Tag steps

9  If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea;

From time to time it is a good thing to take oneself aside and have a heart to heart conversation. Having the right conversation is necessary for moving forward. However, it is not always apparent as to what the right conversation is.

This conversation can be with yourself or because (as it has been stated) ‘No man is an island.” It may involve others.

In other words, it can be either a self-check or a selves check.

A self-check can help us make sure we are on the right path. We know as it says in Proverbs 16:9  “A man’s heart deviseth his way: but the LORD directeth his steps.” That doesn’t mean that every step I take is directed by the Lord. They should be directed by the Lord if we’re Christians, but…

As I’ve shared before, back in the day I had MY life planned out. After marriage, I was going to wait two years before we began our family. I would then have two children first a boy, then a girl…

There wasn’t anything wrong with those plans. We got married and began on the right foot and.

In a world of ‘Well, that didn’t work out,” that didn’t work out. The first child was a boy—born nine and a half /ten months after we were married. The second child (girl) turned out to be a boy. Well, life is what it is, and that is what it was. Three years later we decided to have a third child, which turned out to be a boy as well.

The point is in Proverbs 16:9 Are we more interested in the course we’ve charted (A man’s heart deviseth his way:) or in following in the steps God has planned for us? (but the LORD directeth his steps.)

I’m using these scriptures in the writer’s vernacular of writing, outline, critiques, and editing. God’s plan is his outline.

I read a woman’s story of how ‘she rose above the mean-spiritedness of some other women’ who told her she should not wear short shorts when she came in to worship. Those women were mean and hurt her feelings…

Maybe the woman who was unkind in telling her to wear something more modest should have been more tactful and kind. I don’t know, but there was a day when people could figure out for themselves that a woman wearing two pasty spots on their bosom and a tutu for the bottom wasn’t enough outside of their home.

Critique, we all need to endure critiques. Sometimes the criticism is valid, sometimes it isn’t. Sometimes it does hurt our feelings but weigh the advice. As a writer/critiquer, the advice goes: if one person questions a passage (in your writing), think it over. If two critique partners question it— seriously reconsider what you’ve written, but if there are three or more, just throw it out.

There are many people who want to give you free advice. Weigh it carefully. Free advice can be worth exactly what it costs.

 Psalm 139:23 Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: 24  And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

If you’re a follower of Christ, God wants the best for your life. He wants to transform you to be more like Jesus. But that requires each one of us to let him lead. Back when I had my life all figured out, I didn’t have anything figured out.

I had become a Christian, yes, but I thought I was still in control. Our fourth child (unplanned, but very much loved) was a girl, but by then I could see how my prayers for ‘wisdom and patience’ were being answered. I knew I had enough wisdom and patience.

God added two more children for good measure, and then we asked for one more.

Psalms 139:

1  …O LORD, thou hast searched me, and known me.

2  Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising, thou understandest my thought afar off.

3  Thou compassest my path and my lying down, and art acquainted with all my ways.

4  For there is not a word in my tongue, but, lo, O LORD, thou knowest it altogether.

5  Thou hast beset me behind and before, and laid thine hand upon me.

6  Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain unto it.

7  Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence?

8  If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there.

9  If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea;

10  Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me.

12)  So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom.

There are certain milestones that for some reason we believe once we reach them we will have arrived.

The big milestone when I was young was graduating from high school. In my ignorance, I thought I would be an adult. I would be grown up. I can’t remember what benefit that would give me but on that side of the ledger, it was a milestone in my life.

During high school, my mother had wanted me to become proficient in secretarial skills but that skill sorrowfully didn’t fit me. To add insult to injury, I didn’t drive a car or have access to transportation. But graduate I did anyhow.

Other people saw graduation as a milestone just as I did because at graduation people gave the graduates gifts. A blessing indeed, and a surprise to me. I had already planned on leaving Ohio to go back to my (kind of) adopted/home state of Iowa.

With the graduation money, I bought a one-way Greyhound bus ticket back home. I would stay with a girlfriend for a visit. After that? Well, I had no plan after that, but the first step was to get there.

The second step happened when I went to live at my aunt and uncle’s. Obtaining a job and someplace to live were the final challenges. My Aunt helped me find a sleeping room with a bathroom in a nearby small town, and a job that I could walk to in that same small town.

Milestones—graduation was a milestone but when I reached it it wasn’t exactly the milestone I had expected. In looking back I wonder at the boldness and/ or stupidity of youth. I left my mother’s with less than a hundred dollars and a suitcase that contained most of everything I owned.

Some people like to think they’ve lived their life like the Frank Sinatra song, “My Way.” I’ve never found that song appealing. I find it arrogant. For them to think they chose their path, and how good and laudable it was—on this side of eternity we really can’t know how good it was.

Milestones—when I think about life I marvel at how quickly it goes; how quickly it passes. As someone wrote just lately, I knew I would get old, but I’m sure surprised by how fast it happened.

Psalms 90:

9  For all our days are passed away in thy wrath: we spend our years as a tale that is told.

10  The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away.

11  Who knoweth the power of thine anger? even according to thy fear, so is thy wrath.

12  So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom.

Philippians 2:

1  If there be therefore any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any bowels and mercies,

2  Fulfil ye my joy, that ye be likeminded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind.

3  Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves.

4  Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others.

5  Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus:

6  Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God:

7  But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men:

8  And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.