Directed Steps

The LORD directs the steps of the godly. He delights in every detail of their lives.

Psalm 37:23

The Lord directs us step-by-step, detail by detail. He doesn’t give us a map and say, “Here’s where you are and here’s where you’re going. I’ll meet you there.” Instead, he directs us in such a way that it requires a desperate dependence on the living Lord. Take the example of Abraham.

“Go to a place I’ll show you.” The call is vague and lacks definition: “Head out that way, and I’ll let you know when you’re there.” He left Abraham in the kind of uncertainty that we resist with all our might. God sends Abraham out to wander on a journey that is unmapped, undefined, marked by its very indeterminacy and, I think, intentionally so.

It’s a journey designed to feel like wandering. The way God planned it, if Abraham had any hope of landing on the promise, the journey would require that Abraham be ever alert and listening. Every step mattered because every step was carrying Abraham to the promise and the provision of God. Otherwise, Abraham would never know when the next step would be the one where God says, “You’re there!”

Abraham’s obedience was to put one foot in front of the other. To take the next small step without trying to project several steps down the road.

Look what happens to small steps when the Holy Spirit is involved. One small step becomes a stride. Your best effort, under his power, becomes his best effort. I think of it like this: have you ever walked on a moving sidewalk? You take a step and you wind up several steps farther because the moving sidewalk carried your small, ordinary step with its forward-moving power. Take that same step on a normal sidewalk, and you have progressed one step. Take it on a moving sidewalk, and that step has been carried and extended by the power beneath it.

Father, direct my steps. I am desperately dependent on your leading.

Have you been holding back from a risky, costly course to which you know in your heart God has called you? Hold back no longer. Your God is faithful to you, and adequate for you. You will never need more than He can supply, and what He supplies, both materially and spiritually, will always be enough for the present.

J. I. Packer(1926–), Canadian theologian