God’s pretty cool. I know that sounds almost irreverent and like such an understatement, but honestly, the things He does sometimes are just plain cool. Someone I interviewed recently would term these things “kisses from heaven”—the little touches of favor God gives that He’s under no obligation to do but that He does just because He can.

In the past several months, I’ve done a lot of second-guessing of myself, my understanding of God’s will, the place I am in life right now, etc. I’ve tried to pray and seek His will in Scripture, but there were definitely periods where I felt that I had let busyness and life circumstances distract me, and I was beginning to wonder if I’d missed His will entirely.

A few months ago, I was reading the book Looking for Lovely by Annie F. Downs (a really great book which I highly recommend—especially for anyone who’s maybe not quite content with her life and wants to work on seeing the beautiful things in life). In one of my favorite chapters of the book, Annie described how she’d taken to walking the trail around a lake near her house. One day, as she worried she’d accidentally gotten on a trail with a higher level of difficulty than she intended, the speaker on the podcast she was listening to said, “Trust the path.”

Trust the path.

Look down, she felt God saying (and I’m paraphrasing here). You can see the path in front of you. You saw the map at the beginning of the trail. You know this is going to get you where you need to go . . . even if it does take a little longer than you may have intended.

Those words hit my heart right where I needed them to. As I searched through written prayers I had prayed to God, I saw that—regardless of my distractedness and possibly confused motives—I had been praying for God to show me His will. And as pastor and speaker Andy Stanley says, “God wants you to know His will even more than you want to know it.”

Trust the path, I felt God whispering. It’s right there in front of you, and I’m taking you right where you need to be—even if it takes a little longer than you might prefer.

The reassurance was sweet, and I tucked the lesson away for a rainy day when I was doubting His plan again. But if that hadn’t been enough, He solidified the truth by making it personal.

One day, as I was getting dressed for a run, I noticed several words stitched into the hem of my tank top.

Stay the path.

Okay, God—I got it. And . . . thanks for the reminder.