The God Who Recalculates

If you have ever missed a highway exit, you know the small mercy of hearing Google Maps say that single word: "Recalculating." The app does not shut down. It does not lock you out for failing to follow directions. It does not flash a message across your screen that reads, "You had your chance." It simply accepts where you are — even if where you are is three miles past your exit, heading the wrong direction on I-94 — and immediately begins plotting a new route to your destination.

Grace works like that, only deeper.

When the prodigal son came stumbling home smelling like pig slop, the Father did not hand him a map of all the places he should have been. He did not replay the route history of every wrong turn. He recalculated. He met His son at the current location — broken, bankrupt, barely holding it together — and charted a path straight to the banquet table.

Here is what makes God's grace greater than any navigation app: Google Maps recalculates because it is programmed to. The Almighty recalculates because He chooses to. Every time you wander, every time you take the exit marked "my way instead," the Holy One does not abandon the destination He has in mind for you. He meets you where you are and says, "I can still get you there."

You have never driven so far off course that grace cannot find you.