Remember back in the days before GPS?
When Walking By Sight Got Me Lost
Well, it’s July 1991, and I’m driving to Chicago. Now I’d been to Chicago many times before, but this is the first time I had ever driven by myself. No big deal. Chicago’s an easy drive from Minneapolis. Once I got into Chicago, I was to stay on I-94 to Lake Shore Drive, and then take Lake Shore Drive to Fullerton, and take Fullerton to Damen Avenue. Well I got into Chicago about 1:30am, and I’m driving down I-94, and I see an exit for Fullerton. Well, I think to myself, here’s Fullerton right here, so I get off at the exit. I figured it would be quicker, instead of driving all the way down to Lake Shore Drive.
Now I’m Lost
Now I’m driving up and down Fullerton, looking for Damen Avenue, and I’m not finding a Damen Avenue. After about a half hour, I pull into a gas station, and ask them if they know where Damen Avenue is. Nobody knows where it is, so they start pulling out maps to try and find it, but no luck. Finally, they ask one guy who came in to pay for his gas, and he said it was just about two blocks away. It was a short street, so that’s probably why it didn’t show up on the maps they were looking at. Well, I got there, but I would have arrived a little sooner if I had just stayed true to the directions, and not depended on what I saw. I figured I was taking a short-cut, but it actually took longer than it would have if I just followed the directions. I didn’t know where I was going, and I didn’t fully trust the directions I was given, so once I saw the familiar name, I took it upon myself to go my own way, instead of trusting the directions given to me by someone who actually lived in Chicago.
What Does It Mean?
For we walk by faith, and not by sight. This is what Paul writes to the Corinthians, in chapter 5:7. Paul is actually talking about faith that God has provided a place for us, but this can be applied to so many areas in our lives. What does it mean to walk by sight. We live in a visual world. Our sight guides us through our everyday life, and decisions are made by what we can see. Many people don’t believe what they are not able to see. Even the disciple Thomas said he would not believe Jesus Christ had risen from the dead until he could see the nail wounds on Jesus’ hands, put his fingers in them, and place his hand on the wound in Christ’s side.
Many Cases of Walking By Sight
All throughout the bible there are accounts when people, and nations, have walked by sight. That is why the nation of Israel had to spend 40 years in the wilderness. They were to take possession of the land God had promised them. Moses sent twelve spies, one from each tribe, to scout out the land.
The Spies Return From Canaan
The spies returned 40 days later. All but Caleb and Joshua gave an unfavorable report, emphasizing how powerful the people were. Their cities were fortified with thick walls. Only Caleb and Joshua knew they could take the land God had promised them, and that God would lead them and give the land to them. Unfortunately, the people listened to the other ten spies who said the inhabitants were too powerful, and the cities were too strong for them to be successful. The people grumbled against Moses, and even plotted to choose a new leader and go back to Egypt, where God had just freed them after being slaves for 400 years.
Into The Wilderness
After Caleb and Joshua stood up in front of the crowd, telling them God would be with them to take the land, the people were ready to stone them. At this point, God had enough, and was ready to wipe them out. After Moses pleaded for Israel, God pardoned them, but said they would wander in the wilderness for 40 years, one year for every day the spies were in the land of Canaan.
A Lesson Here
Because ten of the spies only trusted what they saw and did not have faith in God, Israel had to wander in the wilderness for 40 years. God had brought them to Canaan’s doorstep, ready to deliver the land to them like he promised, but because they were walking by sight, they wanted to go back to Egypt, where they had been slaves.
King Saul In Gilgal
In 1 Samuel 13, King Saul and his army were waiting at Gilgal for the prophet Samuel to arrive to offer a sacrifice before going to war with the Philistines. They were to wait seven days, and Samuel would come to sacrifice the burnt offerings, and fellowship offerings, and then tell them what to do. Well, Samuel had not yet shown up, and the Israelite soldiers were starting to flee, rather then fight, so Saul decided to offer the sacrifice on his own, disobeying the instructions Samuel had given to him. As soon as he finished with the sacrifice, Samuel showed up, and condemned him, professing his downfall. In offering the sacrifices, Saul, instead of being obedient to God, decided to take matters into his own hands.
