“Learn to adore a detour.” – Kathy Cagney

“Sometimes the most scenic roads in life are the detours you didn’t mean to take.” – Angela N. Blount

When you think about your own life, what detours were you forced to take that seemed to lead you far away from your original goals and dreams?

Was it a death that turned your life a different direction or a relationship change that forced you to make a 180-degree turn?  Maybe it was a diagnosis that led you down a new, difficult path or a job loss that made the road ahead both impassable and implausible?

I know each of us face detours like this in our lives. Change is inevitable along with the course corrections that accompany it.  Like a road construction detour, life’s detours can cause delays – taking us far away from our intended destinations.  In some cases, these detours can take our lives in opposite or opposing directions – forcing a change in our life we never intended or wanted to traverse.

As you contemplate the detours in your own life, think about these things:

Life Itself is One

“I am but a stranger here, Heaven is my home; Earth is a desert drear; Heaven is my home, Danger and sorrow stand, round me on every hand; Heaven is my Father land, Heaven is my home.” – T.R. Taylor

 “But our citizenship is in Heaven and from it we await a Savior.” – Philippians 3: 20 NIV

When you think deeply about it, our life on this earth is one singular detour – taking us on a journey that eventually leads us back to the Creator.  When you contemplate life in general as an all-encompassing alternative route, it makes the short-term deviations you experience more endurable.  Looking at detours through this paradigm has a way of placing purpose and destiny in the middle of any temporary course change we experience.

Life Detours Don’t Avoid Construction – They Begin It

“The road to success is always under construction.” – Lily Tomlin

So many things in this human life are polar to their spiritual meaning and significance.  As an example, road construction detours in our earthly life lead us AWAY from the roads that are torn up and being rebuilt.  In our spiritual life, detours often lead us TOWARD reconstruction – forcing us to take a pathway that is rough and at times impassable.

As you think about the detours you have experienced in your own life, what was being built and reconstructed at the time?  How did taking the detour begin something new inside of you or cause you to change in a way you would have never experienced?

New directions, unexperienced pathways, and difficult travels have a way of growing and expanding us – giving our journey here meaningful purpose and creating a destiny filled with intention.  The reconstruction process associated with detours makes this possible.

Are Detours Alternative Routes or the Actual Pathway?

“Perhaps some detours aren’t detours at all.  Perhaps they are actually the path.” – Katherine Wolf

“Often what may appear as a detour in life is actually the most direct and empowering path to your destination.” – James Arthur Ray

“Sometimes God’s sudden turn in your life feels like a detour, but in actuality it is the straightest way to your destiny.” – Alisa Hope Wagner

When you think about life’s detours through the lens of God’s sovereignty, then detours really aren’t detours at all.  They perpetuate the concept of a “predestined pathway” – a journey through this life filled with divine purpose and intention.

“For I know the plans I have for you says the Lord…” – Jeremiah 29:11 NIV

“The Lord says, ‘I will guide you along the best pathway for your life.  I will advise you and watch over you.” – Psalm 32:8 NLT

“All my days were written in your book and planned before a single one of them began.” – Psalm 139:16 HCSB

As you experience life’s detours and deviations, I pray you look at them in a different light – seeing them within the context of one long, purposeful journey back home 😊

Your new path may be filled with rough patches and unfamiliar surroundings, but God is renewing and reconstructing you along the way – shaping you into the person you were meant to be. 

The detour is crafting your purpose and developing your destiny.  What may seem like a detour isn’t really one at all my friend 😊 Our loving, sovereign God is guiding you back to Him – in control of each turn and new direction set before you.

God bless!