Detoured

 

Detoured

Acts 28: ¹¹ After three months we put out to sea in a ship that had wintered in the island—it was an Alexandrian ship with the figurehead of the twin gods Castor and Pollux. ¹² We put in at Syracuse and stayed there three days. ¹³ From there we set sail and arrived at Rhegium. The next day the south wind came up, and on the following day we reached Puteoli. ¹⁴ There we found some brothers and sisters who invited us to spend a week with them. And so we came to Rome. ¹⁵ The brothers and sisters there had heard that we were coming, and they traveled as far as the Forum of Appius and the Three Taverns to meet us. At the sight of these people Paul thanked God and was encouraged. ¹⁶ When we got to Rome, Paul was allowed to live by himself, with a soldier to guard him.

 

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Traffic was thick and I wanted to get home. I couldn’t take the stop and go moments any longer. I exited the jammed up road to take my chances on the side streets. I decided to forego making dinner so I stopped to pick up something to eat for the family. There was a homeless person outside of the restaurant. I gave to him.

 

• There have been times when I had a destination in mind, but was detoured.
• There have been times when I had a plan in mind but the plan did not go as expected.
• There have been times when I had a solid expectation in mind, but got a different opportunity.

 

Paul was led to go to Jerusalem to speak about JESUS. He knew he would face opposition from the church leaders, yet he went anyway. After being mobbed, thrown in jail, shipwrecked and detoured to strange places, Paul finally arrives in Rome. Along the way Paul told people about JESUS and showed HIS power.

 

• GOD wants me to accept HIS detours in life.
• GOD wants me to understand that my expectations may be holding me back from see how amazing HE is.
• GOD wants me to be excited about a new fruitful road of life rather than being stuck on the fruitless road of trying to control my fears.

 

Expect detours when serving GOD is what I have learned. I mean, nothing will go as expected in life. When one thing calms down another trial pops up. GOD wants me to see that I can have peace in the middle of life’s journey. HE leads me to places I would not expect and protects me along the way. I am grateful for HIS detours.

 

• Do you have a destination in life that seems to have taken a detour?
• Are there new people in your life that need to hear about GOD?
• Will you accept GOD’s detour by dropping your expectation and allow HIM to guide you to a better place than you anticipated?