lent 17 - defiance

They are digging up the road in our village right outside our house.  There is the most enormous hole, a huge digger and an eight foot fence right across the road with just enough room for pedestrians to walk through from one side of the roadworks to the other.  To say the road is ' closed' would be an understatement.   There are signs six miles away saying the road ahead is closed.  There are signs at every junction on the approach to the village.  The last signs are two hundred yards from the roadworks with a line of cones across the road leaving enough space for those of us who live beside the hole to get through.   All week I have been watching as hundreds of cars have driven past all those road signs, through the cones and right up to the eight foot high metal fence before having to turn round and drive back the way they came.  People clearly don't believe the signs when they say ' ROAD CLOSED'. 

I've done it myself of course.  I've seen the signs and thought ' Ach well maybe the roadworks are over an they havent takent the signs down yet.'  or ' Maybe it's not really closed its just that they dont want too many people taking this route'.    Ridiculous isnt it?  They dont go putting up roadsigns for no reason.  So what is it about human beings that refuses to believe something clearly stated - especially if it is going to cost us some inconvenience.?

God signposts things pretty clearly.  Sometimes He says ' Don't go there - it will be a dead end, a waste of time, you'll only have to turn round and come back again'.   And sometimes we go anyway.  It's a trust thing isnt it?  Do we trust that someone else knows better than us?  And then of course it's a pride thing.  Nobody could possibly know better than us.  And perhaps there's a measure of curiosity too - what could be so bad that we are forbidden it??  Reminds me of a story I once heard about a woman, a piece of fruit and a snake.

So here is my challenge to you - next time you come across a road closure sign ( or a diversion or a locked door or anything else which inconveniences you and takes you out of your planned way)  why not just believe the instruction without question and do as the sign says.  Look on it as training in the physical for authority in the spiritual.   To obey is better than sacrifice . 😊