Clear Direction From God Is Found In Our Obedience

Clear direction from God does not necessarily put us on the straightest path.

The Hebrew word for ‘right’ in todays verse is ‘yashar,’ which can also be translated as a straight line, and this is the reason why we so often misunderstand the clear direction from God. If we render the verse more literally, the full meaning becomes clear: “there is a way straight before a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death.” In other words, the way that seems the most obvious, the most logical, the most sensible, the way that is right there in our face, quite often is the way that leads to spiritual death. The ways of the world are not the ways of God. He will use foolish things to confound the wise. The moment we come to a place where we fall back on our own intuitive and experiential logic, that is the moment to put the handbrake on and look back to God.

The biggest problem is that we take only one literal meaning of ‘straight’ and apply that to our spiritual walk. In our minds, ‘straight’ essentially means ‘in a straight line,’ which implies no curves, rough patches, detours, or difficulties. Psalms is filled with verses which speak of God making our paths straight, and each of these is trued. In a spiritual context, however, ‘straight’ refers not to ease of passage but to the fact that God’s road is the only road that lies before us which will get us to the right destination. Clear direction from God may put us in rough places, but it will always put us in His will.