The Road Less Traveled

Henry David Thoreau wrote that “Rivers and men both run crooked when they follow the path of least resistance”. A funny thing happens to us humans when everything is provided for us: we tend to take the pleasures and comforts of life for granted. Rarely do we have the mettle in such circumstances to strive and achieve great things, especially the greatest of all things: laying down our lives for others in service as if serving the Lord God Himself (Eph. 6:7; Col. 3:23). In other words, a life devoted to a good and noble cause.

Although there have been a few opportunities for me to experience it during the past 20 years or so, having lived and taught mostly in the U.S. during that time, the one thing I have missed most is what I like to call “life on the edge”. For soldiers, adventurers, and athletes, a life on the edge relates to pushing your limits: it involves taking new territory, overcoming adversaries and protecting others, or pushing your personal boundaries and stamina to a point where you have never gone before. For a believer in Jesus, a life on the edge is a life that is radically dependent on God for everything. A life radically devoted to serving others no matter the cost. It is life as God designed it to be; life as it is experienced on the mission field. The life we believers have when we have no choice but to depend on God.

It is always God’s intention to bring us to that point where we are living such a life, a fact He has made clear in scripture: “But the righteous man shall live by faith” (Rom. 1:17). A life lived by faith naturally leads to trials and hardship, but that life on the edge is one that is all the better worth living, since it is hardship that refines us: “knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.” (James 1:3-4) 

Prior to 2018, my wife and I were comfortable in our new life in Spokane, WA, where we had moved LCTI’s ministry and where I also served at Moody Bible Institute’s Spokane campus. It was a time of peace and plenty. And then Moody inexplicably closed the Spokane campus. Despite that situation, God called us to stay with our colleagues, build a new Christian university (a very daunting task, that), and continue training people to serve in the Russian world. Then my wife was diagnosed with stage 4 Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, and we nearly lost our daughter – several times. Our world had come crashing down.

Several miracles later, we are still here. And now we’re all facing a global pandemic. When we go through so many trials, it is only human and natural for us to ask ourselves: Why us? Or as my daughter asked when my wife was ill, “why now?” We couldn’t believe all the things that were going wrong, all at the same time. I was reminded of Thomas Paine’s immortal words, “These are the times that try men’s souls.” But such is the dilemma: though we might pretend it’s not so, all of us will endure suffering. God calls us to suffer in this life: “For to this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving an example that you should follow in His steps.” (1 Peter 2:21)

Have you ever had the feeling when all is going well that something is amiss?  For myself, when life is calm and I have little to be concerned about, there is this aching sense that it just doesn’t feel quite right. A pastor once told me: “If all is going well for you, it is then that you have something to worry about.” What he meant was that if all is so easy and calm, it probably means that our great enemy doesn’t see us as a threat. For a long time we sensed that God was about to do something: we just didn’t know what. And then the events I mentioned above began to unfold…

With the pandemic that has come right to our doorstep, all of us have become aware of how uncertain life really is. It is as if we were living in a dream, and suddenly we woke up to the reality of life’s suffering. But when we live in such times, when things look as if they couldn’t get any worse, that is exactly when we are called to live that life on the edge, because that is when those who put their trust in God are needed most.

While we don’t normally choose the hard road, that is the road for those called to follow Jesus. It is the road early Christians chose, who during the second and third centuries endured some of the worst plagues in human history, and yet did not shrink away in fear, but put their lives in danger and reached out to those who were suffering to give them aid. The result was the establishment of the world’s first hospitals, and an accelerated growth of Christianity. That historical fact would tell us what our response should be today when people are suffering from Covid 19.

In his famous poem, “The Road Not Taken”, Robert Frost reminds us that in life it is often the less traveled path that “makes all the difference”. I am convinced that it is at times such as this that God calls His people to stand up and make a difference. He has always called us to that life on the edge. During this trying time, we must remember that God’s desire is that we take roads less traveled. Jesus came to earth to establish a “beachhead” in enemy territory, and as our mighty leader, He empowers us to bring His light into the darkness.

May we have the courage to rise up, meet this difficult time head-on, and serve people with the love of Jesus. Because only then will we share the incredible and eternal blessings He desires to give us in that life lived on the edge. A life that will have an eternal impact on those around us.