They Don't Call Them Stop Lights for Nothing

 June 9, 2024

Sunday

On the way in this morning, I was stopped at one red light after another. Because I come in so early, there was very little traffic. No one was coming from the side streets. Yet, I still had to stop. It turned a ten minute commute into a little over twenty minutes. 

You would think that this would make people slow down but those few others traveling alongside sped from one light to another. It seemed to make no difference that I didn't speed. We all sat at the lights.

Many people use the lights as an opportunity to read and answer texts. Yes, this is illegal in this state but people don't think that the law applies to them while they are sitting at a light. Maybe we should start calling them "text" lights. It would help if the light also flashed the sign, "Finish your text now. The light is about to change!"

I'm wondering. Are people really that anxious to get where they are going or do that use the distraction and the speeding because they hate the journey? I believe it is the latter. Driving is just getting where they would rather be. There is no joy in the journey.

Now, why would God leave us here if the journey through life wasn't important? In other words, why doesn't God just take us the moment we become Christians? Of course, some of you will say, "If all the Christians are instantly gone, who would tell people about Christ?" True, but do you think that God leaves us here for our witness alone? I think not.

God makes us a people who are worthy of being called by His name. That takes time. There are a whole lot of stop lights on this journey. There are times when we are in such need that we stop everything else just to call upon God to rescue us. There are times that we see God do miracles right in front of us. We stop everything and praise Him. There are times when God confronts us with what we have been doing. We stop in our conviction, turn away from what we were doing and walk with Him again. There should be joy in this journey because we are becoming a people worthy of being called by His name. 

So, do you rejoice at these stop lights? You should. Paul would write while he was in prison:

Philippians 4:4 (NASB 2020) ⁴ Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice!

Prison was a stop light for Paul. I guess you could say he used the stop to text us the letter to the Philippians! Rejoice for each stop light is an opportunity to make us a people worthy of God's name.