My Way or the Highway (Friday Devotional)

“It is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”

- Galatians 2:20

As Lindsey and I waited for the eighteen-wheeler in front of our car to move forward just an inch—something we’d been waiting on for twenty minutes now—our individual reactions to the predicament were markedly different. Here we sat in the mother of all traffic jams, all three lanes of the interstate blocked, and while she fumed to my right, biting her tongue to keep from saying “I told you so,” all I really felt was embarrassment and regret. After all, she had told me so.

We were traveling to a family reunion in Arkansas and had gotten a call from her parents, who had a headstart on us. They had warned us about a big accident they’d just witnessed, one that had shut down every lane of traffic. If you exit now and follow the service road, they told us, you can probably avoid the whole thing.

Lindsey and I were grateful for the warning, but we had differing ideas of how to heed it. According to Lindsey’s parents, the accident was 4 miles ahead—plenty of time, in my mind, to continue before exiting. We’d be able to pass at least one more exit, maybe two, before we needed to take one of them onto the service road. Lindsey thought differently: wouldn’t it be simpler to take the first available exit just to be safe?

As the driver, the final decision was mine, and I kept going, passing the next available exit. Three miles and zero exits later, we were sitting still, staring at the back of an eighteen-wheeler. It would be over an hour before my foot even touched the gas pedal again.

Whether you call it stubbornness, arrogance, or independence, most of us go through life convinced our way is the best way. You might be willing to listen to suggestions, to draw from the ideas of others, even to be persuaded from time to time, but ultimately it is you who makes the final decision. And like me on that interstate, far too often it is not until you’re brought to a sudden stop that you realize your way may not be best after all.

That is one of the key realizations that leads a person to faith in Christ—you understand that you are a sinner in need of salvation, so you place your trust in Christ, believing that his cross can accomplish what your good works cannot. Unfortunately, for many people the understanding that they need to repent is a onetime realization, enough to get them into baptismal waters but not enough to change anything afterwards. Too many Christians have faith in Christ, but are not faithful to Christ.

In Galatians 2:20, Paul gives a beautiful description of what life in Christ is meant to look like: “It is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me.” To paraphrase, “I’m no longer living my way, I’m following the way of Jesus!” Having faith in Christ means more than trusting what Jesus did once on a cross, it means trusting him now—even and especially when he is pointing you in a different direction than you would go on your own. May you have the humility to reject a “my way or the highway” mentality and instead follow his way.