The Compass They Never Learned

Every autumn, monarch butterflies launch themselves into a journey of nearly three thousand miles, flying from eastern North America to a handful of oyamel fir trees in the mountains of Michoacán, Mexico. What makes this staggering is that the generation making the trip has never been there before. They are three or four generations removed from the last monarchs that wintered in those mountains. No parent taught them the route. No elder flew beside them.

Neurobiologist Steven Reppert at the University of Massachusetts discovered that monarchs carry a time-compensated sun compass in their antennae — a molecular navigation system written into their very being. They do not understand the science behind it. They simply obey the internal direction they were given, and it carries them exactly where they need to be.

There is something in this that should stop us mid-sermon. God has written His law on our hearts too. The prophet Jeremiah promised it, and the Holy Spirit fulfills it. We are not left to wander without direction. The question has never been whether God has given us a compass. The question is whether we will follow it.

The monarchs do not argue with the pull inside them. They do not negotiate a shorter route or a more convenient destination. They spread their paper-thin wings and go.

Obedience rarely asks us to understand the whole journey. It asks us to trust the One who mapped it and take the next faithful step.