2010 – July 5 – Walking on a Holy Road

Study from God’s Word… Isiah, Chapters 24, 25, 26 – 27: 1; Also Isaiah 32: 1 – 8 and 35: 1 - 10 … Passage for Reflection: Isaiah 35: 8 … NIV 8 And a highway will be there; it will be called the Way of Holiness. The unclean will not journey on it; it will be for those who walk in that Way; wicked fools will not go about on it. [italicized – or – the simple will not stray from it]

My Journal for Today: Today F. LaGard Smith, in his The Daily Bible Devotional, dated July 5, reminds his readers (and yours truly) that the early Christians, that first wave of converts, which began with the original Disciples, about whom we read about in the Book of Acts, were called “The People of The Way;” and perhaps in today’s passage we have a clue as to why. The learned of these early Jewish Christians, possibly people like Nicodemus and Joseph, those two Sanhedrin Pharisees who had Jesus buried in Joseph’s tomb after the crucifixion, would have known well the prophesies of Isaiah 35, and they would have felt right to be numbered among “the people of THE WAY;” because Isaiah was prophesying about those who would be saved when the earth, as people knew it, was destroyed and God’s judgment came upon those who followed THE WAY of the one, true God as well as those who had departed or denied God’s WAY.

Certainly the remaining inner circle of Disciples, the remaining eleven who followed Christ, would have remembered Jesus’ words in that upper room discourse, when He, their Messiah, had said, [we know it from John 14: 6] “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” And after Jesus’ resurrection, reappearance, and ascension into Heaven, to be labeled as followers after “THE WAY” established by Jesus, their Messiah, and prophesied by Isaiah in today’s highlight passage of Scripture, would have been seen as a glorious honor.

Certainly, for the Apostle Peter, who had been restored by Christ Himself (as we read about it in John 21), to be labeled as one who followed after “THE WAY” of the Lord would have been an honor. And all of the Pauline epistles speak about how one like Paul, himself, resurrected from spiritual death as he was, and given Christ’s instructions to become an Apostle (i.e., one who is called out by Christ) would have considered it a total honor to be a follower of Christ’s WAY.

And so, we’re challenged by Dr. Smith’s self examination question for today, as he writes, ”Do I think of my holiness as an accomplished fact or a life long spiritual journey?” In other words, “Do I think of my walk as a Christian as a journey after THE WAY?” Because today’s prophesy from Isaiah, and the reality of our salvation, leads us to the path of righteousness, which we know of as sanctification; and this is the path to holiness which can – and will – follow if do as we’re instructed by God’s word in Proverbs 3: 5,6 and by Jesus Himself in Luke 9: 23.

And I’m sure, by knowing the charge and challenge of these two passages of truth, you also feel right to be on that path to holiness, known as THE WAY, … the path which will lead us to an eternal relationship with THE ONE in Whose image we are being transformed.

My Prayer for Today: Lord, I walk on Your WAY, following You as THE WAY. Amen