Avoiding Pitfalls

"I spent more than I wanted but you should never send a bored man to a hardware store."

I guess after reading my comment from last year the same could apply to window shopping with a woman during a sale. There are just things that we should know better. We also should know ourselves. 

Most of the time when I have messed up I can look back and see where I went wrong. Sure there are times where I am blindsided and didn't see the pitfall but most of the time I know I could have avoided the problem. 

It starts with knowing better. To know better we have to look to a higher way than our own. I could try to do life on my own thoughts or feelings. I could also try to get a better way from others in society or education. The problem is that all of these ways are flawed just like my own. The only way to know better is to go to God's ways. 

God is perfect. He is all knowing, ever present and all powerful. It just makes sense to look to Him for wisdom. Jesus even modeled His ways so that there would be no guessing on our part of what the will and way of God looks like in the flesh. When we look at Jesus we know better because it is made plain to us in His life. 

This is wonderful but we also have to know ourselves. We need to take inventory and look at the scene of the accident to find out where we veered off the road and what the factors were that got us off track. The signs will be evident. What time was it? Is that a factor? Were you tired or weary? Did you lack information, time or resource? Did you assume or jump to conclusions? Were others involved? Why did their involvement effect the situation? 

When we know the answers to these questions we can conclude that in the future we can look for these factors and find a way around them. Like the guy who went to the doctor and said he broke his arm in two places to which the doctor responded "Stay out of them places." We need to be aware of what factors are involved in our mess ups. This is especially true if it is a habitual sin or something that dominates our lives. It has to be addressed in the Spirit through prayer and the scriptures and then resisted through imitating Jesus and resisting temptation. Remove or reduce those factors in the natural if you can. 

You can do it. We all have things that God is working on or working out of our lives. Don't get discouraged if you fail from time to time. Repent, stay after it and maybe a year from today when you look over your journal you will find that you are operating in a higher way than you used to. That is called progress. 

Are there any other factors you can identify that would add to accidents along the road? What progress do you see in your life from knowing God's ways or knowing yourself?