It is a mathematical certainty that convenience and freedom are inversely proportional.  As one increases, the other decreases.  While it is convenient to use your iPhone to pay for your groceries, refill your prescriptions online, and conduct all your social and commercial activity through a device, those devices have a long memory.  Your digital footprints are never washed away by rain or wind.   What you gain in convenience, you lose in privacy.  And a loss of privacy is always, at some point, a loss of freedom.  Some of this you can control, some you cannot.

The explosive deployment of security cameras and “smart” devices which listen to your digital and audible conversation are things you cannot control well.  The potential that exists to surveil and be surveilled is staggering.   I don’t know if Big Brother is watching, but chances are someone is.   But that loss in privacy, whether consciously or unconsciously, also comes with some remarkable gains in terms of convenience and knowledge.   We have virtually instant access to the current state of our finances, our work, our family member’s location, the temperature, humidity, and occupants of our home, and even the comfort or discomfort of our pets.   And, thanks to the Arkansas Department of Transportation, we can see all the roadblocks awaiting us on the highways and byways.

Arkansas roadways are characterized by three variables that make roadblocks a probability, if not a certainty – a high commercial to personal vehicle ratio, utterly non-intuitive and highly fluid construction zones, and the incomprehensible mystery of merge ramps and four-ways stops to the populace at-large.  In the face of these challenges, Idrivearkansas.com has given us the power to navigate and overcome traffic jams, roadway accidents, construction zones, snow and ice, and even flooded highways.  But what about the other road blocks we face in life?  Discouragement, grief, physical and emotional limitations, self-doubt, insecurity, unforeseen circumstances, and most significantly, our own sin and selfishness.

The writer to the Hebrews exhorts us to “lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us.”  But what if that race has pitfalls, hurdles, stiff competitors, weakness, and weariness?   It sounds so simple, but how can we navigate the roadblocks that will inevitably appear in 2020?   The rest of the verse gives the answer.

…looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. Hebrews 12:2

The good news, the gospel, announced at Christmas is that God has not left us in an estate of sin and misery, but offers deliverance through a Redeemer.  A Redeemer who removed all the roadblocks that alienate us from God and one another, the insurmountable ones – sin and death.  This gospel is the power to push through, over, and around these roadblocks.   It not only navigates eternal life, but life here and now.

What roadblocks await you this year?  Some, you may know or anticipate. Some are known only to God but will catch you by surprise.  How will you navigate them?  Notice what the passage above says.  It is not faith in ourselves or our abilities that allows us to push through, to run with perseverance.   But it is faith in the one who has already pushed through and run with perseverance on our behalf.    Resolutions are good, but mere resolve will not overcome what lies ahead.  May the Lord grant you faith in the One who has already overcome and so, make you an overcomer as well.

Join us this Lord’s Day, January 5, as we begin 2020 by looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.  We meet from 5:00 – 6:30 pm in The Commons at St. Andrews Anglican Church at 8300 Kanis Rd in Little Rock.  Click here for directions. Come with a friend you and join us for fellowship and worship. We look forward to seeing you there.