“Go Your Own Way”
125 Alma Young Adults (November 2009)
M. Levitt & C. Parish
We have read the word of God in Deuteronomy 7 that says “you are a people holy to the Lord; the Lord your God has chosen you out of all the peoples on the face of the earth to be His people, His treasured possessions”. This is a big promise of destiny in our lives, yet with that promise will come confusion and misdirection. We can become all too caught up with producing results and finding our own path that we can miss the point of our destiny: becoming a people “holy to the Lord”.
In this talk, we will discuss some of the ramifications of “going our own way” and the alternate blessings that come when we seek God in our divine moments of destiny.
The prophet Isaiah says this in Isaiah 30:
“Woe to the obstinate children,”
declares the LORD,
“to those who carry out plans that are not mine,
forming an alliance, but not by my Spirit,
heaping sin upon sin…
Therefore, this is what the Holy One of Israel says:
“Because you have rejected this message,
relied on oppression
and depended on deceit,
this sin will become for you
like a high wall, cracked and bulging,
that collapses suddenly, in an instant.
It will break in pieces like pottery,
shattered so mercilessly
that among its pieces not a fragment will be found
for taking coals from a hearth
or scooping water out of a cistern.”
Have you ever gone your own way? Have you ever decided that you knew what needed to be done and grabbed up your bags and went?
What is it that causes us to call our own shots – to “go our own way” – when it comes to our destiny? (Lack of faith, lack of knowledge of God, lack of time spent with Him, too much pride/self-reliance, self sufficiency)
There’s a song titled “Go your own way” with these lyrics:
If I could, I’d give you my world.
Open up, everything’s waiting for you. (c) Lindsey Buckingham/Fleetwood Mac
Even though those lyrics have a different meaning, those words can easily be used to describe what God wants for us. He wants us to have His world; to open things up for us.
We have God’s destiny waiting for us – some of us have it on the doorstep waiting for us to step into – but we don’t always do that. We turn to ourselves instead and “go our own way”.
Maybe it’s because you’ve bought into the same lie that Eve did when she bit the apple. When you bite the apple you rely on yourself instead of God – that was the whole point – the apple was supposed to make her into her own God. She could choose her own destiny and determine what was right and wrong for her life.
If that’s you, you will call your own shots and make your own judgments. You are literally making yourself into your own God tonight.
This might seem like an obvious question, but why does this self-reliance in the big things of life and in our day to day lives diminish the power of God in our destiny?
Secondly, maybe you genuinely want to put God first. You know who He is and want Him to guide your destiny, but you’re too busy. About 60 percent of Christians say that the busyness of life gets in the way of developing their relationship with God.
What’s keeping you busy these days?
Luke 10:38-42 says this:
38As Jesus and his disciples were on their way, he came to a village where a woman named Martha opened her home to him. 39She had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what he said. 40But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made. She came to him and asked, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!”
41″Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried and upset about many things, 42but only one thing is needed. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.”
It seems that Martha allowed busyness to distract her from spending time with Jesus. When she welcomed him into her home, she was preoccupied with preparing the meal, washing their feet, and making sure that the “doing” was taken care of.
Martha’s busyness and preparation turned into her own work that ended up distracting her from sitting with Jesus and reflecting on his words. She got so caught up with producing something that she missed the chance to sit and receive from Jesus first and foremost.
*If you are too busy for God, you are too busy.
Think about the passage Jesus speaks in his Sermon on the Mount. He says in Matthew 6:33 to “seek first the Kingdom of God and all other things will be taken care of in you”. What does this mean in regards to our busyness?
Are you carving out the rest you need in order to truly seek Him first? Is your day so stressful and filled with work that you miss the whole point of destiny – being with God?
To summarize:
1. You can’t chase your destiny without God involved. You will eventually fall short of your full destiny that God has for you – either because you are relying on yourself or because you are too busy to seek God first.
2. If you’re too busy you’re not spending enough time with God. Stepping into the life God has for you requires that we are first spending a great deal of time at the feet of Jesus.
3. If you’re not spending time in the Word, you are not experiencing the true rest needed to seek Him. This is why the idea of finding rest is so important to our spiritual walks – we cannot grow close to someone who we find no time for.
Concluding thoughts: God calls us His treasured possession and “a holy people called out of all the nations of the earth”. He has a destiny for you to step into, (beginning even tonight). Confusion will set in. Misdirection will overcome you in the face of this destiny, yet there is one way you can be sure to be guided into the future: giving up the need to “go your own way” and seeking first God’s Kingdom each and every day of our lives. Growing close to Him – sitting at His feet – is the only way our future is left in His hands rather than our own.
Let’s commit to making that time the pinnacle of our days, now, as we all look forward to stepping into the future that God has for us.
