For sailors a nautical compass has proven to be a lifesaving instrument on many occasions. While reading the Our Daily Bread devotion from December 21, I was impressed with how a compass was instrumental in saving lives. A portion of that devotion follows:
“During World War II, Waldemar Semenov was serving as a junior engineer aboard the SS Alcoa Guide when—nearly three hundred miles off the coast of North Carolina—a German submarine surfaced and opened fire on the ship. The ship was hit, caught fire, and began to sink. Semenov and his crew lowered a lifeboat into the water and used the vessel’s compass to sail toward the shipping lanes. After three days, a patrol plane spotted their lifeboat and the USS Broome rescued the men the next day. Thanks to that compass, Semenov and twenty-six other crewmembers were saved.”1
While a good compass will always point north, regardless of which way you are headed, the Bible is our moral compass that always points us to God and His will for our lives. However, as Dennis Prager commented: “Much of the world’s moral compass is broken. The moral north reads south and the moral south reads north.”2 Only the Bible gives us the wisdom and direction needed to chart a successful course in life. (Psalm 119:105) says: “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” When it comes to seeking godly guidance, theologian John Stott shares how Jesus is our essential guide: “The cross is not just a badge to identify us…it is also the compass which gives us our bearings in a disoriented world.”3
Reading and studying the Bible daily is essential to prevent us from losing our way in life. As we read the Scriptures the Holy Spirit will be able to illuminate biblical truths that will allow us the light we need to transform our hearts and minds to follow in the footsteps of Jesus. To often we allow our feelings to be our guide. Feelings, however, are a very poor compass. Since feelings are constantly changing, often based on circumstances, they are clearly an unreliable guide; especially when it comes to making major decisions.
While the wisdom contained in the Bible is powerful we must be careful when reading Scripture to not take a verse or two and assume that we can run with it. We need to read verses in context in order to get the full and correct guidance that God wants us to apply to our life circumstances.
Finally, it’s not always easy to go against our feelings when God’s compass, the Word of God, is pointing us in a different direction. But if we want to do God’s will it will often mean saying no to our feelings and going against the crowd. But the rewards will be great if we let Scripture, and not our feelings, chart our course in life. Perhaps, Billy Graham summed it up best when he said: “A compass is narrow-minded-it always points to the magnetic north…We must discipline ourselves, personally, to fight any deviation from the course Jesus set for us. We cannot be tolerant of any other course.”4
1 God’s Compass – Our Daily Bread Ministries Canada
2 Quotes about Compass (261 quotes) (quotemaster.org)