What's Your WAEC Office?

During our trip in Nigeria, we were headed to Aguda.

Simple enough.

At least that's what we thought.

The driver was driving.

Traffic was traffic-ing.

Everybody was doing their own thing.

My wife actually knew where we were supposed to be going. 

The problem was she was busy sorting out another transaction.

Calls.

Messages.

Details.

Life.

And somehow...

we kept driving.

I just sat there, enjoying the view.

Then the driver casually mentioned a landmark.

WAEC office.

Immediately my wife looked up.

"WAEC?"

Something wasn't right.

That's when we realized we weren't heading to Aguda anymore.

The driver had misheard something somewhere.

The destination had changed.

The vehicle was moving.

But we were moving in the wrong direction.

Let's just say our travel time expanded significantly.

And as we laughed about it later, I couldn't stop thinking about how much that resembles life.

And marriage.

Because most people don't wake up one morning and decide to drift.

Drift is subtle.

You get busy.

You get distracted.

You start focusing on something else.

Work.

Children.

Bills.

Stress.

Responsibilities.

And before you know it, you're still moving...

but not necessarily toward where you intended to go.

The scary thing about drift is that movement can disguise it.

You're busy.

Active.

Occupied.

Which makes it easy to assume everything is fine.

But motion is not the same thing as direction.

A couple can be busy and disconnected.

A Christian can be active and spiritually cold.

A marriage can be functioning and still be drifting.

That's why landmarks matter.

The WAEC office wasn't the problem.

It was the wake-up call.

The thing that made us stop and ask:

"Wait a minute... where exactly are we going?"

Marriage needs landmarks too.

Moments that force us to pay attention.

A conversation that feels different.

A growing distance.

A recurring argument.

A loss of joy.

A lack of intimacy.

A sense that we're becoming roommates/co-parents instead of partners.

Those moments are not always the problem.

Sometimes they're the WAEC office.

The landmark that tells you something needs to be examined.

Hebrews 2:1 tells us,

"We must pay the most careful attention... so that we do not drift away."

Notice that.

Drift.

Not sprint away.

Not run away.

Drift.

Because most important things are not lost suddenly.

They are lost gradually.

And thankfully, they are often recovered the same way.

One conversation.

One correction.

One moment of awareness.

One decision to pay attention again.

The question is not whether drift is possible.

It is.

The question is:

What is your WAEC office?

What is the landmark that makes you stop long enough to evaluate your direction?

What gets your attention before the distance becomes too expensive?

Because being lost is not the greatest danger.

The greatest danger is continuing confidently in the wrong direction.

And sometimes God's grace shows up as a landmark.

A moment.

A comment.

A realization.

Something that makes you look up and ask:

"Hold on...

How did we get here?"

And perhaps more importantly:

"Where are we actually headed?"

👣 Be Better. 💛 Love Better. 🙌🏾 Do Better. 💍Marriage Works.