The Ancient Paths

There are any number of roads we can take through life. We can follow in someone’s footsteps, going where they have gone. Maybe instead, watch where others have walked, learn from them where the landmines are, and take a slightly different path. There are times when we just wander, taking path after path, looking for the right road to take. I have a t-shirt that reads, “All who are wander are not lost.”

Or, maybe, we see the masses going on the wrong path, so we go against the flow and take a completely different, sometimes lonely, path. Robert Frost’s poem The Road Not Taken, begins with the words, “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both,” and ends with this, “I shall be telling this with a sigh, Somewhere ages hence and hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I – I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.”

Every day we stand at one crossroad or another. Sometimes the choice is nothing more than a fork in the road, and the decision is simply choosing between going left or going right. While other times, it might be a freeway junction, one with many connecting roadways, and the decision is not quite so simple.

There is another option when choosing which path to take – “Thus says the LORD: ‘Stand by the roads and look, and ask for the ancient paths, where the good way is; and walk in it and find rest for your souls'” (Jeremiah 6:16a).

The context is the Israelites were being judged for their straying from the ways of the patriarchs into the ways of idolatry; i.e., they “lost their way.” They stood at a crossroads; the moment called for a clear decision. The “ancient paths” literally means “the good way.” Sadly, the end of that verse says this- “But they said, ‘We will not walk in it'” (6:16b).

Read the rest of that passage (vv.17-21). The nation rejected the ancient paths, even as prophets were sent as watchmen to warn them of impending danger.

Now that you know the context, and remembering that no biblical text can mean more to us than it meant to the original readers, how can we apply the words of 6:16 to us today – in this time of so much unrest and uncertainty, in this time when rest for our souls seems like wishful thinking, in this time when for most of us, daily rhythms are anything but rhythmic, in this time when there are potentially so many roads we can take as the world around us spins faster and faster.

Here is my stab at an answer – Every day we stand at one crossroad or another. Will we take the way of obedience or the path of selfishness (disobedience)? In His grace and through His mercy, God warns us of pending doom, pending struggle, pending frustration, by taking the wrong path. This appeal to seek the ancient paths points us to the path commanded by God, known ever since He revealed himself and his ways in the covenant at Sinai (Exodus 19-24). The ancient path is the path of obedience., the path leading to life. In Deuteronomy 30:15-16, the Lord, through Moses, set a choice before his people, prosperity or disaster. That same appeal is given to us today.

Through this meditation, I hear God saying to me, I have a choice. I can choose the ancient paths, and in doing so, not only do I find life, but also peace and rest for my soul (Matthew 11:28-29). Or, I can choose any other path.

What might Jeremiah 6:16 be saying to you?

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