 life choices
Last week here at the Norwich Vineyard we began looking at some aspects of the life journey of David. When you think of your own life journey thus far, I wonder what are the moments that have defined your path whether good or bad. There are probably many but some might be really significant. For others it is just an accumulation of choices, events and happenings in a seemingly powerless life, things that have just happened to you whether you wanted them to or not.
Travel journeys can be weird like that as well. Back in history you marked your path from inn to inn. You could also navigate from church tower to church tower as each one was different in shape. In my youth you looked for sign posts and studied the road atlas. Today we can download from ‘AA route finder’ or follow the instructions from a ‘sat nav’. But how many times do you end up somewhere you never intended? Someone I knew loaded up the destination slightly incorrectly on his ‘sat nav’ and ended up miles from where he needed to be. Large articulated-lorries end up trying to find their way around tiny rural villages with lanes smaller than the width of the vehicle!
Young David was a shepherd. I am not convinced that that was his chosen career choice but rather something that was put on him because he didn’t quite fit in with the rest of his family. He had a different mother to his seven brothers, it was probably a little embarrassing and so he was shipped off into the back of beyond to look after sheep whilst the older brothers did the manly stuff like being in the army with King Saul. But while he spent time just doing as he was told he learned a whole bunch of stuff that shaped him and set him on a course that was to define a nation.
Firstly He learned to love God in word and song. Secondly he learned to trust God in times of adversary - when a lion or bear attacked the flock David was there with his catapult and stones to defeat and defend. Thirdly he learned obedience, being a servant, choosing to put God first so in every situation the name of the Lord would be honoured. By learning simple skills and combining them with good choices he would become, as Paul says in Acts 13 v22 of God who says …. David son of Jesse a man after my own heart.
May we be those of whom God can say that we are after his heart and will do what he asks of us.
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