Footprints on the path to Day by Day Discipleship

Photo via Good Free Photos

I've been thinking about "Footprints", the poem which tells the story of a person who sees two sets of footprints in the sand and concludes with God saying, "When you see only one set of footprints during the hard times in your life, that is when I carried you." This gives everyone warm and fuzzies (I even have those "emotional goosebumps" right now, just writing this).

I'd like to write a continuation of that poem about the same person, coming to the end of their life (not just a dream, as is the case in the original poem) and seeing the good and bad times and the single tracks at times that distinctively are God's footprints (after all, not even Shaq can fill God's shoes) but seeing fewer and fewer instances of those single prints. Instead, there are more instances of the two sets of footprints walking through the tough times. Then there comes a point where there is just the person's own footprints leading up to the very feet upon which the person is presently standing.

Again, the person turns to God and, with despair in their voice, cries out, "You stopped carrying me! I thought we were getting closer! I thought I was growing in my faith! Why did you stop supporting me?"

God would answer, "We did become closer and the more you trusted me, the less you needed me to carry you. As you grew, you were able to walk with me through those difficult times in your life. As we became more aligned, and your thoughts became my thoughts and your ways became my ways, that is when you carried me through the tough times in your life. Well done, good and faithful servant."

There's more to come with my notion of Day by Day discipleship but I believe that God is speaking and I want to be a good and faithful listener.