It's Monday . . . and like Willie Nelson, I'm On The Road Again! Shannan and I are taking a serpentine route through the back roads of Georgia, Alabama, and Tennessee. It's a longer drive touring the two-lane blacktop, but it is sooooooo much more fun.
A few years back, I traveled more often. In fact, I was gone so much that one of my boys had Willie Nelson's On The Road Again as my ringtone for his phone.
These days I travel less. But all the driving on this trip has me thinking about our bigger journey, the ultimate road trip we call LIFE. When I review the Scriptures, God reminds me that on this ride I am just a temporary traveler:
But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul. Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation. 1 Peter 2:9-12 ESV
Today, I face an open road with a pretty quick car. The day is mine, or so it seems. Peter reminds me that I belong to God ("a people for his own possession"), that I have a mission (to "proclaim the excellencies of him"), that my time is short ("I urge you as sojourners and exiles"), and that I should not get distracted ("abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul").
Yes, I am on the road again! For that matter, I'm always on the road. So are you! We are sojourners and exiles, temporary travelers on our way to our true home.1 In the meantime, we're not just piling up miles on the odometer of life. We are On The Road Again--and not parked in some cemetery--in order to proclaim His excellence.
How might you do that on your journey today?
________________
[1]The letters of James and Peter. 2000 (W. Barclay, lecturer in the University of Glasgow, Ed.). The Daily study Bible series, Rev. ed. Philadelphia: The Westminster Press.