Throwing the Stick

"Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding." — Proverbs 3:5
 
Are you trying to make God's will match yours?
 
There's a story about an old woman in Scotland who traveled from village to village selling thread and small household items. Whenever she came to a fork in the road, she would take a stick, throw it up in the air, and whichever direction it pointed when it landed, that's the way she would go.
 
One day, someone saw her throwing the stick, watching it land, picking it up, and throwing it again. And again. And again.
 
They asked, "What are you doing?"
 
She said, "I'm trying to figure out which road to take. This one over here looks very rough. I don't want to go down that road, so I'm throwing the stick until it points in the direction I want to go."
 
That's the real problem with many of us. We say we want to be in the will of God, but if God would lead us down a difficult path, we'd probably say, "God, is there another direction? Is there another way?"
 
We want God's will to align with us rather than for us to align with the will of God.
 
"Many are the plans in a person's heart, but it is the LORD's purpose that prevails" (Proverbs 19:21).
 
Stop throwing the stick until it points where you want to go. Stop praying until you hear what you want to hear. Stop seeking counsel until someone agrees with what you've already decided.
 
God's will isn't a multiple-choice test where you keep guessing until you get the answer you prefer. It's a path to walk—even when the road looks rough.
 
Put the stick down. Follow His direction. Even when it's not the way you wanted to go.