The Parable of The Sat Nav

A number of years ago now we purchased a Sat Nav - they had become all the rage, everyone was buying them and over time I had become dependant on this little box of tricks whenever I made a journey.  It's not that I couldn't read a map - after all I had been a Cub Scout in my childhood - it's just that everyone has a Sat Nav these days and although everyone also seemed to moan about them and have a story about being sent on a fool's errand by this little box - 'everyone' still used them.

Then, about three weeks ago, our Sat Nav became permanently and irretrievably confused - it was a sad ending!  Wherever we were and whatever we wanted it to do - the only function it could now perform was to give us the directions home - which wasn't much good if you were already parked on the Manse driveway and really wanted to be told how to get to the COTHA Quiet Day at Bulstrode Park, Gerrard's Cross.

After the pressing of many buttons and the vain hope that a good night's sleep might cure our Sat Nav - we had to 'retire' it and it no longer lives in our car!

So what has taken its place?

Well, I have started, once again, to think for myself!  I use my own mind to explore routes, weigh up different options and look up suggested possibilities on Google Maps and my 2009 battered road map (which has lain in the glove compartment unused and unloved for years!). I even do something quite radical - I chat though the different road routes with my passenger and together we work out a way forward.

It's all become much more interactive, evolutionary and even scary - as opposed to comfortably dependent and rather mindlessly obedient.

Now I know no parable tells the whole truth and I also have to confess that a new Sat Nav is on its way from Amazon even as we speak.  But this interlude without such a device has made me think about how I choose the road ahead - do I do what 'everyone' does and take a 'prescribed' route via a Sat Nav or do I explore the options before me differently, take a risk, ask others, try out alternative possibilities and discover for myself that 'travelling hopefully' is an important part of the journey.

And in all of this might there just be some similarities with our journey of faith?

All good wishes,

Ian