Red light

Are red lights a bad thing? I tend to think so; when a light is red, it keeps me from getting where I want to go as quickly as I would like. When used symbolically, a red light is anything in my life that tells me to stop. I generally don't like being told to stop. Do you?

Yesterday I was in a car traveling from a service celebrating the life of my friend's mother, and we had a couple of cars that needed to stay together. Unfortunately traffic caused us to get separated and so we were a little concerned that the car behind us might not know how to find my friend's house.

As we pulled up to the next intersection, the light changed on us at the last second. That usually frustrates me - I almost made it! But in this case, Steve slowed, stopped, looked for the car behind him, and said, "The red light may have brought us together."
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I think that in life we see a purpose to red lights sometimes. We know that things are bad for us and God puts red lights to protect us. But this was a purpose I never thought of. What if sometimes the red lights in our lives are God trying to slow us down....slow us down not because of any bad thing we're headed toward, but to let our friends and family catch up to us?

For example, I can think of a time when I was in a hurry to jump into a career and move away from my hometown. God put up red lights, and looking back I can see that it brought me together with my family and countless friends who have built me up as a person. The red light brought us together.

So I think next time God says stop,  it will be time to look in the rear view mirror for people he may want me to be with. The red light may be bringing us together.