Matthew 3:1-12
I’ve never been on a long car trip that didn’t eventually take me through an area of road construction. Maybe the guardrails needed replacing. Maybe the lanes needed re-striping. Or maybe the entire roadbed had to be redone. Whatever the case, traffic slowed down as we inched by the site before returning to normal speeds. It’s frustrating, but it leads to improved roads so it needs to be done.
Both the writer of 2 Peter and John the Baptist know that improvements need to be made in the way we are traveling spiritually. Matthew quotes the prophet Isaiah as he describes John’s ministry: “Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight” (Matthew 3:3). The language in 2 Peter is far more direct. “They (false teachers of the gospel) have hearts trained in greed…They have left the straight road and gone astray…” (2 Peter 2:14-15).
What does it mean to walk a straight path, to travel in the proper direction? It means living in tune with God’s will. It means opening ourselves to what it is that God is doing in our lives. In the words of Micah, it means to “do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with your God” (Micah 6:8). The good news is that God has not left us to do the “road work” alone. In Jesus Christ, God walks the path with us, points out the dangerous curves and the icy patches that can cause us so much trouble. With God’s grace we are able to repair our spiritual lives and walk a straighter highway, the highway of God.
Prayer: Lord, help us to live in faithful obedience to you and to walk straight paths untainted by greed and selfishness. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
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