The Crossroads Store
The skies were still dark when I headed to my holiday destination. I awoke just after four am in order to get there and waste as little daylight as possible. Callaway Gardens is only an hour and a half from me, but it didn’t stop me from preparing for the difficulty that I expected to have while traveling. See, the sky was not only dark because the sun had yet to rise, but the clouds above me were heavy and ready to shed their weight. I couldn’t yet tell whether this anticipated storm was going to hinder or help my day’s agenda. I didn’t know when I left if the weather of the moment would follow me east or not. Thankfully as I traveled, I left the storm behind me. The further I went, the clearer it became and my plans grew more and more hopeful.
The great theologian Charles Spurgeon once said “Digging a well is hard labour: but it is better to dig for water than die of thirst.” As I drove down the road, I praised the Lord for the abundance of water in my life. A great excess of Him is being poured out plainly before me and I am fool if I overlook His sovereign provision and blessing in my life. Tears were all I could do in response to these overwhelming feelings. The Lord truly loves me and I Him.
Just as I was forming this new understanding, I pulled up to a four way stop. I was at a crossroads. To my left sat an old, fixed up country shop called the Crossroads Store. I rolled down my window and snapped a picture of it with my phone. What if there was literally a store selling everything we need at every crossroads we come to in life? I rolled up the window and sat my phone down on top of my Bible in the passenger seat. At that moment, I realized that we do. We have a wealth of knowledge stored in one place and we have the freedom to carry it with us wherever we go. Whether we choose to use it or not, it is still available to us and the solution to our dilemmas is free in cost.
Like many others, I’ve recently been faced with decisions that need to be made. Today, I answer these questions in faith. Whether I can see far into the future or not, I will trust in what has been founded on faith from the very beginning.
“…but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
John 4:14 (ESV)