How Close Are You?

As seen in the  "The Heartbeat" and published in the Hot Springs Village Voice

"In five-hundred feet turn right." "In one-mile bear left." These are just a few phrases we might hear if we have a navigation feature in our vehicles. Things have been made way too simple for us these days! Gone is the way of the paper map.

When I entered the military a long time ago, we learned to navigate by many different means. One way is navigating by the stars. If you could find the north star, you easily knew the cardinal points on a compass. My father taught me at a young age to navigate in this manner. Another way he taught me was to use a compass.

By the time I grew of age and entered the military, I had a head start on the rest of my recruits. All I needed was a map and a compass and I could find any point in the woods. For our final test in land navigation, we paired up, were given one map and one compass, and several points to plot on the map of which we had to physically find. The hard part was this: once we plotted the locations in pencil on our paper map, we oriented it to north with our compass. Then the drill sergeant took away our compass!!! That is how we learned to navigate by terrain. But little did we know, the drill sergeant placed a compass in our backpack and only told us of its existence if we gave up and called in on the radio.

Our lives are no different. We think we have plotted out our lives by setting goals like a fancy car, a prestigious degree, and maybe a big house behind a gate with big columns. Life throws us curves with peaks and valley, steep hills to climb, and definitely some rocky roads on our way to our goals.

But sometimes we get disoriented and lose our way. We look at our "life map" to try and figure out what went wrong, and even think about back-tracking to start over. It’s hard to figure out where you are when you’re tired of going up and down, up and down over life’s terrain.

When we gave our life to Christ, He set a path for us. It may include some of our own life goals or maybe not, but it certainly included His. We can get down, lose our way, become discouraged, and even think we’re lost in the woods without God anywhere around. Even so, we have two things in our "backpack" to help us: a way to call to God, and a holy compass.

James 4:8 says, "Draw near to God and He will draw near to you." We cry out to God and He pulls us out of any predicament, just like Jesus pulled sinking Peter out of the water. And to find your way, all you need to do is open the Bible – His Holy compass.

Sometimes we think we have gone a long way from God, but I assure you, the journey back is only one step long. Turn your eyes (and your Holy compass) upon Jesus!

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