Bobby and I went to Coalgate to their meeting last night. I am so glad we went on this particular night. Richard Jones is such a good speaker and he brings some good thought provoking lessons. Some things were brought to my attention that explains a lot that has happened in our lives.
"Jesus has walked this trail ahead of us and He knows the pitfalls and we can follow Him with the confidence that He will get us through it safely." -Richard Jones. It is only by His grace that our life goes as smoothly as it does...because He has seen the pitfalls and can guide us around them! Just one tiny example of what I mean:
While coming back from visiting my dad, we got so terribly sleepy and still had over 2 hours to go. It was almost time for evening worship by the time we got to Anadarko, OK and I wondered how we were going to spend an hour in there and probably 30 min or so visiting with the brethren and still drive home without going to sleep and running off the road. We also had our 'precious cargo' in the back seat! It was so very tempting to not stop, but we just couldn't do that...and to think the kind of example for our children that would have been.
It was amazing that when we got back in the car to finish the trip home...we were not even a bit sleepy! And...we didn't get sleepy all the way home. If we had decided to not follow Jesus in His trail, I'm convinced things would not have turned out so good. This is just one little example and there are many.
Another thought: There's always going to be something in our way. It's Satan's way of getting us back on his side. Jesus knows that but there are times when we think we are following in Jesus footsteps...but we are not at all. We are just fooling ourselves...like we could have done that night by rationalizing our situation.
Yes, there's something in our way up there, there always will be...but if we follow the trail that Jesus blazed for us,though hard it may seem at the time, we will be all right, but otherwise not so much!
