Wrong Turnings

We’re not far into the New Year, and the warm days of spring are still some way off. But it’s not too early to think about exploring the countryside, and making sure we go the right way to get where we’re going.  At the same time, it’s wise to ponder those wrong ways, too.  However closely we may study the map first, the roads or pathways don’t always fall into a recognisable pattern when seen on the ground.  We may travel for some time along a narrow track before comparing our progress to the map.  Maybe a side road or some other landmark is sufficiently similar to the map to convince us for a while longer that we are right, and that just a little further we will come to our goal.  But then, reluctantly, we have to conclude that this way goes nowhere and wasn’t the one we meant to take after all. 

You will have guessed, of course, that I’m not just referring to exploring the countryside, whether it be on foot or by car.  Our path through life is a journey too, and here too it is important to take the right roads.  Every day we have to make decisions, whether large or small, and to base these on correct information and the application of sound principles is essential.

I’m reminded of a prayer, which turns out not to be as old as I had thought, since its author, Reinhold Niebuhr, was born in the latter years of the nineteenth century.  The text exhorts God to “grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”  How well this applies to our whole-life-journey.  Often we see only one way to achieve our goals; there may be others, but we reject these out of hand.  Until, that is, we reach a point where forward progress is minimal, or nil.  Then we have to admit – perhaps with some degree of egg on face, and often with a need to accept some financial disadvantage – that there might be a better way, and we retrace our steps.

With a General Election coming up in a few months’ time, there are many who are asking themselves just who would make the country’s best political leader for the next five years. Some say that the best leader is one who follows the principle advocated in the Serenity Prayer and, as a result, is willing to acknowledge his mistakes.  That may be so, at a personal level although, for a politician considering the cost of losing face, it may be harder to contemplate.

Jesus must have wondered, as he prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane, whether perhaps He had taken a wrong turning when he ‘steadfastly set his face to go to Jerusalem’ (St Luke 9:51, KJV.)  However, He was reassured that He was doing the will of His Father, and we can only humbly respond with our gratitude for His sacrifice on the Cross, and call upon the benefits thus won for our redemption when we suffer the consequences of taking our own wrong turnings.