The River and the Road

The day started well, went well, everything was fine... until something tripped that switch, and it happened again.

Anger.  The seventh member of our family.

No where to hide.  No way to stop it.  Bruising everything it comes into contact with.

Didn't help anymore that it was Valentines Day.  Love, hearts, sweets, and... anger.

I went to work the next day dazed.  My heart bruised.  Yet somehow, when I am most hurting, I find the most comfort in comforting others.  The next day, early, I had to fly on a trip.  I was tired.  Tired, emotionally bruised, hurting, stunned.

I flew.  I sat in airports.  I flew some more.  Halfway through the day, my thoughts began to come back to me, and I stared out the window with a quiet heart. By this time, we had gone over one ridge of mountains and were over a plain with a smaller ridge of mountains coming.  I looked out watching the snow on the peaks, the patterns in the ground.  And then I saw this:  (trust me, it looked better in real life, but...)

I had been sad, thinking this is going on so long, and does anyone care, and when is it going to end, and what is my life like living with this.

And I saw the view.  And smiled.

You see, we think like people.  People want to get from here to there, so they draw a straight line and make a road.  From here to there - there it is.  But when God traced the path of the rivers, He didn't draw a straight line.  Speed and efficiency weren't even in His dictionary.  He let the river wind.  Back and forth it went through the valley, sometimes almost touching itself as it would back around.  Going nowhere fast.

But in-between, it watered the whole valley.

God doesn't work on our time or think in our patterns.  Where I see that we seem to be back to where we have been before, so we can't be farther down the path, He sees just another twisting of the river watering the plain.  The river still reached its destination.  Just on God's timing.

And quietly, I heard Him speak to me.

  Don't judge the progress by the road when I drew the rivers.