Recently, after a visit to a local shopping outlet park, a couple attempted to return home after an enjoyable and productive afternoon. However, their plans for the return journey were thwarted because the entire car park and surrounding area were gridlocked, due to police controlled road closure. A serious traffic accident necessitated the closure to enable the emergency services to clear the debris and blockage from the road. The couple soon realised they were going nowhere, they were stuck! Gridlocked! A three hour waiting period followed until the road blockage was removed and traffic began to slowly vacate the retail park.

Do you have an area in your life that is gridlocked, a place where nothing seems to move or change?

The book of Exodus, chapters 5-14, records the account of the children of Israel in slave bondage under Pharaoh in Egypt. He was a cruel and hard taskmaster and the Israelites were desperate to leave. The Lord called and equipped Moses to appeal to Pharaoh to release them from his slavery and lead them to the Promised Land. (Whoever God calls, he equips for divine purpose.) The Israelites were severely oppressed under Pharaoh. God had seen and heard their cries, and at the set time, God raised up Moses to lead their exodus from bondage. Their gridlock was broken by divine intervention.

There is a set time, an appointed time in God. He is never in a hurry, but He is always on time! His timing has divine purpose. The trial of our faith is to produce gold in our lives, not “wood, hay and stubble.” There is a place in my “wilderness” where the barren land becomes a blessing in the warmth of His embrace. In His presence is fullness of joy, in spite of my circumstances. This joy is related to His presence and rest in my life, and is entirely independent of my circumstance. God is seeking a people who will love and worship Him for who He is, not just seeking Him for blessings and miracles. When I enter in to that deeper relationship which He desires to have with me, the miracles will follow. “Signs and wonders will follow those that believe,” not go before them!

Sometimes there are blockages in our lives of our own making. Under the spotlight of the Holy Spirit, the Lord will show us the cause of our gridlock when we seek Him. Blundering and murmuring through negative circumstances causes me to continue wandering in circles, moving but getting nowhere, just like the children of Israel in their desert wanderings. There is a big difference between the trial of my faith, which is the purpose of God, as opposed to the negative consequences resulting from a wrong choice I have made. If it is the latter, praise God that He has made a way, through Jesus Christ, to redeem all my failure and sin when I humbly repent before Him. A broken and a contrite heart He will not despise. Jesus is my Redeemer, Restorer and the Lifter of my head. Hallelujah!

A blockage in my life of my own making is caused through self seeking. Is there a place where I have sought to promote myself or project myself by word or deed. This is pride and causes God to resist me – 1 Peter 5:5 “….all of you be subject one to another, and be clothed with humility: for God resists the proud and gives grace to the humble.” Self-seeking, seeking to take the credit in self glory is an abomination to God. A gridlock in my life of my own making is because God is not being glorified in some area. We can be so familiar with christian jargon. We can sing vehemently in church, “We give You all the glory…” and yet our hearts can be so far from that position, taking the credit, seeking glory for our own deeds and achievement instead of acknowledging the Lord’s enabling power in us.

The glory of God never leaves His hand, “Thine IS the glory,” He will not give it to another, but many seek to take it in self glory and suffer the consequences of God resisting them.

Our Heavenly Father seeks those who will worship Him in spirit and in truth, (John 4:23-24). God examines the motives of our heart, not the deeds we do! Man sees the deeds, but more importantly, God sees the motive of our hearts, in other words, why we are doing what we are doing – to please men for self glory, or to please God?

God is working with His people to bring them to a place where He can trust them with His glory, and that they might live in His presence. God equips and enables us to do His will for His good pleasure. Jesus was the firstborn of many sons, and the Lord is “bringing many sons to glory”…..this is our birthright, it is offered to us, it is down to our choice. If I do not have it, others will, because God’s purposes on this planet will not be thwarted. He WILL have a people who will live in His presence and bring glory to His name alone. How does this happen?…..Christ in me, the hope of glory! God’s glory! This life I live is all about Him, not me! “I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ lives in me, and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me,” Galatians 2:20.

As we live, move and respond to the light of the Holy Spirit in our lives, our God will remove the blockages and fulfil His word. Isaiah 40:3-5 “….Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be exalted, every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain. And THE GLORY OF THE LORD SHALL BE REVEALED, and all flesh shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken it.”