Skip to main content

Following the path

 

I had a busy day ahead so scrambled out of bed extra early and into my exercise clothes. Before I was barely awake I was walking to the nearby park enjoying the quiet of the early morning. The park is a beautiful place and displays God’s artistry with a wild abundance of trees and wildlife within a carefully manicured lawn, a stream and several small lakes. There were only a handful of people walking at that hour of the day, mostly with dogs.

I spontaneously worshipped as I walked through that peaceful, spiritual place. I felt God near. Gazing ahead at the winding pathway, I could not see around the corner but felt a delicious sense of expectation even though I already knew what was ahead. I have walked that path many times.

How often do we look ahead in life and wonder what is around the corner, yet filled with the expectation that God has gone ahead of us and we can be assured of his presence as we continue our walk. The path may take us to green pastures where we can lie down and rest, it may be beside quiet waters where we will find restoration, it may be through a dark valley but we need never fear because he is always with us (Psalm 23:2-4). As we follow God, he will guide us and show his faithfulness. A new year is almost upon us and I am waiting with that same delicious sense of expectation for God to reveal himself in the next part of the path I am walking.

Happy adventures all.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Planting Seeds

  Carrying on from last week, I was wondering how I am sowing seeds. I realised that we can all sow seeds everywhere we go. I don’t go out that often actually, I don’t belong to any secular groups but I can still be responsive to the leading of the Holy Spirit. Under his leading I made a determined effort to get to know the names of all the staff at my two favourite cafés that I visit at least weekly. I ask about their families; I support where I can. My friends and I find opportunities to give them all a little gift of chocolate and a card with a verse of scripture written on it. They all know we are Christians. I guess that might be called planting seeds. I converse with the supermarket checkout operators just to have a chance to bring a blessing to them. Some of them now know I am a Christian. I can easily bring God into conversations with unsaved family members, neighbours and strangers I stop and talk to in the park—with the leading of the Holy Spirit. I do not adopt a heavy...

The Importance of Unity

  What do you do when you think the Pastor or Senior Leadership Team have got it wrong! A friend was recently talking about a decision made by our Senior Leadership Team (SLT) including the Pastor. We are a small church community, so decisions affect every member there. However, unless directly involved in a programme or initiative the SLT do not know how a decision they make might impact on the on-the-ground day-to-day running of that programme or initiative. It is important to talk to those involved to get their perspective and even in a small church this might not necessarily happen. Having said that, our SLT are generally very good at consulting. So, what do you do if you think it’s an unwise decision? This will of course depend on size of the church, whether the Pastor is a good listener and is prepared to talk about it and I’m sure, many other factors. My perspective is that I do not want to be talking about the Pastor behind his back. I do not want to gossip about him ...

Taking Time Out

  I had the privilege this week of attending a retreat with five other women. The retreat was over three days but unfortunately some of the nine women who intended to go, were unable to as other urgent commitments came up and needed to be kept. So it became a bit different than expected. Six of us attended the first day, but two of us could only go for the day. Another two were going out the following day for the rest of the retreat. Unfortunately one of our ladies became quite sick and to her disappointment missed it all. However, the day I attended was blessed.   The retreat was held at a beach house belonging to one of the group, at an isolated beach about an hours drive away. It was a beautiful sunny day. We deposited our bags and the first thing we did after admiring the view, was to have a cup of tea. This lead to a lovely lazy discussion about all sorts of things, a great introduction to spending time together. Following this we spent about an hour studying and discus...