Where there's a will ...
Ever thought of building a railway line? You can’t see the destination, but you know it’s there somewhere beyond the horizon. The landscape is raw and empty, like a blank page waiting to be written on. The future lies pregnant before you – an unknown! You can dream and anticipate, but the full potential of stepping out into the landscape is beyond imagination.
Once built, a railway opens an unexplored territory; it’s full of promise and danger. The trucks can roll almost unhindered, one after the other after the other after the other; where the tracks are laid there they’ll go.
There are just two things to begin; choose a direction, and then choose to start laying track to that distant, yet inevitable, unseen destination. Where there’s a will …
Mugabe has been building a railway, and he has Zimbabwe on the tracks locked to a destination that seems to end in a cliff. How to derail that train? One way or another it seems headed for a train smash.
The African Union is building a railway. It’s only recently started, but already some details on the horizon are becoming visible, and it’s not looking too pretty.
South Africa tried to build a railway to Zimbabwe, but in the end decided to just pretend the rails existed, and so the train goes nowhere. Mbeki built his presidential railway, Zuma’s building a railway, and so is the ANCYL. What is their destination?
It’s a jaded phrase to say that where there’s a will there’s a way, but like most trite phrases we trot out, we ignore what’s implied. The purpose lies not in the building, nor in overcoming the challenge, but in reaching the destination! Jesus built a railway, across some rough territory, but his destination is beyond compare.
Arguably the greatest tragedy of this age is the breakdown of the will; we choose by default tossed by popular opinion, never allowing our will a chance to stand firm. We let the rails of least threat and effort take us into a flat, gray, featureless, dull landscape. Those who say the Journey is more important than the Destination have obviously not looked out the window recently!
When the people of StB have a will:
- leadership and community will grow
- worship services will explode
- giving will outgrow receiving
- home groups will reach to others
- a light will shine brightly
Where there’s a will … where’s the will?
Is your railway the Grand Apathetic Express, non-stop to the wilderness of passivity, boredom, and irrelevance where all is gray and the light is fading fast?
It’s not about rules and religion, it’s about the destination, and the railway conductors a fun guy! Which is your railway?
Paul’s railway sign: Rom 6:13