Another Lesson
Because Saul walked by sight, instead of waiting for Samuel as instructed, as soon as the seven days were up, he made the sacrifice himself in direct disobedience to God’s orders. If he had walked by faith, he would have trusted God, and waited for Samuel regardless of what things looked like.
Peter Walks on Water
Matthew 13: 22-23 talks about Jesus walking out to the disciples on the water. When they first saw him, they though it was a ghost, but when Jesus told them it was him, Peter asked Jesus to tell him to come out on the water. Peter walked out on the water, but when he started looking at the waves, and wind, he got scared, and he started to sink. Jesus reached out and lifted him up saying, “You of little faith. Why did you doubt?”
Lesson Three
Peter had faith enough to walk out on the water because Jesus called him out, but when he took his focus off Jesus, and started looking at the troubled water around him, he forgot about his faith in Christ, and focused on the waves, and started to sink. Walking by faith asks us to trust God even when things are breaking loose all around us. It will help us make good and godly decisions in times of trouble.
The Cross And The Switchblade-A Walk of Faith
Take the story of The Cross And The Switchblade. David Wilkerson was the pastor of a very small church in rural Pennsylvania. During his personal prayer time he was drawn to a Life Magazine article about some teenage gang members in New York who had beaten a fifteen-year-old kid to death.
The Call of God?
The more he looked at the article and looked at the pictures of the seven gang members, the more he felt God was calling him to go to New York to help those boys. He brought this up to his wife and congregation, and with donations from his congregation, he and a church member headed off th New York. Well, not only did he not get to talk with those gang members, he was also kicked out of the courtroom, and a well-timed picture by a newspaper photographer made him look like a bible waving lunatic.
Faith In God
Well, he went back to home, humiliated, and also quite confused. He was sure the Lord was leading him to speak with those boys. Well he resumes his normal routine, but still he felt God was calling him to go back to New York. He went to his small congregation again, and again they donated money so he could travel to New York. Once again, he and the same church member traveled to New York, and again he was denied from seeing those boys, but this time, something different happened.
Walking By Faith Doesn’t Always Look Like It
A kid from the streets, a gang member recognized Rev. Wilkerson from the photograph of him being kicked out of the courtroom on his first trip. He introduced him to his gang. They considered him one of them. The cops didn’t like them, and they didn’t like him either. From there, over time, David Wilkerson was able to present the gospel to gang members all over New York, and eventually founded Teen Challenge, which is a Christian-based organization to help teenagers with problems such as substance abuse, or self-destructive behavior. This is what it looks like to walk by faith, and not by sight. He never did get to help those original seven boys, but God had a much bigger plan for him.
A Great Example
That was a great example of walking by faith. David Wilkerson felt he was being called by God to go to New York to help some gang members, and he is humiliated. He doesn’t lose sight of God’s calling. When others may have given up, he continued to trust God’s call, walking by faith, and not by sight. As a result, he was able to start an organization that has helped people with substance abuse for almost 60 years.
Walking By Faith Can Be Hard
Walking by faith instead of by sight, can be hard. We know through God’s word, what we are supposed to do, but we have a tendency to look at the situation and make decisions based off of that instead of trusting in God, and what he is able to do. What should we do? We allow God to show himself. I mean that we step out in faith and let God show he is true to His word. The more we step out and walk in faith, and trust God, the easier it will be for us to continue to do so.
Pic Of The Post
The pic of this post is a picture is called, The Maze. Have you ever been to one of those corn mazes that they usually have in the fall? You try and find your way through all of the twists and turns, wrong ways and dead ends. You’re walking by sight and it’s difficult to get through that maze. What if you had someone to give you directions through the maze? Someone to tell you where to turn at each section. It would be a whole lot easier to get through it. Well, life is sort of like a maze, and when we depend on ourselves, we make the wrong turns, and end up at dead ends, but when we depend on God to direct us, and put our faith in him, he will guide us through the maze of life, with all of it’s twists and turns. To view the pic of the post, just click on the “Pic Of The Post” link.
Please feel free to leave questions, or comments.