The mountains or the beach always call our names in October. This week we leaned into the mountains of Tennessee. An RV campsite in Townsend enjoys mountains from all sides and a rocky river walls it in on three sides. Nature is up close, and the October colors never disappoint.

Since our stay included the weekend, we chose a local church for our Sunday morning worship. After a warm offering of praise music, one of the laymen in the church delivered the message. He spoke with passion and clarity as he expressed the depth of John 14:6 – “I am the way, and the truth, and the life.”The enemy is always intent on offering alternatives to God’s Word, and this one is certainly no exception to his attempt at altering.

The mountain layman emphasized “THE” and its exclusivity. In today’s world, that single word can create an uproar. It seems humans with the most influential platforms have a real distaste for Christians who believe and propagate such an idea. Good works, kindness and righteous steps – (just being good) that many believe are doorways to that heavenly place are certainly  “gentler” means of religious thinking.

The maps app on my phone thinks like what a lot of people want to believe. If I put in a destination, the app will usually give me two or more ways to reach that destination. Even the estimated times are given. That app is handy to have, but God’s eternal home for His children has only ONE way of arriving.

The truth! How we could discuss this at length. Today’s thinking is rapidly departing from God’s truth to man’s set of values and laws. What a mixed-up world we navigate! I don’t need to fill up these lines with the many ways man is distorting God’s Word.

While enjoying this mountain break, I read a book about the imprisonment of Corrie ten Boom in a concentration camp. I would like to assign it to every young person from middle school to college as a must-read. The atrocities the Jews endured and those who befriended them is beyond my imagination. Reading that book would hopefully make those mindless, protesting college students burn their Nazi and anti-Semitism signs. If they only knew the truth!

How do I describe the LIFE that Jesus called Himself? One has to experience it to know the joy, peace, comfort, compassion, healing, and counsel that comes with the indwelling Holy Spirit. And that list is endless, but it does shepherd us through this life, past death and into His eternal presence.

“I am the Way, the Truth and the Life.” It’s the gospel in a brief sentence. Lord, use us to show the blinded THE WAY, the deaf to THE TRUTH, and the lost to THE LIFE.

 

Letters to Camille Anding may be sent to P.O. Box 551, Brookhaven, MS 39602.