I will run in the way of your commandments
when you enlarge my heart! Psalm 119:32
The movie, “The Last of the Mohicans” opens with three men running through a dense forest at top speed. They have been hunting down a deer and they are trying to get within killing range of it. Every time I watch the movie I think to myself: “How in the world did those actors run
through such a thick forest without tripping and falling headlong?Today’s verse, Psalm 119:32, makes me picture our life in this world sort of like that movie scene. Sometimes life seems like a dense, overgrown forest that we have to fight our way though. There is entangling brush, and brambles, and thorns, and there are roots to trip over, and gopher holes in which to turn an ankle. And like it or not, we have to make the journey.
And then we discover the word of God with its truths, and precepts, and commandment. And it’s like a path that has been cleared for us. What a relief! But it’s not a little rabbit path that we still have to carefully make our way along. It’s wide and flat and clear . . . so clear that instead of stumbling or shambling along we can run flat-out along the path that God has cleared for us.
There’s a certain sense in which God’s path through this world is constraining, but there’s also a sense in which it is freeing. It’s constraining because there are things “out there”, off the path that I want, and because I am on God’s path, they are now out of my reach. That can be frustrating and disappointing. But His path is also freeing because the stumbling blocks, roots, ruts, holes, brambles, thorns and various other types of dangers of life and not on God’s path. I can run along it full speed with all of my strength without fear of stumbling, tripping, falling, or injury. No skinned knees, no sprained ankles, no broken bones. Imagine a forest path so clear, so smooth, so well-maintained, and so-wide that you could actually to run a marathon along it! That’s what it’s like to live our lives according to God’s word. The dangers, risk, fears and uncertainties are swept away.
So what is this path of God and how do I find it? Certainly we’ll find it in the scriptures. But there’s more to it that just information. Jesus said:
Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. John 14:6
And He told us how we find that living way:
You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, 40yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life. John 5:39–40
So the bottom line is this:
The path of life described in the Old Testament is embodied in Jesus Christ. He is the Path! And if we stay on that Path, we can run through the forest of life in freedom and without fear. God is so good!