By Brenda Cannon Henley
In our walk with God, He leads us and guides us. God shows us where to go and how to go, but He does not make us go. We choose to follow Him and we choose how to follow Him. As we walk on the path that the Lord sets out for us, the devil is constantly trying to get us to step off the path. He offers distractions and shortcuts.

Distractions will take us just a few steps off our path at first. We will hear or see something that looks interesting and we think that we will just go take a look, just for a minute. Once we get there, it is interesting.

We get ready to go back to our path and we see something else that is interesting, so we step over there to look at it. Before we know it we have wasted hours or days or months or years doing nothing. We are wandering. If we wander too far we can easily get lost. Our world is filled with distractions – TV, internet, Facebook, friends, places to go, and things to do. They can lead us to wander in the wilderness. We must be constantly aware of them and purpose to avoid them.

Shortcuts are where we see where we are going. We see where God is leading us, and we think we see a better way to go. There are several dangers with shortcuts. The biggest danger is in the thought that we know a better way than God. That is always a lie that comes from our pride. The moment we step off the path of God we step into the path of sin.

Another danger is that God plans a certain path for our life, and every step, every encounter, every person we meet, and every situation we we are in is a teaching moment from God. God is always preparing us for what is coming, for wherever He is leading us. If we bypass the journey and go directly to the destination, we will not be ready, and we will not be prepared for what will happen there.

Shortcuts not only take us away from what God has for us, but the devil will use them to take us places that will destroy us. If the shortcut was the best and the safest path, God would have taken it in the first place. The devil wants to lead us on a path that seems good, but will but will end up in places we never wanted to go.

When we are hiking a trail in the wilderness, we never want to leave the trail without a purpose and a plan. The trail is the safest path. The trail goes to its destination. The trail is the shortest, safest way to get to where it is going. God may lead us off the main trail, but He will show us another path that has a purpose and a destination. God always leads us from one place to another at the pace we can follow and on a path that we can walk. God never has us wander without a purpose and without a path.

The devil will lead us off the path, into a mess and then we can count on him laughing as he leaves us there.

Brenda Cannon Henley can be reached at (409) 781-8788 or,
[email protected]

[July-13-2020]