This podcast was born during the COVID-19 lockdown. I wanted to find a way to serve and encourage people while I was locked in my house and unable to minister in the way I usually do as a missionary teacher. It was an ugly time for missionaries since travel was nearly impossible and our schools were all shut down. I considered many titles and themes for this podcast, but finally settled on Walking the Way. Rather than theology, apologetics, or heaven help us all—politics, I wanted to focus on walking the way of Jesus, encouraging people to make their faith a more tangible and fruitful part of their everyday life.

Today, I am going back to the beginning and looking at the other path, the path that has been misleading us ever since the Garden of Eden. It’s the path that doesn’t trust God, the path of selfish desire, impatience, envy, and pride. We were all on it until we repented and put our trust in Jesus.

The other way scarcely needs explaining because we are immersed in it daily via the media and our culture. But because it is so common, it’s also easy to suffer from “home blindness,” like the spot on the carpet that has been there for so long that you stopped noticing it years ago. And while we may be able to resist the coarser sins of this world, the attitudes that drive them hit us from so many angles that we need help to keep them from seeping in and slowly turning our heads away from the path of Jesus.

This is why the book of Hebrews so frequently warns us to be aware of the danger of wandering away. It tells us to encourage each other every day. Consider this passage:

Take care, brothers,

The urgency in this passage is focused on the slow hardening of our hearts brought about by the “deceitfulness of sin.” The other road is constantly calling, constantly making us offers both large and small, tempting us to turn and look away from the path of Jesus. The best defence against this onslaught of tempting ideas is the help of our brothers and sisters in the faith. We must encourage each other in the faith daily.

Time for an analogy

There are two kinds of housekeepers.

One allows the house to fall into a terrible state and then struggles to make it livable, then kicks back and allows it to fall back into that awful state again, and the cycle repeats. The other kind of housekeeper constantly monitors the condition of things and immediately cleans or repairs each thing.

When it comes to our spiritual houses, Hebrews is adamant that we must be that second kind of housekeeper. But more than that, as individual members of the house of God, we have to care for each other to keep the house of God clean. We have a responsibility to our brothers and sisters that we too often neglect. Maybe it’s the other road calling and telling us that such care is unwanted meddling. Or maybe our motives are not for their best interest or God’s, but ours, so out of a nagging guilt, we do nothing. But no matter the motivation or the lack thereof, we need to pray through the noise and get to the place where we can, with loving hearts, encourage the faith of others. In the process, our own faith will be restored as the body of Christ gains in health and strength.

If you are like me, you have spent too much time pondering and playing along the other road. And way too much time sitting back and waiting for others to change.

This Week

Let’s decide together to decisively turn from the other road of mistrusting God’s goodness, which leads to unbelief, self-will, sin, and ultimately destruction. Let’s walk together on the Way of Jesus and encourage each other every day so no one becomes hard-hearted and returns to that “other way.”

Have a great week!