KEEP MOVING

I have not blogged in quite a while. Many topics have come to mind, but the burning desire to write did not come along with them!  Lately, a subject has been stirring in my spirit that I feel led to share.  I don't know about you, but I have been in a season of change, transition and regrouping in many areas of my life. Seasons like this can be so uncomfortable that the tendency is to simply stop.  That's the easy way out and the option the enemy loves to entice us with.  As I was driving home from work last week, the Lord gave me some insight that encouraged me and reminded me to press on even through the storms of life.  I was on the interstate headed home when all of sudden I ran into a terrible rain storm.  It was one of those where visibility became extremely limited as the rain was beating against the windshield.  I initially considered pulling over since I was already traveling at a snail's pace with my emergency blinkers flashing.  Before pulling over, I called home to let my family know what was going on and find out what the weather was like there.  When my daughter answered, I asked about the weather and her response was, “It’s all clear here.”  After hearing that report, I felt a new desire to keep driving now that I knew what was up ahead.  As I continued to drive, the weather subsided the closer I got to our house, and by the time I arrived, the weather was perfectly clear.  That's when God spoke to me.  He said that we do the same thing in our spiritual walk.  When we face storms in life, we often take what appears to be the easy way out and pull over and get out of the race.  However, if we simply keep moving, we will ride out the storm until we arrive at the destination he has for us.  If I had stopped on the interstate, I would have prolonged the time I had to deal with the downpour and delayed my arrival to clear weather. I know how hard it is to survive what I have termed the “gut punches” of life---those things that come against us unexpectedly to knock the spiritual wind out of us.  What God was saying to me was that we cannot allow those things to stop us.  Just like when I kept driving through the storm, we have to keep pressing through hard places that come against us to cause us to give up. I've actually had moments when I have said out loud, “I give up!” (As my pastor would often say, “Maybe you’re more spiritual than I am and never had moments like that!”) Thank God I was able to shake off the despair and not camp out in that place. Instead of focusing on current circumstances that may be disappointing, frustrating, hurtful, etc., we have to remain focused on the promises of God concerning what's ahead. I want to encourage those who have been bombarded with the storms of life to keep moving and don't give up.  After all, it's hard to hit a moving target!  Remember, all is clear up ahead.

Philippians 3:13-14  Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, ¹⁴ I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

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