Jesus calls himself “the way”. Have you thought about the dimensions of what that means? Jesus is the way to God. That’s the quick answer, but what is a way?
Yancey thinks about that in this devotion. It’s a path, a journey, which means that it is indeed true, faith is a daily process of walking with God, of inviting him into the details of our existence. He recalls the words of Kierkegaard that many Christians are like kids in school who want to find the answers to their math problems in the back of the book. Yeah, we were all tempted to do that. But why weren’t we supposed to just copy them? Because the only way to really learn math was to do the work, step-by-step.
It’s the same in terms of our faith. We have to follow the way. For some reason, God doesn’t take the junk out of our lives. Yancey tells the story of a friend who prayed constantly to have sexual temptation removed. It didn’t just happen magically. How many of you have prayed something similar? “God, just please get rid of. . .” Fill in the blank with a temptation or trial in your life. God seems to prefer the long road. To quote Yancey, “God seems to value character more than our comfort, often using the very elements that cause us the most discomfort as the tools in fashioning that character.”
It’s a long way, that relationship of faith. And I think it’s interesting that we can describe it as a journey, but the element you can’t miss in all of this is that God often asks us to be still in the middle of this journey and just let him do his work. We have to let him chisel away. Maybe you’ve seen this skit before, maybe not. But if you feel like sometimes you’re being asked to sit still while God works away at you with a chisel, take a look and reflect on the journey of being still.
Tags: faith, God's chisel, journey, way