Path of Life

Boy, it has been a busy, eventful, gut wrenching yet purposeful time since I last wrote.  I am not sure where to begin as there is much on my heart.  I have several posts to write with each having a different focus.  This particular post regarding our path of life.  How many of us chose our path?  How many sought God's path for our life?  How many of us have attempted to modify or adjust His pathway due to lack of understanding, simple stubbornness, or trying to avoid where the road appeared to lead?
I am not proud of this, but it would appear that all the above is true for myself.   For forty years I walked a path that was unproductive and in some cases destructive to the person I wanted to be yet never believed I could be.  That path was predicated on my horrendous childhood, and the lies believed because of its damage to my soul.  Dan Allander stated in his book Wounded Heart, "Abuse leaves a hole in one's soul."  That is so true!    Without knowing Christ personally, one walks in defeat, as a victim expecting only more bad to happen and in some cases continue a course that would lead to that lie.  It is a lie, yet the victim does not know that.  Their reality was founded on lies, abuse and a skewed view of their person hood, value and worth. 

Personally the truth is, that ONLY in Christ and His Word, can these errors and the damaged brought about on the person can be healed in time and truth replaces lies, value and worth are a gift from the Lord and is not contingent on anything, except Him.  Since this is truth, the hard part is accepting this truth, replacing the lies and false value and worth with the REAL thing.  Read Romans 12:1-2; Ephesians; I Corinthians and other passages regarding who we are "IN CHRIST."    What I discovered is that unless I believe this truth and then replace those lies for truth my path of life will never change. However, my salvation and home going is assured according to scripture.  This is the hardest yet most important part of the exchange, believing what is written.  For it is not, I repeat not contingent upon my feelings or past experiences.  Our whole g rid of filtering what we read, observe or feel must line up with the scriptures or we will not walk in newness of life and on the "path of life"  He has chosen for each believer.  Every path will look different because it was designed for each child og God.  Not one path is chosen for everyone, the destination is the same, but the pathway will be  an individualized design.

Once a person accepts this truth, we will no longer judge one another or be critical.  We all learn at a different pace and way.  God Knows exactly what step builds on the next.  Much like domino's if the correct domino is tapped the others fall into place.  What is different from domino's is that we humans do not always take the next step God designed, so He has to reroute our path of life, to get us back on track.  It is a complicated, by human reasoning, process that incorporates the whole Godhead.  If, we ignore this "path of life" through our lack of reading the scriptures, praying and listening for guidance, and/or shutting the Holy Spirit up, then we will no longer be in harmony with the Lord and failure will be the fruit of this course.  However, the opposite is true; read, pray listen and obey is as the old hymn would say, "the only way to be free in Jesus."

I believe for the most part we without realizing it are copycats.  Trying, without awareness to follow the path of another or doing what we were told by others, even those in authority.  Only God knows the "path of life"  He has chosen for me, no one else.  The choice is ours, but the outcome will differ depending on our choice.  The question that arises then is; Will we trust on His chosen path for me?; Will I lean entirely on Him alone?; Will I be confident in His choices regarding those events that He has allowed to come my way?  For me, that is widowhood, that was seeking a career to support myself, health issues that bring much pain and discomfort, judgement or strong criticising by others (whether its true or not), all leading to total reliance on Him, not myself, job, family or anyone individual. 

Of course all would change some events happening in our lives, as we want to alleviate pain and suffering, yet this is the way we grow to maturity in Christ.  However, some of our pain was brought on by our choosing our path rather than His.  Too often, we despise or unappreciated the "path of life He chose for us.  In losing our true focus on Christ, we can lose intimacy with Him and His blessings.  Only His chosen path for us is the true "path of life."  Why not redirect our wrong view of His path and trust that He knows what is needed for our growth and testimony of His work in us and sharing  this with those who need the encouragement and challenge to stay on His specially designed path of life for us, keep Him in our focus and measure our individual path by anther ones path.  We cannot fix ourselves, this is futility and vanity; He can not only fix , but make us brand new.

So, whether we stand on the precipice of a cliff or running up a beautiful mountain trail, we need to hold tightly to His hand, feel His strength and without fear take the next step.n  Let us walk in the light as He is the Light, and allow His thoughts to reprogram our thoughts with His truth, not lies from the past or discouragement because the path is hard, rather let us grow deeper in depth and breath. 

As the song states: "I surrender ALL!"  All to Jesus I surrender...my desires, paths and leave the outcome to Him.  Blessings and love to Jesus my Lord and to you who may read this blog.