Reflections on the Road: Week Eight

Reflections on the Road

Week Eight

The Path of Righteousness

Focus Passage: Psalm 23

Focus Verse: Psalm 23:3

Bible Reading: Luke 6-12

      One of my favorite Poets was a man named Robert Frost.  The best-known Robert Frost poem is entitled "The Road Not Taken" (https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44272/the-road-not-taken).  In this poem a traveler comes to a 'fork' in the path that goes in two directions.  Both paths look appealing and he regrets that he will not be able to take both.  The poem ends with these iconic last five lines

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

      The traveler in Frost's poem took the path less traveled by and it made all the difference.  Likewise we are a people that come to the proverbial fork in the road where the path diverges into two leaving us with a choice to make.  One path is a path of unrighteousness which is broad and wide.  Many take this pathway into condemnation.  But there is a second pathway and that is the pathway of righteousness.  The Psalmist speaks of this in verse three when he writes "He leads me in paths of righteousness for His name sake."  Remember this Psalm is visualized from the eyes of the sheep.  Sheep are creatures that naturally wander and get lost.  They stray into barren fields.  The Bible says that we are a lot like sheep, Isaiah 53:6 says that "we all like sheep have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way..."  We need a path of righteousness but we can't find that path on our own.  The Bible says that there are none of us righteous and that our best effort at righteousness is nothing more then filthy rags.  How can we get on a path of righteousness?  How can we have a right relationship with God if our best effort falls woefully short?  We need a Good Shepherd to put us on another path, to guide us and lead us.  As a believer we have been moved from being tools of unrighteousness to righteousness.  We have been given the righteousness of Christ through His death, burial, and resurrection.  It is because of this that God asks us to live righteously, to stay the path and follow the Good Shepherd.  When we sin we stray from the path, when we obey we stay on the path.  Why does God put us onto another path?  Because He is good.  Because He is love.  And for His name's sake.  Our walk reflects directly on our Good Shepherd.  Our path determines how closely we follow the Good Shepherd.  May your path honor Him.

Reflections on the Road:

The goal of "reflecting" is to examine our life.  Take a moment right now and ask yourself what path you are currently walking, one of righteousness or unrighteousness?  The path you are one is determined by who you are following.  If you are following the Good Shepherd you will find your pathway to be one of righteousness.  The question isn't so much which path are you on but who are you following.