I was thinking today… about what it means to go “against the grain.” Have you ever felt like an outcast with family, friends, or other Christians because you were doing something different from them? I am not talking about something that goes against God and what the bible teaches. I am talking about God leading you to make a different choice.

It is not easy when everyone is doing one thing and you are doing another. I believe there is a reason God is leading you to do something or to make a different choice than what He is leading them to do.

I looked up what the expression “going against the grain” means and it says doing the opposite of what you normally do or of what is expected of you. Are we as Christians doing what God expects of us or what our culture/society expects of us? They are conflicting a lot of the time.

When Jesus entered Jerusalem He was the opposite of what the people were expecting. They were expecting a warrior/King who would overthrow Roman rule and free them from their oppressors. But He actually came for a much bigger purpose, to SAVE them and FREE them from their own sin and to give them EVERLASTING LIFE. That is just one example; Jesus turned everything upside down (in a good way) with God’s teachings.

My point is at the end of the day YOU will be before God to account for what you did or didn’t do, and if you listened to God or did not. God guides you and sometimes He may be guiding you to “go against the grain.”

(Proverbs 14:12) There is a way that appears to be right, but in the end it leads to death.

(Psalm 118: 8-9) It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in humans. It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in princes.

(John 15:18-19) “If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you.”

To God be the Glory,

Lynn Manucci Warrick