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02-25-08 GPS or DGS?
The Daytona 500 ran last week, a “big one” if you are a racing fan. This was the first stock car race of the New Year. It was attended by several hundred thousand people and watched by millions all over the world. The cars travel around the track at speeds approaching 200 mph.
Needless to say the “drivers” do not need a “GPS”. Most of us are familiar with the term GPS (Global Positioning system) but some readers may not be, so let me explain. This little “techno device” can determine in just a matter of seconds where you are anywhere on the earth and with proper input, can help you get anywhere you need to go. A GPS operates by signals from satellites. As a side note, I heard last week that there are over 25,000 items floating or orbiting in space.
Also last week, I flew to Alabama to attend the funeral service for one of our great missionaries, Bro. Tim Gelatt. (You can go to the website for Faith Baptist Bible College in Ankeny, Iowa, to hear Bro. Tim’s last message spoken in their chapel service.) Upon arrival in the Birmingham airport, the rental car clerk asked if I would like a car with a “GPS” system and I responded, “Sure!” As I left the airport and headed northbound on I-65, I turned the system on. It began to talk to me and tell me about my location. It gave me all kinds of options. I stopped to program in my destination and was amazed how this little instrument “charted my course” and “counseled me” on directions. Needless to say, I used it several times on this trip. What an awesome little tool for travel!
At car races like the Daytona 500, drivers don’t need a GPS. In reality their journey of 500 miles gets boring and monotonous as they go round and round! Very little changes, unless it is the cars in front of you or (even better) those behind you!
Our life is not as simple. The track is challenging and ever-changing, requiring great skill and endurance. However, no GPS is needed. There may be times when our lives seem repetitious, like the driver on the track, but for the most part our lives are different each day.
- Demands are new.
- Decisions must be made.
- Problems must be solved.
- Relationships must be developed or mended.
- Work must be done.
- Physical problems must be addressed.
- Financial problems must be worked on. There are a lot of “things” that distract us and divert us and even get us on a detour going nowhere!
For my comparison today, I am borrowing the phrase “DGS” from a book by Dr. David Jeremiah. He calls this a “Divine Guidance System” (p. 73, Signs of Life). When we stop and realize what a GPS can do for us as we navigate here on the earth, we can be grateful for the provisions of technology. We should be even more grateful, though, for the DGS!
Dr. Jeremiah explains our Divine Guidance System as what God has designed to direct in the believer’s life, by the power of His Holy Spirit. We can open up God’s Holy Word, read it, meditate upon it, apply it in life and find the power of the supernatural system designed by God. It could well be called God’s DGS!
Life is not like the
- “egg shaped” track of Darlington, SC (1.366 miles long, the
- “triangle shaped” Daytona track (2.5 miles long), and it won’t be like the
- “many turns” (11 actually) of the Watkins Glen track (2.45 miles long) but it will get complicated and difficult. You may or may not need a GPS, but I can most assuredly promise you that you will need a DGS!
How does this DGS setting sound:
“Trust in the Lord with all thy heart, and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct thy paths.” (from the wisdom of Solomon, Proverbs 3:5-6)
Until next week, Pastor Sears
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