Delusional Spiritual Myopithy!" John 15:26-John ...

“Delusional Spiritual Myopithy!” John 15:26-John 16:4 Key verse(s) 26:“When the Counselor comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father, he will testify about me.”

Oh that dreaded sign! “Caution––Men Working!” Normally I am pretty good about planning out my day and making sure that there is enough time to get the work done on schedule and get to the places I need to get to on time. People who know me know that I am seldom if ever late. I like to build a cushion of time into every trip just so I can get there with a few minutes to spare and, perhaps, have enough time along the way for the unexpected. There is one thing, however, that neither I nor most drivers that are planners have much control over––detours.

Earlier in the week I had an appointment in a town that was exactly 17.9 miles from my office. (At least that was what the trip planner told me.) I was informed that if I drove on the preferred routes at the designated speeds I would arrive in exactly 29 minutes. I put in my cushion of five minutes and decided that I would need to leave the office precisely 34 minutes before the hour of my appointment. I left confident and assured that all was well. That is except for the fact that I did not know that one of the small towns I needed to pass through was detoured.

Although there were several warning signs as I approached the small town, until I breached the hill just outside of it, I hoped against hope that perhaps there was some mistake or perhaps it was some sort of road illusion. (It’s a condition called male, delusional, road myopithy.) But there it was, just over the hill; a road that simply ended with a big orange sign that read “Men Working––No Through Road.” Tempted as always to test out the situation, I crept around the sign and peered down the road. Sure enough! There were men working all over the place. There were torn up streets and exposed sewers. There were piles of gravel, bulldozers, dump trucks, backhoes and a county sheriff imposed just ahead of my crawling vehicle. In due diligence I decided to turn it around and backtrack back to the main road and follow the detour signs that had been so generously provided for my assistance just on the other side of the hill. I knew that with a bit of added speed and a clear head I could still make that appointment. Risking the rutted road and feigning that I was not “thru traffic” would not only be risky, it could land me with a pretty stiff fine. The safer and more secure, albeit unplanned route, would be the better choice.

I often think that God’s Holy Spirit works like that in our lives. He scouts out our paths long before we travel them. He spies out what needs to be corrected or eliminated in our lives and then sets to work putting up the caution signs. “Spiritual Detour Ahead!” “Holy Spirit at Work!” “No Traffic Here Unless You are Headed for a Crack-Up!” Since this is sometimes the easiest route or, perhaps, just the route we prefer by habit, we test the waters a bit and creep up on God’s hard-working Spirit. We have a choice. We can try to pass through unnoticed or simply feign that we are not that concerned with the trouble because, in truth, we really live here anyway and belong in this mess. That doesn’t fool God and it’s only delusional thinking on our part. In truth we don’t belong there and God has some pretty good reasons to block our paths. When it comes to taking the right spiritual path in life, its sometimes much safer to take the detours that are so graciously provided by our God through His Holy Spirit. When we see the warning signs it’s always better to heed them rather than test them. Delusional “Spiritual” myopithy? Probably not a good idea.