…I Heard You Were Leaving! What’s the Rush?Exodus 14Roadblocks

Complaining, Directions, Following Orders, Rush-Rush, Staying Together….

Two million slaves, on the road trip of their lives—this was an abundant & fruitful band of people! The harder Pharaoh worked them the more children they had! The more they tried to slaughter the innocent boys, like they’d tried to do when Moses himself was spared, the more clever their midwives became. Some estimate Egypt’s population to have been about 5 million… now with the exodus of 2 million slaves- the Pharaoh would (understandably) be quite upset! With the labor force gone, who would do the work?

I’d be a rich man today if I had a dime/dollar for every time someone has said, “When God closes a door, a window opens somewhere else.” Or, something similar to that.

I must have heard the Lord wrong… I thought he was saying a life-long work in Chemistry, but he was really saying a life-long work in ministry! A degree in Chemistry… a change of heart and life-path to ministry; Seminary in Atlanta… seminary in Kansas City. Change of direction…roadblocks—the way seems impossible. But God provides a way where there seems to be no way. (use quote)

Mark 11:22-23 Jesus answered them, ‘Havefaith in God.Truly I tell you, if you say to this mountain, “Be taken up and thrown into the sea”, and if you do not doubt in your heart, but believe that what you say will come to pass, it will be done for you.

Roadblocks happen all along the journey. They loom up like giant mountains in the way; they stretch out like endless oceans, impossible to cross. They come in the form of detours, closed opportunities, illness, broken relationships, fractured hopes and dreams, shattered plans.

I told you earlier that I finally got the wax out of my ears and heard that God was saying ministry… not chemistry (they do sound the same, don’t you think?) and yet, even then, the roadblocks loomed ahead:

Knowing I didn’t know anything at all about the Methodist church, I thought I’d better get my self to their premier seminary for proper training and preparation—so off I went to the largest and finest (at the time) seminary they had; Emory University in Atlanta. That lasted only one year. Kansas City was my way through the “red sea” and pillar of cloud by day and fiery spectacle at night. By God’s grace alone we made it through (Judy and I…. and, by that time, our tiny bundle of curious joy, Nathan)

I could go on and on with story after story of how God provides, even in the midst of endless interruptions, disappointments, bends in the road, sudden changes in direction, but one thing I know is that God is powerfully in the midst of the journey and the struggle and is able to provide a way THROUGH, even when it seems impossible. I hope your hear that today and take it to heart. For I know you are in the struggle too and very likely are encountering a giant roadblock even now.

It may help you to know (as it’s certainly helped me) to know and see that we’re not the first to stand there at an impossible Red Sea or Reed Sea or whatever you want to call it, timid and afraid to even put our toe in the water.

  • We know much too well the temptation to simply turn around and go back
  • We know much too well the tendency to whine and complain and blame someone
  • We know much too well the fear and terror that wells up within us and tendency to “play it safe”

But doing all that is not the way to any kind of “Promised Land” It’s only the way to a lifetime of servitude and drudgery, living as a slave to someone or something else, when all the while God would have us be free and live fully and wholly as we were created to be!

So what are we to do? Moses said it pretty well… “Get Going!”

Have you found that to be the case?