She was loaded up in her booster seat, dressed in a sassy black-with-stars leotard, with her hair in a top knot. This was my first time taking Lilli to her new gymnastics class, and she was pretty excited about it.

I plugged the address into my phone’s GPS, and the conversation started.

“Mimmie, you’re not going to let the phone tell you where to go, are you?”

“Well, yes, honey. I’ve never been there before, so I need it to tell me where to go.”

“I’ve been there before, Mimmie! I can show you how to get there!”

Curious, but not enough to depend entirely on a 5-year-old’s sense of direction, I muted the sound of the GPS and put it where I could see it.

“Okay, Lilli. You tell me where to go, but I’m going to leave it in my phone for backup, just in case you aren’t sure.”

And so we went. She spotted certain houses, a fountain in the middle of a neighborhood pond, a big white building, power lines, and finally, the gym. Truthfully, there was only one time she was a little hesitant, but she eventually made the right turn choice at every landmark.

“Wow, Lilli! You got us here! Good job!”

“I DID, didn’t I? You’ll have to tell Mommy that I know how to get here, now, so I can probably just walk from now on. She won’t have to bother taking me anymore.”

“Well, honey, she’ll still need to take you. That would be a really long walk, and you’re still just five.”

“Why? I’m almost six, and I KNOW WHERE TO GO!”

By this time, we were at the door and she spotted her class, handed me her jacket and shoes, and queued up.

Sitting there watching her, confident in her class, I smiled to myself, thinking about our conversation. There have been approximately 1,000,072 times in my life when I’ve had a destination in mind, decided I had a good enough idea of how to get there, and set out without any real certainty I was right. A few times I succeeded enough to think I could handle it without any help at all, so I dismissed my Driver, the Great Mapholder, releasing Him from His duties, because, hey, “I know how to get here, now, so I can probably just walk from now on.”

We are an arrogant bunch, aren’t we? Yes, “we,” because I know you’ve done this, too. We all probably started around age 5, because I think we’re born with a sense that we know best about most things. I don’t know about you, but I’ve been around long enough, and hit enough dead ends, to know that just isn’t the case. God can see the WHOLE map. He doesn’t need to rely on landmarks, or a keen sense of direction to get us there because He IS the way.

Why in the WORLD wouldn’t we rely on Him to get us where we’re supposed to go?

Jesus, take the wheel in Lilli’s life.

And mine.

Yours, too?

Trust God from the bottom of your heart;
    don’t try to figure out everything on your own.
Listen for God’s voice in everything you do, everywhere you go;
    he’s the one who will keep you on track. ~ Proverbs 3:5 MSG