Follow the Light!

2 Disclaimers:

1) This blog was written with Andy’s full knowledge and permission and was not posted until he had given it.

 

2) This blog would be beneficial to any reader, but my target audience for any blog (and especially this one) is always women.

 

I just started a Bible study by Mary Kassian, and today she had one of those questions where you were supposed to look up scripture and apply it to a question.  I’m embarrassed to say that one of the scriptures was Psalm 119:105, and I didn’t recognize the reference.  When I looked it up, I could have kicked myself.  The verse is, “Your word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path.”  Sorry for the King James Translation – that is how I memorized it years ago, and therefore, how it must appear in this blog.  I love this verse. Today, as I was looking it and thinking about how God has given us the Bible to clearly guide our paths, I found myself drawing parallels to an activity that is happening in my classroom right now.

 

I am teaching 9^th grade IB students.  The IB program is similar to the AP program and allows students to earn college credit in high school and graduate with a special certificate indicating that they have finished the program.  The program is really cool because it truly focuses on the student as an entire learner.  One major goal of the program is to develop well-rounded lifelong learners and critical thinkers.  As such, when we do projects in class much more emphasis is placed on the process of planning and creating a product than on the product itself.  Right now, my students are writing children’s books that can be used to teach an important character trait.  I’ve given them really detailed instructions on how this project is graded, and I’ve stressed over and over the importance of the process – especially the brainstorming process – over the children’s book itself, but they are DYING to start their books.  It is taking everything I have to keep them focused on the instructions in front of them and not jumping ahead into their own thing.

 

Reading this verse and thinking about my crazy day in school today reminded me that we behave so much the same way with God’s words.  He has given us instructions that should make our lives easier and our reward greater.  About keeping God’s laws, Psalm 19:11 says, “In keeping them there is much reward.”  If my students would follow my instructions, their project would run much smoother, and their grades would be better.  Right now, they feel like I’m giving them extra work and making their lives more difficult.  They wonder why they have to fully document the process when they are ready to write their books, and they want me to let them off the hook.  However, I know that they are going to be evaluated by a certain rubric and that if they don’t take the steps to document their brainstorming now, they will regret it when they see their grades.  I think God is the same way with us.  He has given us rules and guidelines, but they aren’t for his benefit.  He isn’t trying to make our lives more difficult, and he doesn’t get pleasure out of watching us squirm.  He is trying to make our way clear.  He is trying to light our paths and make it easy for us to get the reward and to experience the joy that comes with following his word (Psalm 19:8).

 

Think about it – you have probably found yourself in situations where you really followed the Lord and felt such a great reward and so much joy from it, and you have also probably been in situations where you have not followed and been kicking yourself.  I have kicked myself sooo many times! 

 

I had a situation once in college where a close friend was walking a path I didn’t think was wise, but instead of showing her the love of Jesus, I turned my back.  I was horribly judgmental and prideful, and I was so critical of her decisions.  It was not the way the Lord would have had me do the relationship.  The lamp unto my feet said speak the truth in love (Ephesians 4:15), and not let any unwholesome talk come from my mouth but only what was useful for building others up according to their needs (Ephesians 4:29), and to first take the speck out of my own eye (Matthew 7:5).  But I ignored all of that.  I walked in darkness, and I reaped that “reward.”  I destroyed a special friendship, and I didn’t have any part in seeing my friend walk back to the Lord.  She turned from the path she was on – but to no thanks from me, and though God has been gracious and brought me her forgiveness for my actions, we are no longer close friends.  There are times when I think of our friendship, and I can’t help but wonder what would have happened if I had followed God’s word in that situation.

 

There are also situations where I have definitely followed the Lord and reaped such benefits.  I can’t believe I’m about to share this very personal detail on my blog, but I feel that it absolutely fits the topic, and maybe it will help someone somewhere.  So here it goes.  One way that I have been able, truly by the grace of God, to follow the Lord is in the area of purity.  Until my wedding night, I followed God’s call absolutely to be sexually pure – truly there was not even a hint of sexual immorality in my life (Ephesians 5:3).  I have to give credit to every guy I dated, and especially my husband, for making it so easy for me to follow the Lord in this area, but I also have to say that the reward for following God in this area absolutely could not be greater.  Until my wedding night, I think I followed the Lord kind of blindly.  I knew he said to be sexually pure – so I absolutely was (and if any girls out there want to know more details about what that means to me, please email me: shannonvspeight@gmail.com).  But after my honeymoon, I just had such an enormous understanding of why this precept was so important – at least for girls.  On my wedding night, I cannot describe how important it was for me to know that Andy was completely committed to me forever no matter what BEFORE I slept with him.  And he didn’t just say he was committed – he pledged it in front of all our friends and family and God.  He didn’t tell me what I wanted to hear – he showed me in a wedding ceremony.  Lots of guys say they are committed or they will marry girls, but we have to admit that there really isn’t a commitment until there is one!

 

I became so much more passionate about waiting for marriage AFTER I got married than before.  I can’t describe how thankful I am that I know with surety that Andy married me for myself and not for my body or what I can do for him sexually – in fact, those things mattered so little that he married me without knowing them.  I also look at the girls I know who sacrificed pieces or all of their purity and broke up with boyfriends before they got married, and my heart breaks for them and what they lost to a guy who didn’t want to commit to them.  My heart also breaks for their husbands who didn’t get to know them exclusively in that way.  I think it is equally as sad to see the message future husbands communicate to the girls that will be their future wives when they say, “I’m not ready to marry you – I want to finish school or save more money or buy you a ring or give you time to plan a wedding – BUT I do want your body now (or as much of it as you will give).”  How selfish – and what kind of ground work is being set for the marriage?  Certainly not the groundwork the Lord lay when he said in Hebrews 13:4, “Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral.” 

 

I don’t want the message to be too harsh, so I’m going to shift gears for a moment.  Admittedly, the truth hurts at times, but the wonderful light giving truth of the Bible is that there is forgiveness for any sin.  Praise the Lord that he forgave me for my sin against my friend in college, and I’m also super thankful for her forgiveness in the matter as well.  God washed that away, and I know he no longer remembers it.  He can do that with sexual sin or any other area of sin in our lives that we are willing to turn away from.  1 John 1:9 says “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.”  He will make us totally clean and holy and right.  The sad part is, though, that sometimes the consequences of our sin linger.  For example, though I am right in God’s eyes and right with my friend, I have lost the relationship that could have grown deep in the years we were estranged if I had acted according to God’s precepts.  He made us right again, and I know that he can do that for any struggle of yours, but I guess I hope that this blog might speak truth to you that his ways are always so much better than ours, and that he gives us a light to direct our every path and answer our every question if we are just willing to follow it.  Just like my students.  If they don’t follow my instructions for this project today, we can still get them on the right track before it is due, but it would be so much easier for them if they follow my guidelines from the beginning.  If you are like me, you have probably messed up in some areas, are getting right some areas right, and trying desperately to follow in a lot of other areas.  My encouragement today is that you let God have the mistakes and that you be washed in his forgiveness (Isaiah 1:18-19), that you persevere in the areas where you are finding success (James 1:12), and that you strive to follow the Lord and his word with every decision that comes your way in the future (Psalm 119:10-11).