I press on toward the goal for the prize of the heavenly call of God in Christ Jesus. -- Philippians 3:14

Follow the yellow brick road is Kansas speak for don't get stuck. In the mud. Way out in the country with only the cows and the milo crops.

Locals warn us to stay on the yellow colored limestone roads after rain. The brown roads get muddy and slick. We are mindful of these warnings after a couple of close calls that nearly landed us in a ditch. There's a road called "O" that will forever be known in our family as "Oh No Road" because we didn't heed the advice. Now we don't do country rides in the rain and we choose carefully when we take the dogs out to see cows after rain.

It's not always so easy, though. Once we followed a good, yellow road up to the top of the hill only to discover too late it turned into a bad, brown road on the other side. There was no turning around, no going back. My brother had no alternative but to keep moving forward as the pickup fishtailed and clumps of mud flew in the side windows. He managed to get us to an intersection of one of the good, rockier roads. It was the steady pushing ahead that saved us from getting stuck deep in the mud.

I try to think of whether it's a lesson in foolishness or faith. Or maybe some of both. There might be something like a lesson about staying steady in faith in the midst of unexpected changes in life and about ever working forward rather than bogging down in the mistakes of the past.

We laugh about it. And maybe that's as important as a life lesson--the reminder that God wants us to keep going, but merrily.