Trust your compass? | Previous Challenge Entry

how it works

TITLE: Trust your compass? | Previous Challenge Entry
By Mike Hill
05/11/16
LEAVE COMMENT ON ARTICLE
SEND A PRIVATE COMMENT
ADD TO MY FAVORITES

As one with two ancestors whose last breath contained the dead dry dust of the Alamo, North may conjure up quite different feelings for me than it does others. My brain senses that, by now, North must either have a very large ego or some sort of inferiority complex. There is something always pointing to it. During good times and bad, proud times and not so proud, incessantly, unrepentantly, dispassionately the compass arrow is always pointing North. Dependable and steadfast the compass arrow is something we can always trust. The cornerstone of all navigation, it is the rock upon which we lay our very survival. Pilots have to block out thoughts of “It can’t be right.” More than one pilot has spiraled their plane into the ocean because they trusted their feelings rather than their instruments.

Getting lost is no fun! The trees close in on you, you hear things you didn’t hear before, and a sense of claustrophobia creeps in. Your space seems to be getting smaller, your heart beats faster, your breaths come short and fast, that little place in your brain is screaming “Let’s get outta here!’ With a confused mind you miss signs, you doubt, your judgement isn’t sound, your anxiety level is on overflow. The road is just over the next hill – or is it? It has to be – doesn’t it? Its time to S.T.O.P (Stop, Think, Observe, and Plan).

You flip out your GPS – batteries dead and useless. You make a mental note to carry some extra batteries next time, if you get out! You try you cell phone. No signal. Then you remember the little compass in the butt of your knife. If I can just find North, I know the road is that direction. It’ll point North – I can trust it – or can I?

Discernment, to our contemporaries, is an eleven-letter dirty word. The premonition of judgement stymies many. However, discernment is necessary for a successful Godly life. The compass points North doesn’t it. Well actually, yes and no. It points to magnetic north, rather than true north – points on the earth that can be a thousand miles apart. To confuse things even more, that distance can change from year to year – magnetic North moves – you might say it is relative. In some places, Memphis, TN for example, the difference between true North and magnetic North is negligible. While other places, say, Portland, OR, there may be 16 degrees difference. If you want to arrive at the North Pole, you better be taking a different route than what your compass says. You have to adjust – the map and the compass are not going to adjust for you!

Interferences from magnetic fields can also affect the direction the compass points. When navigating, care must be taken to eliminate this outside interference lest we end up in places we don’t want to end up. In living a Christian life we utilize many pointers to guide us. The Bible points us to Jesus. Jesus points us to God. These pointers never vary. What we have to watch out for is interference. Our feelings can lead us to different pointers. The worldly view can cause our path to end in a different place. Satan would like nothing else than to cause us to doubt these pointers and spiral into an eternal life apart from God. When you feel this happening S.T.O.P.! Trust God, trust Jesus, trust the Bible, and make sure you really do know how to use it. And the only way to rightly use it is to rightly know it!

PREVIOUS ENTRY | NEXT ENTRY
SUBMIT YOUR ENTRY FOR THIS WEEK'S CHALLENGE

The opinions expressed by authors may not necessarily reflect the opinion of FaithWriters.com.

If you died today, are you absolutely certain that you would go to heaven? You can be right now. CLICK HERE

JOIN US at FaithWriters for Free. Grow as a Writer and Spread the Gospel.