SHOUT IT OUT

I was in Brisbane this week for a youth pastors intensive. I have never driven to Brisbane or in Brisbane, but I have been there before. Some of the roads are three lanes and that is even in the suburbs, it’s crazy (I live in Bundaberg and the most lanes we have are double). I didn’t have a map of Brisbane so I went onto google maps to get directions to my friend’s house and the place where the intensive is. I printed these maps out. Even though I had these maps, of parts of Brisbane I still got lost. Sometimes I couldn’t find where I wanted to go because it wasn’t on the map I printed.

On Tuesday morning when I was on my way to the intensive I nearly took a wrong exit. In Brisbane they have the inner city bypass, again three lanes. I knew I had to be in the far left lane so I wouldn’t take the wrong exit. But all of a sudden I started veering left. I looked up and I had accidentally taken the sunshine coast exit, I had to turn back into the right lane otherwise I would have gotten totally lost and probably missed most of the first few sessions at the intensive.

There’s a scripture from Matthew 7:13-14 (MSG) it says:
13-14"Don't look for shortcuts to God. The market is flooded with surefire, easygoing formulas for a successful life that can be practiced in your spare time. Don't fall for that stuff, even though crowds of people do. The way to life—to God!—is vigorous and requires total attention.

There are two points out of this verse that relates to my experience. The first is from verse 13, ‘Don’t look for shortcuts to God.’ Some people like bits and pieces of the Bible... the verses that suit them but they don’t get the full picture of God’s love and what he has done. It’s like when I didn’t have the full map of Brisbane, just bits and pieces and I still got lost.

The second point is from verse 14, ‘The way to life—to God!—is vigorous and requires total attention.’ I had the map of how to get to the intensive but I nearly went in the wrong direction because I was listening to music. I have to pay attention. It’s the same with our Christian walk; we can get distracted from all sorts of things, not necessarily bad things but we can veer in the wrong direction until it’s too late.

-Michelle