My Way or the Highway

I left home early the other morning, the sky bright and the roads clear and dry.  One interstate led to another.  I could see clouds up ahead on the horizon, but what were a few clouds on a blue crisp day like this?

And as soon as I came across the state line, I drove into a snow storm so thick, every car and truck went from the speed limit to a virtual crawl.  The snow was so deep on the pavement, I questioned if we were even traveling on lanes at all.  I saw cars on the shoulders, unable to traverse any further. The ramps were lined up a half mile ahead of time, people desperate to escape, thinking perhaps it would be easier another way.

I kept my course, excruciatingly slow.  One car pulled into a "free" lane, pulling past as if it had a waiver.  Within a hundred feet, the car was up to its bumper in snow and moved no more, like a ship run aground. The long slow line of cars and trucks passed slowly by.

I snuck in behind a large Fed-Ex truck and let him lead the way.  This twelve mile section of road took two hours and fifteen minutes to traverse.  I watched the digital clock in the car move even slower than the traffic. The images of vehicles passed in and out of sight like people in a dream.

Finally, I saw the exit sign for my next highway.  I followed "my" truck, hoping it was not headed directly into a field, because I would have no way of knowing.  Quite suddenly, traffic began to rouse itself like sleepy teenagers getting up for school.  By the time I reached the next exit, traffic was moving at a near-speed limit pace, the roads clear but wet.  I exited, pulled into a parking lot, cleared my now-almost-inoperable windshield wipers of thick crusty ice, stretched my legs, and started on my route again.  The next seven hours were blue skies and dry roads, as if that short section of blizzard never existed.

When we obey and follow God's way, He guides, provides, strengthens, and delivers -- even through a thick mess.  And it is in the struggle that we realize that we do not abide in our own strength, but His.  The world will make you hard.  Jesus does not make you tough; He makes you strong.

His way is always the High way.  Even when I don't understand what is happening, I can follow Him through it.

LORD, make me faithful even in mystery, running full-speed or creeping along on my knees, full of Your strength and living in Your grace.

For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
neither are your ways My ways, says the LORD.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are My ways higher than your ways,
and My thoughts than your thoughts.

                                      Isaiah 55. 8-9