Direction and Purpose

Well good morning hope this finds everyone well. I was not available to write yesterday but I thank God for the Job I have even when I start at 2:00am. You I learned something though sometimes you just have to have quiet time with God and yesterday was that for me. My thoughts and prayers yesterday helped me find some direction that I needed about stuff that I am going through. In 2 Thessalonians 3:1-5 we read a request made by Paul a request for prayer;

“ ¹ Finally, brethren, pray for us, that the word of the Lord may run swiftly and be glorified, just as it is with you, ² and that we may be delivered from unreasonable and wicked men; for not all have faith.
³ But the Lord is faithful, who will establish you and guard you from the evil one. ⁴ And we have confidence in the Lord concerning you, both that you do and will do the things we command you.
⁵ Now may the Lord direct your hearts into the love of God and into the patience of Christ.”

What I love about this verse is the humbleness you see in Paul’s writing His only real desire is to see God’s work done and to share the Gospel with as many as he can. In the last verse though he gives us an instruction that many times I fail to heed, “May the Lord direct your hearts” having direction and purpose are important. One time while I was in service I was responsible during a training exercise for being the lead vehicle for my platoon’s movement to our next location. I had served at Ft. Irwin for several years and was pretty confident about how to travel around the some 30,000 acres that make up the base. Well on this particular evening the Lieutenant tells me over the radio to move out and we start to roll he lets me lead for about 5 minutes and we are bouncing down the road sun directly in our eyes and he comes over the radio and says are we not supposed to be headed east. Well it’s about 1800 hours 6 pm for those who don’t know military time. It only took a minute for that to register and I quickly made a 180 and started in the right direction. I learned a valuable lesson in that and it has stuck with me. Just because you are confident in the direction you are headed does not make it the right one for you. In our walk with God sometimes we have to stop moving forward and look to see if we are going where he is leading or if we are just headed where we want to go. One other thing I was leading several others that day and I had to think about them as I made my way. You always plan your route of travel for the slowest and heaviest vehicle in a convoy be sure you know who you are leading it will make the trip much more enjoyable. Have a blessed day in the Lord may his light shine from you wherever you go.