Walking With God

Walking With God

Scripture: Amos 3:3; Hebrews 11:1-6; Genesis 5:21-24

There is a song I love titled “Walk With Me.” The song says, “Walk with me Lord, walk with me. Walk with me Lord, walk with me. While I am on this, tedious journey, I want Jesus, to walk with me.” The song also includes verses about Jesus holding our hand, being our guide and walking with us in the midst of our trials. There are several versions of this song and I like them all. If you just listen to the song, it would appear that the person is asking the Lord to walk with them on “their” journey, as if they are in control and they are inviting the Lord to assist them. But I hear it differently. Let me share this story to help you understand what I hear with this song and why I love it. A few weeks ago my granddaughter was at our home and she wanted to go to the lower level to be with Nikki. We have taught her that she can only go down there with someone else and she had to hold the rails as she went. I told her she could go, thinking that she would just hold the rail and go down and be with Nikki. But my granddaughter came over to me, stuck out her hand and said, “You have to come with me and hold my hand.” She wanted me to hold her hand as she went down the stairs. She could have gone alone and just held the rails, but she wanted me with her. This is what I hear with this song. I do not want to walk alone so I am asking the Lord to walk with me – to guide me which turns into me walking with Him. The title of my message this morning is “Walking With God.”

Do you remember the first time you took a walk with the person you had fallen in love with? Do you remember the first time you held their hand and experienced the feeling of electricity flowing through you as you held the hand of the one you loved? What about your memories of walking with your parent(s) when you were a child? Remember how they took your hand so that you did not run out in traffic? If you have children of your own, I know you have experienced times when you have been walking with them and they grabbed your hand when they felt fear. Their holding your hand provided the sense of peace, calm and security that they needed in that situation. In each of these situations each person made the decision to walk alongside the other person. In order for us to walk with someone there are three things that must eventually be agreed on. First, before the walk can even happen, each person must be in agreement that they want the other person in their presence and walking alongside of them. Secondly, and this can be decided before or during the walk, there must be agreement on where they are going. And finally, once the destination is decided, they must agree on the route they will take to get there. Without there being agreement on these three things the walk will not necessarily be successful.

Before I go further into the message, if you are walking with God, I want you to consider “how” you are walking with Him. For example, when two adults choose to walk side by side, they are on equal footings and either can make the decision as to where they are going and how they will get there. But this is not the case when an adult is walking with a toddler. When an adult is walking with a toddler, the adult is the one that controls the walk. The adult decides on both the destination and the route to get there. Now along the way the toddler might put up a fuss or attempt to fight against where they are going, but in the end it’s the adult who ensures that the destination is reached. The behavior of the toddler is normal because the child is just acting like a toddler acts. However, as the toddler becomes a pre-teen, they learn to walk alongside the adult without fighting against the route or the final destination. What’s the difference between the toddler and the preteen: both are acting according to their age and maturity. So what is my point? My point is we cannot walk alongside of God as His equal; we walk alongside of Him as a child would an adult. When we first receive salvation, we are that toddler that might pull against God because we do not know where He is leading us. However, as we grow and mature in His word, we begin to walk more in step with Him. As you think about your walk with God, how are you “attempting” to walk with Him? Are you trying to walk with Him as an adult with equal say; or as a toddler trying to go your own way; or as a preteen allowing God to lead? Now, keeping this in mind, turn with me to the third chapter of the book of Amos.