Making a change in your valley - Audio

The journey of live involves many ups and downs. Some roads we travel are chosen, but most are chosen for us. Life as we know it is full of changes. There will be valleys along the way. Our text begins with great anticipation: He is on his way to the house of God to worship. Our text highlights a place, a valley, that our traveler must go through to reach the house of God. Historians are not able to pinpoint the exact physical location of the valley reference in this Psalm. This Valley of Baca has been translated the valley of tears. Another called it the valley of misery. Though we do not know the exact location, we know that it was bleak and desolate. Our text indicates that he had to travel through this valley in order to reach the house of God. In life, the determining factor is not in it's valleys, but in the traveler who goes through the valley. It is not in the circumstances in life, but in the person that determines the worth of a man. God made the valley, but what we call the valley and what we make of that valley is up to us. Man can be use things, or be used by them. What we discern in this "valley of tears" will determine what we make of it. In our text, the Psalmist decided to make something of the valley they were in. They realized that God needed them to go through this valley in order to reach their destination and that they needed to make something of the situation. The message in our text is not just to grit our teeth an bear the situation until it is over; rather our Psalmist rejoiced and broke out in song in the valley of tears. He looked around and enjoyed a little bit of heaven. Something happened in that valley that transformed it from being a dry barren land to one with pools and springs. They did not make their way through the valley whining and complain, they found God in the midst of their misery. They left behind pools of water to benefit those that came behind them. Life is not what we find in it, but what we make of it. What we find in life is not always pleasant, The bible does not say that they found wells in the valley, but that they made wells. We do not always find life as we want it to be, we must make life what we want it to be.