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Our way maker on the journey

Lynne Baab • Tuesday December 2 2025

Our way maker on the journey

“Way maker, miracle worker,
promise keeper, Light in the darkness.
My God, that is who You are.”

Nigerian Gospel singer Sinach won Song of the Year for "Way Maker" at the 2020 Gospel Music Association’s Dove Awards. She is the first Nigerian to win that award. The song was released in 2015.

“Way maker” is an evocative way to describe God. We can bring so many interpretations to that name. Many of them are relevant for this series of blog posts on life as a journey. I want to give you three of the connections that come to my mind when I think of the Triune God or Jesus as our way maker.  

1. “I am the way, the truth, and the life,” Jesus says to his disciples in the Upper Room on the night that he will be betrayed and arrested. Jesus has washed the disciples’ feet, predicted his betrayal and Peter’s denial, and told the disciples he’s going away to prepare a place for them (John 13 and 14). Thomas has asked, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?” (John 13:5).

The way, Jesus says in his reply, lies in understanding that Jesus himself is the way, the truth, and the life. Jesus is the way maker because he himself is the way. He doesn’t give us a map separate from himself.

Jesus, guide us into your paths. Calm our desire for precise maps ahead of time and help us draw near to you as the one true way. Teach us how to know you as our way maker, every day, every moment.

2. Jesus guides us by lighting the way. In the verse from Sinach’s praise song that I quoted above, she also notes that Jesus is the “light in the darkness.” That theme of God as light occurs frequently in the Bible, culminating with Jesus’s words, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life” (John 8:12).

Jesus says those words in the temple treasury during the Feast of Booths, the festival where the people of Israel remember that they wandered in the wilderness for 40 years. They slept in tents. God guided them every day. Again, no maps. God’s guidance moment by moment.

Psalm 119:105 gives a double descriptor of the way God lights our path:

“Your word is a lamp to my feet
    and a light to my path.”

“Your word” can refer to God’s commands in the Bible, the Bible itself, and to Jesus. All of those are ways God guides us into the right path.

Holy Spirit, open the scriptures to us as a lamp to our feet and a light to our path. Jesus, word of God, be our light, our way maker.  

3. “God makes a way where there is no way.” Various versions of those words have been floating around the Christian world in praise songs and memes for a while now. They are comforting words in facing obstacles. Probably the closest connection with the Bible comes in Isaiah 43:19:

“I am about to do a new thing;
    now it springs forth; do you not perceive it?
I will make a way in the wilderness
    and rivers in the desert.”

Way maker, open our eyes to your new things. Help us see how you are making a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.

We are in the first week of Advent, waiting for the birth of Jesus. In Advent, we also long for his second coming when Jesus will restore all things and all people to our redeemed and beautiful selves. As we look around our world, we can see how much we need God’s redemption. We need God’s light on our paths more than ever.

As this busy month begins, take a moment to rest in the names for Jesus mentioned here. Take a breath with each name. Soak in the joy and brightness of Jesus’s light.

Way

Truth

Life

Light of the world

Way maker

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Next week: Forgiveness on the journey. Illustration by Dave Baab: Green Lake, Seattle.

Some of my favorite past Advent posts:

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