I have a pretty good internal sense of direction. I typically only go to GPS or Google maps when I absolutely have to do so and I always go kicking and screaming. Several years ago, while leading a mission group in Nashville, we decided to go to this well known ice cream shop in town for an evening treat. I was almost positive that I knew where it was and that we could walk there from where we were staying. An hour and 4 miles later, it turned out that I was wrong on both accounts. The shop was not where I thought it was located nor could we walk there. You can imagine how well this went over with a tired group of missionaries who had spent the entire day in 95 degree heat working on a house.

It’s a good reminder that if we don’t know where we are going we will never get there. It seems at time to almost be an epidemic in that we seem to wander around aimlessly with no sense of purpose or destination. We try to live out God’s calling with little or no attention paid to where God is actually calling us. We need periods such as Lent that call us to actually try and figure out where we are supposed to be going. No matter how many good intentions there are on our path, we have to have a strong sense of where we are going. To walk a path with no destination leaves one weary and unfulfilled. It’s when we walk a path with purpose towards God’s calling upon us that we find life, abundant life.