You ever feel like you’re stuck in
a rut?
You struggle out of bed, bump along
to your standard breakfast, rattle on to your tolerable job, just keep going
through the motions, same old tasks, same old people, same old words, lies,
sins. Nothing ever seems to change. God hasn’t accomplished anything for you
(or with you) that you’ve noticed in months. You’re old and grouchy and tired (no
matter how young the calendar says you are) and others keep passing you up on
the highway of life every day.
Sound familiar? I have those days.
Some days I have them more than others. The days when nothing is really out of
the ordinary... but nothing really seems to be a blessing, either. The ones
where God seems to have wound you up, spun you... and walked away. The days you’re
caught on an alto drone note and just marking time. Meh. Bleagh. So what?
We had a Bible study this morning.
In the midst of eggs and sausage and earnest discussion, Proverbs XIII 15 caught
my ear.
“Good sense
wins favor, but the way of the treacherous is an enduring rut.”
Wait. The treacherous get stuck in ruts?
I know this the alternative
translation, the one in the footnotes, but to my mind, it is far more
picturesque. At one summer camp in my youth in Texas, there was a piece of the
old Chisholm Trail where you could still see 150-year-old-ruts, etched by
covered wagons, inches deep, in solid rock. Those teamsters rolling north were
set in their ways, it seems—just like the treacherous.
But these treacherous ones require
a direct object to their verb. To whom are they treacherous?
A) A loyal servant?
B) A friend?
C) A king?
The correct answer is, for the Christian,
“All of the above” for Christ fills all those offices. If Proverbs is right
(and it is) only the fools, the wicked, the ungrateful are left to plod down
life on the same road, shoulders bowed and bulling through by the main force of
their will. Glance at the preceding part of chapter thirteen. They are unable
to turn away from the “snares of death” because they have no good sense. And
sense comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. And this reverence for
the commandment mentioned earlier extends to all God’s words, not just his
written ones.
Has he spoken you a rainy, grey,
textureless day? Thank him for the blessing of crops that grow and water that
goes down cool. Has he spoken you a slow, meandering life? Thank him that he
knows your frame and did not burn you out in a flaming lesson on
overconfidence. Did he give you a community where you seem the least among the
brethren, able to contribute nothing of value? Thank him for the opportunity to
grow and learn if not to give. And if you’re growing and learning, you won’t
feel left out and static.
Wake up and feel stuck in a rut?
Thank God and wait. Sometimes he’s just waiting for you to let go of the
steering wheel.
