I really rely on the GPS in my car to get me places. The GPS has probably saved more gasoline than any other recent improvement to cars. Those of us who are directionally challenged don’t waste gallons of fuel trying to find our destination. However, we must not overly trust these handy devices. Recently I was doing my usual daydreaming and missed a highway exit. It took less than a second for the GPS to recalibrate with new instructions. As I got to the ramp where traffic was coming onto the highway my GPS told me to take a sharp right. Had I obeyed I would have saved myself ten miles of driving but I also would have been driving the wrong way on a one-way ramp. I wonder if she (I’m sure it’s a she. It has such a nice feminine voice.) would have paid for the ticket.
We really need to pay attention to whom we pay attention. Some people speak and act with such confidence; it just seems right to listen to their counsel. Yet they can be as wrong as wrong can be. Just forty-eight hours before Lehman Brothers went belly-up a very loud voice on a financial television program told us all to buy Lehman Brothers because “it was solid.” So much for authorities. When we are children we obey our parents. When we are in school we obey our teachers. When we are in church we obey our pastor. Or do we? Should we? At some point in our lives we mature and stop checking our brains at the door. In Isaiah God tells us to reason. God is not honored by blind obedience. He is best served by thoughtful, intelligent, principle-driven decisions.
Written by Roger Bothwell on March 20, 2009
Spring of Life Ministry, PO Box 124, St. Helena, CA 94574