I’m directionally challenged.

That confession isn’t new and it’s certainly been the subject of a lot of blogs and message illustrations.  But the issue for me isn’t just embracing the fact that I’m a shame to my gender because I can’t find my way back to or from anywhere.  The issue for me is learning to deal with my “handicap”.

My solution?  Google Maps on my iPhone.  No, this isn’t a commercial for either one of those products; it’s an admission to my solution.  I keep GPS very close at my side—literally: my phone rests in a holster on my side.  If I need to get to the grocery store: recall that location in my maps program.  Get to the AMC (where The Purpose Community Church meets) from a CC’s on Airline?  No problem after a few touches on the responsive screen of my smartphone.

I would be up poop creek without a paddle if my GPS ever stopped working.  I’d be lost and scared.

Did you know our spiritual lives have similar guiding devices built into them?  Proverbs 7:1-4 reminds us…

My son, keep my words and store up my commands within you.  Keep my commands
and you will live; guard my teachings as the apple of your eye.  Bind them on your
fingers; write them on the tablet of your heart.  Say to wisdom, “You are my sister,”
and to insight, “You are my relative.”

In the context of Proverbs 7, these four verses are applying wisdom to warn of avoiding adulterous women.  And by doing this, these verses demonstrate the necessity of good “spiritual guidance devices” to direct us.

We are commanded to “keep…store…guard…bind…write” the wisdom of the Lord into our existence.  I doubt there are many Christians reading this who will argue with this.  The issue is really this: since we know this is something we should do, why aren’t we doing it?

Why don’t we “keep…store…guard…bind…write” the wisdom of the Lord into our existence?  Why do we bounce around like pinball though life, banging against pain after pain all the while ignoring the lessons our Heavenly Father is trying to teach us?  If we know what we should do and refuse to do it, what does that make us?

Stubborn?  Definitely.  Defiant?  Yep.  Stupid?  That too.

For us to have the manual for living (that would be the Bible combined with prayer and worship) readily available to us and to ignore what it teaches is just dumb.  No wonder we keep having to go through the same trials and troubles over and over!  The Lord is trying to teach us what we don’t want to teach ourselves.

It’s like me complaining against Google or Apple if I don’t type in the address and click “Navigate”.  It’s not their fault if I’m too stubborn, defiant, or stupid to use the tool I need.  Let me get lost for a few hours and I might figure out the route.  Or I can use the tool, type the address, click “Navigate” and be there in seven minutes.

So what’s it gonna be, follower of Christ?  Are you going dig into the Word of the Lord this year, coupling it with prayer and worship?  Are you going to sharpen your use of the spiritual tools of faith in 2015?

I hope so…otherwise, it’s gonna be an extra long, extra painful, and extra twisting pathway.

Instead, I urge you to open your Bible, heart, and mind and “click Navigate”.