Highway 2012

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As I start to recalibrate for a new year, I am so thankful for the fresh start. 

God, in the journey this year will be thank you for the description of Your Way as a highway.  It is open and nourishing, progressing toward spirit and depth that are the only things that will make me “me” in the face of troubles and trials.  Thank you that it is not a way that holds worry, confusion, wrong turns, mistakes.

I don’t have to make every step correctly.

I don’t have to turn left or right or make sense out of directions. 

Despite “external evidence” in the landscape of my surroundings, it is a path that is safe. Untouchable from things that would decay.  

I see a picture in my mind's eye of an aquarium, where there is a moving sidewalk under a tunnel of clear glass, a strong bubble protecting me from the sharks and harm on the other side. I am free to observe and move past without fear of injury. I see them, and I know they desire to harm me, but I am untouched.  

Fill in the blank for yourself: What do you experience as threatening and circling above…marital dissatisfaction, a career performance, disappointment or failure, dissatisfaction with your physical body, mistakes in conduct, a struggling loved one, anxiety, a persistent hurt in your heart or body. 

They are frightening to look at.  

Should you be vulnerable to them you would most likely be torn apart. 

But, according to the promise below in Isaiah 35—we are not. 

The path we have the blessing to move down this New Year is a way to move and evolve in goodness and thriving. 

Like the moving sidewalk through the shark encounter, we need only to be still and know. It certainly takes intention and practice to stay there, but how comforting: We don’t even have to lift our legs to walk down the path. God sends us forth with his energy.

Colossians 1:29
”For this I labor, striving with all the superhuman energy which He so mightily enkindles and works within me.”
Isaiah 30:15:  
“In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength…”
Lord, as the year begins help me fine tune my practice of being still and true.   Let me “sing as I make my way home, an unfading halo of joy encircling my head, welcomed home with gifts of joy and gladness as all sorrows and sighs scurry into the night”. (Isaiah 35


Isaiah 35—the Message:

3-4Energize the limp hands, 

   strengthen the rubbery knees.

Tell fearful souls, 

   "Courage! Take heart!

God is here, right here, 

   on his way to put things right

And redress all wrongs. 

   He's on his way! He'll save you!"

 5-7Blind eyes will be opened, 

   deaf ears unstopped,

Lame men and women will leap like deer, 

   the voiceless break into song.

Springs of water will burst out in the wilderness, 

   streams flow in the desert.

Hot sands will become a cool oasis, 

   thirsty ground a splashing fountain.

Even lowly jackals will have water to drink, 

   and barren grasslands flourish richly.

 8-10There will be a highway 

   called the Holy Road.

No one rude or rebellious 

   is permitted on this road.

It's for God's people exclusively— 

   impossible to get lost on this road. 

   Not even fools can get lost on it.

No lions on this road, 

   no dangerous wild animals—

Nothing and no one dangerous or threatening. 

   Only the redeemed will walk on it.

The people God has ransomed 

   will come back on this road.

They'll sing as they make their way home to Zion, 

   unfading halos of joy encircling their heads,

Welcomed home with gifts of joy and gladness 

   as all sorrows and sighs scurry into the night.

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