Press the arrow to listen to 10th Avenue North “By Your Side” as you read today’s devotion about God’s direction.

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Scripture
Trust in the LORD with all your heart
And do not lean on your own understanding.
In all your ways acknowledge Him,
And He will make your paths straight. Proverbs 3:5-6

Observation
This Post-It note sized verse was one of my mother’s favourites. As a child it seemed simple. But now life is complex. It’s tempting to look for more complicated things. However, this simplicity is just what we need.

Here’s my paraphrase:

Instead of trusting your instincts and distrusting God, totally lean into everything he says with every part of your willing and choosing. Hold your own opinion with skepticism, because you don’t know best.

Don’t worry about knowing what to do, instead just know God and then you will know what to do. Strive for the deep knowing between friends that is wordless but deep. Sitting in a silent room both know the others thoughts. As you fall into that friendship with the Lord you will know what is on his mind.

The blessing is not so much that God will take you to the right road, but that he will bring the good road up to meet you. He will straighten the kinks and bumps.

Application
The choice word in this is “acknowledge”. The Hebrew word is one we all know. “Yada”, made famous by Jerry Sienfeld, “Yada, yada, yada.” The word means more than “to know” as if God’s direction were just information. The word means more like “knowing”, because through deep relationship we know what is on the mind of a friend even without words. Life is confusing and requires direction not so that I will get directions and make my way, but so that through all the bewilderment I will come to really know the Lord.

Prayer
Father, today I want to know you more than I want to know my way. That is the test of whether I’m leaning on my understanding or my own. I don’t want just information, I want an ever deepening relationship with you. Amen.