The Steps of a Good man are ordered by the Lord – Psalm 37:23
I was driving to the office when the scripture randomly came to the forefront of my brain this morning. I responded and said “why not the leaps of a good man or the crawls?” and that is how we ended up with today’s Quench My Thirst blog post.
By the way, this is often how conversations with God happen, not always through a loud audible voice that calls you out and makes you stop whatever you are doing. The Lord will tell you or remind you His way, that He is the one ordering your steps and maybe you will respond with your own response or you won’t respond at all and that will be that for you that day. End of conversation. Something else we could reflect on about the voice of God and the importance of engaging it.
I digress, let’s go back and uncover what I learned when I asked my question of why the Lord orders steps and not leaps or crawls.
The scripture itself speaks to God actively guiding, establishing, and fortifying the daily life and decisions of those who trust and follow Him. Now establishment means firming up a path, so that even if one goes out of the rail somehow, they can still find their way back to the path ordered for them. But this does not make me understand the steps part of it, let me tell you my logic. There are instances where we have gone off the rails, and you would think that maybe when we find our way back in the path, we have the grace to leap or crawl back into that path from all the misfortunes of being outside of His will. But scripture only speaks about steps in this instance and we do know God is intentional, He does not waste a word.
Well, I learned something powerful about the idea of steps in someone’s walk with Christ and what they represent. I hope it encourages you in your Christian walk with God.
- Steps actually represent faithfulness. Each “step” implies an incremental, daily walk, whereas a “leap” could imply an impulsive jump and a hurried spirit. God calls us to a daily walk with Him, not just jump to a conclusion but fellowship. Steps represent a continuous, moment-by-moment dependency on God’s guidance. It’s more of a long-term commitment to a relationship. Here I am reminded of a decision one makes towards a healthy lifestyle. This kind of decision could be driven by internal motivations like a health scare or alert or it could be driven by external decisions like one’s shape changing because of weight gain and maybe not fitting into some of your favourite clothes. There are usually two types of decisions one can make in these moments, decide to do a step-by-step process of changing your eating habits, when you feel a certain way because of your good eating habits, you may decide to incorporate gym. This is motivation driven by the previous steps you have taken. But on the other hand, you could have a person decide to take a leap and to do an operation and cut out everything you don’t like about yourself and never go back to the step by step process book the doctor had given you upon consultation. After the operation, the relationship with the doctor will come to a close. This relationship of a leap is instant and short term. Scripture says “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path” (Psalm 119:105). A lamp does not light the entire journey (a leap); it lights the immediate next step.
- Steps generally involve a process. In the process of our walk with God our character gets developed. God is more interested in who we become as a result of our journey with Him more than what we get because we walk with Him. What we get was always ours, but fellowship with God is the real prize when you understand that your sinful nature is what separated you from God. A walk with God is an invitation to draw near and become who you have always been meant to be. Leaps in nature circumvent the process of refinement and character building. I once lived in Cape Town and had two routes to go home to Umtata. Anyone who has had to travel that route knows how exhausting it can be. Often one would have to choose between the Garden route (long and breathtaking) or Karoo (dry and quicker). One of the things I remember well is how difficult it was to close the last lap driving between Ngcobo and Mthatha if I had taken the Karoo because of the poor roads, poor sight because it’s at night and fatigue. However, driving through the Garden route would often be associated with stops, enjoyment of the scenery, a clear destination with less worry of the time it would take as the road had provision and motivation for unforeseen delays. There was less worry of getting to a destination by a certain time but more of a let’s where the road takes us. The Garden route could be the steps that are ordered by the Lord (Instead of “let’s see where the road takes us”, you now say “Lets see where the Lord takes us”).
- Steps are more deliberate and established. They are not stumbles. Steps are often following a pathway. Something established with a purpose. But the word of God makes provision even for our stumbles in our walk with God. Psalms 37:24 says “Though he stumbles, he will not fall headlong, for the LORD holds him by the hand” Because steps are ordered, if we stumble, it is not a disastrous fall because we are walking, not jumping or running. A fall from a jump usually hits harder than a stumble. God does not want us to fall to a place where we can’t recover, this is why He orders steps not leaps.
- Steps reflect God’s attentive nature and how He values us. God is attentive to the details, He does not do things with the pressure of time, because He lives outside of time. He does everything for each one of us from a place of value. The Bible shows us of this characteristic in Luke 12:7 where it says “Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows“. This is how meticulous He is about each one of us.
- Steps guard against traps of life. How often have you heard the saying “Take a leap of faith”? Did you know that’s actually not scriptural but it sounds like it. Traps often catch us when we are hurried and rushing for a decision or an outcome and they sound like the truth. We find ourselves slipping into errors that would not often become if we exercised patience and waited until we could discern what the right thing to do is. In Matthew 4: 5-7 the Bible narrates a story of how the devil tried to trap Jesus by asking Him to jump (leap) from the temple, saying God would catch Him as written in scripture. But Jesus responded with Godly wisdom and told Him how such an act would be a test of God, something one who knows the character of the father would not need proof of. The idiom “take a leap of faith” sounds good but actually biblical faith is rooted in the character of God, not a blind guess which is often what people mean when they say “take a leap of faith”.
My prayer for you is that you also like me get encouraged by the fact that the Lord chose steps over leaps because He was being meticulous about our lives, because He wanted fellowship with us not a relationship that was driven by things. He wanted us to come home daily and speak to Him about our journeys. This is a father who is after a relationship with us.
Thank God, Jesus pursued me.
LM
Quench My Thirst 