Man, Where are You Going? And How Will You Get There?

May, 2006

by: Walt Bertelsen

In the Summer of 1975, Michelle and I got lost in the woods of Central Wisconsin. We were in the “jungle camp” phase of our missionary training. We had set off in the morning with the objective of finding a tent pitched in a clearing. We had two backpacks: one for food, the other for our nearly two-year-old son, Paul. The tent was about three miles away. We had to find it using only a compass.

The task seemed simple enough, especially for me. After all, I was a proficient combat infantryman in Vietnam who could find anything and hit anything. Find a tent? No problem!

But I couldn’t find that tent. We wandered for hours, Michelle seeking to follow the lead of her head, (who was clueless). As the sun began to fade in the Wisconsin summer sky, I finally did what every man absolutely hates—I went back and asked directions. Reeking with pride? Of course. That morning, I failed to do two things before setting off. First, I assumed I knew just how to use the compass and didn’t need someone else to tell me what I already knew—so, of course, I didn’t ask. The second (and related to the first) was that I didn’t consciously walk in dependence upon the Lord to guide our steps.

Did I learn the lesson? Well…five years later, I was taken under the wing of the son of the Manjak chief and given their family name—Ndonky…. Why, in the ensuing years, did God put me through the same lesson many more times? Because I was failing to learn an essential life truth, a truth that the Lord sought to teach men right from the beginning: He created man to need counsel.

The Genesis account teaches more than the creation and fall. It teaches us much about the nature of our Creator and about man (male and female) created in His image. In the on-going relationship they had before the serpent entered, God had already given counsel to Adam. And Adam, on the way to being lost, did not elicit additional counsel—he didn’t ask directions.

We cannot undo that, nor can we change our own past. We only have this moment and whatever else God chooses to give us. But we can do the two things that I failed to do on that long-ago summer day: We can get directions on the proper use of the “compass” that we have been given (I mean, of course, the Scripture). Secondly, we can walk in dependence upon the Lord, the Spirit who illuminates the Compass.

Here are the four points I’m seeking to get across to you: You need the compass. Use the compass. Get instructions on how to use the compass. Live in dependence on the Maker of the compass.

You need the compass (God’s Word). I said, “God created man to need counsel.” If you ask me for a proof-text, I’ll simply place a whole Bible into your hand! God’s Word is not a strung-together series of stories and disconnected commands through which we know how to jump through hoops for God. It is, rather, a purposeful, embroidered whole, designed by the Creator in such a way that you might know the LORD, who alone is God, and to know His directions (Col 1:9; 2 Pet 1:3). It is real answers for real life. Jesus Christ, the real Man, asked directions continually (prayer). And, He used the Compass.

For instruction on its use, that same Compass points you to Christ’s Body, the Church, where you can learn to use the Compass and not be tossed by every wind of doctrine (Eph 4:13,14), and so grow into a mature man (the image of Christ). Depend on His Spirit to illuminate the Compass, then follow Him.

Are you a real man? Where are you going? How will you get there?