NO GUARDRAILS – What is guiding you? Following Jesus from the Edges

NO GUARDRAILS

Pastor Calvin Cook

November 17, 2025

Isaiah 54:7 “For a brief moment I abandoned you, but with deep compassion I will bring you back.”(NIV)

I was recently having a conversation with a brother in the faith. We were talking about what most conversations end up with today about how bad things are. How people in their actions seems to have deserted God and teachings of scripture. We lamented politics, governments, church failures, basically ending with the conclusion that all we can really do is be different. To be different as people who claim Christ, different as churches with a heart set on holiness, the move of the Holy Spirit, and be what the early church lived out in devotion to the teachings of scripture, a holy fellowship, the practice of meeting together, and building each other up.

Then my friend said something very profound – “the world has lost the guard rails.”  We live in a feel-good world, that if it feels good do it regardless of how it will affect someone else.  This life seasoned by greed, self-focus and being in control has created a very downhill trend for all the world, except where the focus is completely on Jesus.  Where disciples and followers of Jesus are risking everything and following at all cost.

What does it mean to live life without guard rails? Gail and I recently traveled on a very curvy, steep, mountain road that had no guardrails. Gail’s fear of going over the edge was a constant reminder to me of the danger that existed if we went over the edge.  One of the comments she made was “we would be down over the hill side hurt or dead and no one would find us for days.”  The warning rang true with me in several ways about how we live life and how others live life.

Without the guardrails, which need to be relationship with God as a follower not just a visitor in times of trouble, the reading and study of scripture, a positive prayer life for direction, listening and discerning the voice of the Holy Spirit, and living a life of worshiping with gratitude to a God who does truly love us.

I realize what the scripture in Isaiah 54:7 says as God speaks “for a brief moment I have abandoned you.” Which is what some people think that God has abandoned us. But has God abandoned us or have we abandoned God? Have we traveled roads and lived life within the guardrails, or have we gone off the edge where we think no one ever again especially God will love us or find us.

All the while – God also says in Isaiah 54:7 “with compassion, I will bring you back.” Did you hear that God with compassion emphasized will bring us back when we have gone off on our own or over the edge. Are we willing to come back? Not just part of us, or in times of trouble and desperation, but all the time. Will God bring us back? YES !  Does God want us back? YES!

Now the big YES is up to you. Will you say YES to God?

Prayer: I am praying right now Lord, wherever I am lost, whatever has happened in my life that has me off the edge lost in a forest of uncertainty. I seek you to be by deliverer, my guide, and redeemer of my life. I surrender all – In Jesus name I pray – Amen