Daily Manna · Day 154 · June 3
Ordered Steps
“The steps of a good man are ordered by the LORD: and he delighteth in his way.”
What do you do with a life that has turned out different from the one you planned?
I do not mean the tragic version of that question, only the ordinary one. The job fell through. The move was cancelled. You live in a city you did not choose. Underneath it all runs a low, steady grief about living on a detour, with no road back to the route you drew.
This is the verse people hand you at that point, and they usually hand it over wrongly. They act as if it means every turn was secretly arranged for your benefit, so you should feel better now. Read it where it sits. For twenty-two verses before this one, Psalm 37 has been comparing two kinds of people, and these "ordered" steps belong to one of them. The verse itself says only "the steps of a man," yet the whole psalm is about the person whose life is set toward God. So the verse does not promise that any path you choose is His; it promises that a life handed over to Him is directed by Him. It also says "he delighteth in his way," which is a surprising thing to say about a road that runs through a detour like yours.
Read one verse further, because the psalm knows what you are really asking: "Though he fall, he shall not be utterly cast down: for the LORD upholdeth him with his hand." That sentence expects the fall, and it does not prevent it. It is a promise about what you land on when you fall.
So the truth to carry is smaller and harder than the one people usually offer. You were never promised your own route. You were promised that your steps are directed. God takes pleasure in the road, even where you cannot, and a fall on it is one you will survive. That rests on the LORD, who has hold of your hand, and not on how well you walk.
Daily Manna runs on a two-year cycle. The year two reading for day 154 is Jesus Wept (John 11:35).