[The LORD] guards the course of the just and protects the way of his faithful ones (Proverbs 2:8).

I often wonder what the paths of our lives look like to the omniscient, omnipresent, eternal God.  I picture Him sometimes as an air traffic controller, headset strapped on one ear, drinking coffee, looking out from His tower and charting out the courses of 7 billion individuals.  It feels like it would have to be insanity -- so many paths to coordinate, so many details to arrange, all in real time!  No wonder there are so many crashes and calamities!  Even if God limited his scope of operations solely to His faithful ones (which could be one reading of Proverbs 2:8), it would still seem like a ridiculously complicated job.

But then I remember that the eternal character of God means that He exists outside of our time and space.  He's not frenzied or rushed, in the way that we so often are.  He's got all the time in the world, literally, to give each individual situation His full attention.  When people's lives crash (which they regularly do), it occurs to me that it doesn't have anything to do with God's vigilence or attentiveness.  It has to do with His ability to communicate with the person flying in the cockpit (if you'll allow me to extend the analogy a bit further).  If each person is listening to God and responding obediently, then each person's personal path is protected; God will guide those who are faithful to tune in and follow His instructions.  But if someone has cut himself off from communication with God and is not even trying to re-establish those lines of communication, then it seems like there's only so much that God can do.

I like this about God -- that He is loving and active and involved in so many individual lives, always ready and willing to take on a "bigger caseload," but at the same time He is not One to strong-arm others or manipulate people who are unwilling to be manipulated.  I believe that He's big enough and powerful enough to have a course charted out for each and every individual in this world; but still He gives us the choice if we want to follow His path for us or try to make the best of things on our own.  I, for one, love the idea of tuning my radio into the Control Tower and asking for God's guidance to pick my way through the world's crowded skies.  It certainly requires faith and a willingness to act according to the justice of previous instructions until specifically directed otherwise -- and this is not always easy.  However, it is clearly the best and safest place to be.