During our church gathering this morning, the preacher asked how we would have crossed the Red Sea if we had been one of the Israelite people when God opened up the sea for their escape from the Egyptian army.  His suspicion is that we would all have approached it like he would have — very cautiously, testing the ground and the walls of water with hesitancy and fear before fully heading out and getting through the unknown “bottom of the sea” territory as quickly as possible.  I would guess that’s more true than I would like it to be.  I like to think I would put my hand in the wall of water — running it up and down, making patterns with my fingers as I walked along — but somehow, I think fear would have kept me from touching it.

The real question, though, was not what would I have done but what do I do now when life appears to be a desert with no way of escape and God opens up a “sea” in front of me and says, “Step right in!”  Do I trust Him enough to do it?  How hesitant are my steps?  How much do I enjoy the journey and how much do I just hurry through — trying to get this part over with as soon as possible because who knows how long God will continue to hold up the “walls”?

Yet that is primarily just theory — the what would you, what if questions that have unproven answers until actually put to the test.  The hard part came through another set of questions — “What is the “sea” in front of you and will you be still long enough to see and trust God’s way through it?”.  Wow!  Is there something in front of me that is preventing me from escaping my past that God wants me to be still long enough to be able to see His path through it?  Is there a path that He has already opened for me but fear and logic has kept me from even considering it?

These were the hard questions this morning and I don’t have answers to them.  The only answer I know is to seek God more fully and learn to trust Him completely.  There’s an old chorus that I remember from years ago that goes something like this: “Got any rivers you think are uncrossable, Got any mountains you can’t tunnel through, God specializes in things thought impossible, He does the things others cannot do.”

I pray that you and I would consider the surroundings of our life and remember what God has called us to.  When there appears to be a sea in front of us, may we be quiet before the LORD long enough to hear and see the path that He will make and may we be courageous enough to walk through it with Him.