CONTROL

II Corinthians 5:14 – For the love of Christ CONTROLS and urges and impels us.

I've recently been on a few long distance road trips and there's a strange, but not new, phenomena I wonder if you're aware of. There are still a few stretches of highway that are 55 miles an hour, believe it or not. I was in the right hand lane, the "slow" lane, and noticed that everyone was flying past me. My natural instinct was to speed up in order to catch up and remain in the flow of traffic. Does "go with the flow" sound familiar? So I accelerated up to 60 MPH. Again, traffic was whizzing by at what I would estimate to be around 65-70 MPH. I knew that if I increased my speed above five miles over the speed limit that I was doing so at my own risk. I couldn't believe or understand why the masses were so blatantly breaking the law.

Guess what I did? I pressed that wonderful button called Cruise Control and let not my heart be troubled. There's something about that button that gives us freedom in more ways than one. It's a shield and a safeguard as well as a convenience. Even though the traffic continued at their Daytona 500 pace, I was safe within the bubble of Cruise Control.

Do you realize that within each believer we too have a Cruise Control button and it's called the Holy Spirit. We have a built in warning system that throws up the red caution flag when we start to get distracted and disoriented by the crowd. We have God's word that should be daily planted in our hearts as a lamp unto our feet and a light unto our path so that we can stay on the right course and make the right decisions. If we willfully choose to tap into this Holy Cruise Control and obey the Spirit of the Living God within us, coupled with his mighty, unshakable word, then we can sail through life in the boundaries of His bubble.

I'm not saying there won't be storms and accidental wrong turns, but we don't have to be led by the crowd or confused about the rules. No more will we have to be checking our rear view mirror in worry and sweating when we see blue lights. We will have a peace that passes all understanding, and we will reach our destination in one piece at the proper time.