“The shortest distance between two points is a straight line.” This and similar aphorisms were often repeated by my father as I grew up. I’m sure it was spoken in various contexts, but I suspect it was most often associated with getting somewhere faster or something being done more efficiently.
It’s certainly true in the sphere of math, geometry, and spatial reckoning. But sometimes we try to apply this rule in a figurative sense and it falls short. While a few chart their desired life destination at a young age and stumble upon a direct route to get there, they are the exception.
For most of us, it is more of a winding path, with some unexpected twists and turns along the way. Moses was saved from government-mandated infanticide as a baby and chosen by God to be a great deliverer of His people. Incredibly, he came to be raised and schooled in Pharoah’s household, seemingly the ideal place of power and influence. But it was not from this obvious position of royalty, youth, and strength that Moses fulfilled his mission. Not at all.
Instead it was an 80-year-old Moses (who’d spent 40 years herding sheep in the wilderness) who received the call and empowerment of the Most High. And how did it happen? He was leading a flock to the backside of a desert and saw something interesting off his path–a bush set on fire yet not consumed. Moses said to himself, “I’m going to turn aside and see what’s going on here.” We’re told in Exodus 3 that when the Lord saw that Moses had turned aside to look, that’s when He spoke to him. Interesting. If Moses had just kept going straight to the backside of the desert, intent on his goal, he might have missed this entirely. He had to turn aside. And it wasn’t a young, strong, brash Moses who delivered the millions of Israelites from Egypt, but a weathered, seasoned elder who had learned humility and reverence.
Hundreds of years after Moses, young David was anointed the next king of Israel. Yet his ascension to the throne was anything but a straight line. He had to run for years from his half-crazed predecessor who wanted to kill him. For companions, he had a rag-tag crew of men all described as either distressed, disgruntled, or in debt! Yet God led him on a circuitous, character-building, faith-challenging route to the throne, and blessed his kingdom.
Straight-line paths are very appealing to those in a hurry. But God is not in a hurry. He is more interested in who we are than in how directly we arrive. He seems to have all the time in the world, and invites us to be shepherded by Him, to come unto Him, to learn from Him, to find rest in Him (Psalm 23, Matthew 11:28-29).
The shortest distance between two points may be a straight line, but as anyone who’s driven across Kansas can attest, straight lines are boring. It’s the curves that make life interesting.0
So true-to-life and beautifully put, JB – thanks!