Have you ever wondered why it takes you so long to get from one point to another in life? Ever feel like the detours to get there are taking you even further from your destination?
I had a dream recently about getting from one place to another. God showed me that he could take me directly from point A to point B. But there are times that maybe he intentionally had me go through two or more other places to get to my destination because there was something He had to reveal to me, something that I wouldn't have learned, wisdom I wouldn't have gained, an additional tool for my toolbelt that I wouldn't have had if I hadn't gone on that detour.
We're always in a hurry to get somewhere and take for granted the times when God has gone out of His way to bless us and we didn't even know it or realize it. Those detours may have been valuable destinations, storms even, where God was actually protecting you from something much worse but providing you with valuable time to rest and be still and know that He is God, just to let Him be God. Maybe He took you out of your own way for your own good because His ways are higher than your ways.
He showed me The Amazing Race TV show. I didn't watch it an awful lot but I get the concept of EZ Pass. If a team had done well enough on a leg of the race they may have earned and elected to use this EZ Pass to get to their next destination quicker and easier than the other teams by not having to complete a difficult task, a scavenger hunt, or whatever was next for that next leg of the race.
God never promised us an EZ Pass to life and just maybe He gives us our own scavenger hunt to go on to help us to be more like Him. After all, isn't that what sanctification is??? The process of becoming more like Jesus? Maybe we just need to be pressed a few more times in the winepress so that our wine comes out smoother and more full-bodied.
Whether we are the grapes or the clay, God is our master, the vineyard keeper, and the Potter. He will do whatever it takes to help us fulfill the purposes that He created us for.....if we let Him. We are co-laborers with Christ. Doesn't that mean we work with Him? Or shouldn't we? Shouldn't we succumb and surrender to the pressing, to the molding? For our own benefit? For God's Glory?
If Jesus is in us and He walks with us, beside us and He goes before us, wouldn't it make more sense if we walked in step with Him, in tune, like a dance? Remember bag races we had as kids where we teamed up with another kid and we each put a leg in the bag? The team that was in sync won the race. Imagine what we could accomplish if we walked in sync with Jesus. Imagine how much more God could do through us if we were more aligned with Him. Imagine how much more He would be glorified if we did that and that was the case.
It's time! It's time to pick yourself up, dust yourself off, grab your master's hand and let's go. You are the potter, God. I am the clay. Mold me, Father! Shape me! I surrender! Is it time you surrender also to let God work a mighty work in your life??? I pray you are blessed in your own pressing and molding.
"Yet you, Lord, are our Father. We are the clay, you are the potter; we are all the work of your hand" (Isaiah 64:8 NIV).