barely marked with a tiny arrow). I was headed home.

As I settled into my seat, turned on the cruise control, and smiled at Lucy's instructions to “continue on the current route,” I thought about how easily we grow frightened or frustrated about the roads we travel in life.

Sometimes we simply need to zoom out.

God has a design for your life on earth. More certain than the path on my GPS system, God has drawn a plan that stretches from the day you were formed to the day you will draw your last breath.

Psalm 33:11: The counsel of the LORD stands forever, the plans of His heart
from generation to generation.

Before Adam and Eve were formed, God had already mapped out a way to rescue them from the sin they would fall into. God was not surprised by their behavior, and nothing has stunned Him yet. His plan for your life was designed before time began as well. He knows the detours you’ll take, the side roads you’ll experiment with, and the obstacles that will nearly do you in. But, because of His love, compassion, and righteousness, God will not allow His ultimate plan to be shaken. Our lives are intermingled with others, even for generations before and behind us, and God has a specific plan for your life to affect eternity.

Isaiah 25:1: LORD, You are my God; I will exalt You. I will praise Your name, for You have accomplished wonders, plans formed long ago, with perfect faithfulness.

When God decided to create the world, He did it. He spoke it into existence out of nothing. He made man and woman exactly as He planned. He formed a nation for Himself, and has kept that nation intact against all odds, exactly as He said He would. He came to earth in the form of the Son of Man exactly as He had foretold for thousands of years. He chose the time for Christ to die (even though men were determined to thwart His timing), He brought Him to life as He said He would, and He made sure the gospel was spread around the world with the help of an unlikely group of followers, just as He had said He would do. God always, perfectly, and faithfully carries out everything He says He will do.

So, why do the plans for our own lives seem so fuzzy and uncertain?

We zoom in too far. We see our lives with eyes that are far too shortsighted.

If you place a map just inches in front of your face, you can see myriads of roads and intersections, but you can’t tell which way to go until you hold the map out a foot or two and look at the big picture, with your destination in sight. When we focus on the choices we need to make (careers, children, houses, a move) and the obstacles that seem to get in our way (strained relationships, health issues, financial problems), we're looking at our lives with earthly eyes rather than with a heavenly vision.

We need to surrender our lives to the One who has our destination in His hand. We need to trust the One who placed us on this earth at exactly this moment in time to carry out specific plans that He has made for us. He is sovereign and, if we are His, we can be assured that He has allowed every single choice…every obstacle…every circumstance…every relationship…and not one of them has taken Him by surprise. Pray. Ask Him what to do, where to go or how to do it. He always listens, and He always responds, sometimes in silence and often with an amazingly clear Voice. Read your Bible and let God talk to you and guide you through His spoken Word. Sometimes we have the roadmap right in front of us, but we don't even bother to look. Then we wonder why we have to make so many U-turns.

Proverbs 16:9: A man's heart plans his way, but the LORD determines his steps.

We can reason and scheme and dream and work, but only God knows the final outcome of our lives. From our own limited perspective, the only thing we can know for certain is that we will get to the end of our lives one day.

Our youngest daughter, Lia, called from Middle School Camp the other day, where she was serving as a counselor. "Mom," she said, "I believe God has called me into fulltime ministry, and I have accepted the call." I was delighted, and even more so when she continued, "I know God gave me the desire to major in biological engineering next year, and I don't know how He will use that in ministry, but I'm going to head into it and trust Him to either use it or redirect me."

An amazing thing about God is that He wil not force us to travel with Him. We are free to forge our own paths, to follow our own self-focused steps, or to devise our own itinerary, all the while ignoring God completely. But another amazing truth is that, if we submit our entire lives to Him, God will faithfully use every single circumstance...the bumpy roads and even the barricades...to complete His work in us.

So, the journey is up to us. We can focus on what we want, what will make life easier, who has made life difficult, and what we wish were different, we can fret over decisions and whine about unfairness, we can manipulate and calculate and regulate, and we can take our lives in our own hands and hope like crazy we end up with something in the end that matters. Or, we can experience the joy of settling into our seats and listening as God assures us that we are, indeed, to “take the next legal U-turn” or “continue on the current route.” If we will surrender our choices to Him, God will lead us closer to Himself, and that's where we wanted to go all along.