“I’m On a Spiritual Journey, So I’m Ok”

Monday, January 12, 2015

Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” John 14:6

This is a dangerous distortion because it contains a very important truth: The Christian life can rightly be described as a journey. Jesus spoke about the narrow way that leads to life (Matt. 7), and he himself said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life,” and “no one comes to the Father except through me.”

In our culture, the spiritual journey has become a metaphor for the sum total of a person’s spiritual experience: Any faith you have, any doubts, any experiences, all become the soup of your journey, and the journey is an end in itself.

But there is a spiritual journey on the way to being lost, as well as a spiritual journey that ends with being saved. Your spiritual journey cannot save you. Spend your life as a wandering sheep, and you will spend eternity as a lost soul. Only the Good Shepherd, Jesus Christ, can save you. No one is saved by going on a spiritual journey.

Peter says, “You were straying like sheep” (1 Pet. 2:25). There’s the journey! You were wandering all over the place in confusion. You were lost, not really knowing what you believed or to whom you belonged. But you have now returned! He doesn’t say, “You are in the process of returning.” It is a definite completed action.

There is a whole journey of following and growing in Christ, but the Christian life begins with a definite return to Jesus Christ as the Shepherd, Owner, Overseer, and Lord of your life.