Three years ago this last week, I started a new job. Prior to that, I had gone through a season where I learned what it must have been like for Israel to wait on their deliverance out of Egypt. While I loved the people I worked with, I desperately felt like I needed a new opportunity. I was in constant fear that my job was going to be eliminated, and the working conditions continued to get worse and worse with no real light at the end of the tunnel. I waited and waited. I would like to say I was patient in the waiting, but I was not. When I finally stopped putting limits on God with regard to the kind of job I was willing to take and fully trust in Him, He opened up the most unexpected door for me.

In all honesty, I was not really sure exactly what kind of job I had applied for. All I knew for certain was that I met the qualifications, and hoped against hope that this was the place for me. It was. I left a job that I had ten years of training and investment in, one in which I considered myself very well versed, for one I knew very little about. Over the last three years, I have had a lot of on-the-job training, and a lot that I have just had to figure out on my own.

One of the things I have figured out on my own has to do with Manufacturer’s Recommendations. Prior to this job, I never really paid must attention to those. In case you have not, either, let me enlighten you. When you buy pretty much any product with a label or package insert, you will find printed, among other things, the manufacturer’s recommendations for proper use, care, maintenance and storage of that product. I have learned that when someone calls my office with a question about a piece of medical equipment they are using or have purchased, my first reply is to ask them what the manufacturer’s recommendations say with regard to the question they are asking. Usually, they have no idea, but almost without fail, the answer to the question they are asking me can be found in those.

I could speculate on an answer to the questions that are generally asked, but why would I do that when I can go to the very one who made the product, who knows the most about the product, and find my answers?

You guys are smart cookies, I bet you know where I am going with this.

So often, we have questions about how this life is supposed to work. Situations arise, things happen, troubles come, and we are often left wondering the best way to deal with them. Many times, we don’t even think to see what the Manufacturer’s recommendations are for our situation. We seek advice and direction from others who are knowledgeable without even considering taking a moment to read the instructions already printed out for us.

I do that. I run to the people I lean on for help. More often than not, they do just what I do at work. They send me to the Manufacturer’s recommendations. If the people you seek out for help in your life are not directing you to those recommendations, then you need to find new advisors. If they are not pointing to you God’s holy word, then you are taking a huge risk.

When someone comes to me needing to know how to store, or clean, or properly use a piece of medical equipment, I can usually come up with some pretty sound advice all on my own. But I have learned that what I know pales in comparison to what the creator, or manufacturer, of that piece of equipment knows. The same is true with this life.

Everything we need to know to navigate this life is written in the Bible, God’s recommendations. We just sometimes forget to look there, first.