If you want your journey to count

---

The truth is that our finest moments are most likely to occur when we are feeling deeply uncomfortable, unhappy or unfulfilled.

For it is only in such moments, propelled by our discomfort, that we are likely to step out of our ruts and start searching for different ways or truer answers.
~ M. Scott Peck, The Road Less Traveled

---

In my early twenties, The Road Less Traveled greatly influenced me. Although its author M. Scott Peck, an American psychiatrist who died in 2005 at 69 years old, wasn’t decidedly Christian at the time (that would come a few years later), his book was deeply spiritual nonetheless.

Its opening line piqued the interest of many:
       “Life is difficult.”

He compared our view of reality to a map:

If the map is true and accurate, we will generally know where we are, and if we have decided where we want to go, we will generally know how to get there.

If the map is false and inaccurate, we generally will be lost.

Unfortunately, this obvious truth is often ignored.

The Problem:
If we’re on the wrong road, we’ll end up at the wrong destination, dawdling on paths that lead to nowhere or worse.

The Solution:
Make our journeys count; check the map to be sure we’re heading in the right direction.

Scripture speaks often of journeys and highways and roads and ways (Greek word: hodos).

• For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life...
  Matthew 7:14
• ...you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways.
  Luke 1:76
• You have made known to me the paths of life...
  Acts 2:28 (from Psalm 16:11)

And my favorites:

•    “And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. And you know the way to where I am going.”
     Thomas said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?”
     Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”
  John 14:3-6

So while the road less traveled may be difficult and the way be narrow, at least there is a road. There is a way.

And its name is Jesus.

We don’t have to clear our own paths and pave our own roads.  There already is a way of salvation (Acts 16:17) and it is the most excellent way (1 Corinthians 12:31).

It is a living way, a holy way, opened up to us, one that we can confidently walk in and stay clean on (Hebrews 10:19-22).

We can belong to it (Acts 9:2), worship God on it (Acts 24:14), and be known by the LORD in it (Psalm 1:6)

Scott Peck didn’t always get it right in The Road Less Traveled, but he had it correct here:

We must always hold truth, as best as we can determine it, to be more important, more vital to our self-interest, than our comfort.

And not only to our self-interests, but also to those with us along the journey. And most importantly, to the glory of the Father.

By sticking to the truth map in the Word (John 1:1), our journey will be blessed (Psalm 1:1-2).

Even if the way gets hard and the view sometimes is limited, if we’re on the right road, side by side with our Savior, we can delight in the journey, take roadblocks in stride, and share what we see along the way with others.

May each of our journeys be significant, purposeful, and God-honoring on the road less traveled.

* * *

How is your journey along the road less traveled?