God’s GPS

Recently, I was visiting with my daughter Mona, in Sydney, Australia. She had only just moved to Sydney 3 months before that, and was not too sure of her way around this huge and daunting city. But that hardly deterred her- she had a GPS! And was more than happy to take me anywhere my fancy directed! I was absolutely fascinated as I watched her just enter in the address of our destination, and then voila! With a series of explicit suggestions, the GPS took us safely wherever we desired! I have to admit I really enjoyed the exact and clear instructions after my own experiences in India. My husband and I have been avid travelers, driving around South India on our vacations equipped with one of those huge unfolding maps. I remembered the many occasions we’d stop to ask local people how to get to a certain landmark village or town and every time we’d get just one standard answer: ‘strite’ with arms flaying right or left to indicate the ‘real’ direction! Folk in rural India are also on a different time zone altogether and if you happened to ask how far a place was or how long it would take to get there, they’d say it’s just a few minutes away or really close but that could be anywhere between 10 to 50 kms. and take you an hour or five! So you can see why I was taken up with this GPS!

However, one afternoon, after a long drive through a beach, directed by our GPS, when Mona pulled it out to enter the name of a shopping centre (but, of course!), the GPS took the carpet out from under my feet by uttering four very frightening words: “Unable to locate satellite!” How could that happen, I asked dismayed at what I saw as a technological let-down. Or a conspiracy with my husband! Oh well, she confessed that she had forgotten to charge it! Charge it? It hadn’t occurred to me that this might be a requirement! As marvelous an invention as it was, the GPS was completely useless if not charged!

Which made me think of the obvious parallel in our spiritual lives… the Lord has promised in Isa 42:16, “Along unfamiliar paths I will guide them.” (NIV) He is indeed the one who told Abraham to leave his home and family (Gen 12:1) and to Jacob he gave the specific instruction of when to return home. (Gen 31:3) Innumerable characters in the Bible were given clear directions, told of events that were to transpire, battles that were to be fought and plans that were to be followed .

The path we are on may often seem unfamiliar, strange, even on occasion, intimidating to us. But it’s not to God. He knows our tomorrows just as well as He knows our todays. And just as He provided counsel to the people in the Bible, He desires to guide us too. Provided we stay “charged” at all times! Plugged in, tuned up and picking up every signal He’s sending our way! May our personal, spiritual GPS-es never cop out on us just because we failed to ‘charge up!’

HOPEFULLY…..

It’ almost the end of January, of 2010! What hope and excitement the year began with! A New Year always does! There’s something about the newness of an entire calendar year that evokes a good feeling in the hearts of us all… fresh, clean and untainted, straight from the hand of God, like a blank page awaiting what must be marked on it , some moments erasable, some etched permanently. Some beautiful ‘Kodak Moments’ and some of heavy-laden sorrow… Yet we humans are inherently built to thrive on hope. The acclaimed poet Alexander Pope remarked “Hope springs eternal in the human breast!” It never dies! No matter what has transpired in our lives, given the opportunity, we will hope again! We may have had the worst imaginable experiences in the year just gone by, but that doesn’t deter us from believing for better in the days to come! Who says Man is not resilient? Optimistic? And an incorrigible dreamer at heart! We may fall, but we are quick to shake off the dust and rise up again like the Phoenix of folklore. And that, precisely, is the reason that a New Year has a way of spreading bonhomie and cheer all around.

And, what’s more, hope is exceedingly pleasing to the eyes of God. When He regards a child that has pinned his hopes on Him, the Scripture says that nothing pleases Him more . Rom 4:18 declares , “Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations…”

When we hope, we align ourselves with Heaven’s plans that are for our good and not for our destruction, especially when we put our trust in God! While hope is its own reward, it also carries one- the fulfillment of our dreams!

We’ve all been disappointed in people, but that slight, silken thread of hope is preserved by God Himself, that it we may use it to hold on to Him.

The most marvelous hope of all to me, though, is the one we have of living with Christ beyond death! What an awesome hope! It’s a hope we can appreciate even more in the face of the death of a loved one. The hope of meeting up with dear ones gone on before us. Take this out of the equation of Life, and I reckon, most of Life would be reduced to a meaningless futility of striving that leads nowhere!

I can say “Amen! ” to St. Paul who affirms in Acts24:15, “I have the same hope in God…, that there will be a resurrection of both, the righteous and the wicked.”

I leave you with this wonderful scriptural blessing from Rom 15:13 “ May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in Him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.”