This is my new series on stories to grow by . . .  stories with a lesson!

My husband and I were on a trip to help our daughter move to another state and I have a funny story to tell you from it.

Because we were moving her from an apartment in one state to another state, including a piano, we rented a moving truck.

Since we were going to leave the truck at the place we were moving her to, we went in two vehicles – my husband would drive the rental truck and I would drive my little Yaris.

When we came to the first tollbooth, I had a transponder in my car to pay the toll, but my husband had to go through the toll booth to pay cash.

So I went through and just drove slowly hoping he would catch up, but I noticed that he was not coming yet. So I pulled over on the right side of the highway to stop and wait for him.

I didn’t wait too long before I saw a Penske rental truck zoom pass me and so I realized that he must not have seen me on the side of the road waiting for him.

So, of course, I got back in traffic trying to reach him so that we could be in tandem again.

It didn’t take me long to realize that he must be trying to catch me thinking that I was in front of him having gone through the tollbooth first.

Since I was having a hard time catching him, I grabbed my cell phone and hit auto-dial to call him.

And I said to him, “Mark I am behind you. You need to slow down!” and he replied, “Oh, I thought you were in front of me.”

After a while, I told him that I was not the car behind him, but I was the car behind that car. So I was about to catch him.

But a few minutes later, he called me back and he said, “Amy, you are not behind me. You are nowhere to be seen behind me. There is no black Yaris back there!”

Then I realized that I was following the wrong truck!

It was a truck that looked just like the one my husband was driving, the same size, headed the same direction, but it was not the truck my husband was driving.

There are some great life lessons found in the mistake that I made with following the wrong truck.

I was very sincere in believing that that was my husband leading me to the place we were to go, but I was sincerely wrong.

And you know what? That can happen so much in our lives.

Spiritually, we have to be careful who we are following. Sometimes we can get sidetracked by books, philosophies, or charismatic people, and we think, oh this is the right way. But we have to be careful and be certain that we are following the truth of Jesus Christ and His Word first and foremost in what we are following.

Another application would be our health. There is so much hype out there when it comes to our health. We have to be careful that are following clinical studies proven by science as well as testimonies of what has worked for other people. And even then we have to be certain that the testimonies are honest.

Marketing and advertising can say anything and can deceive us. Be careful.

Third of all, we have to be careful with who we are following with our business lives. At one point I was following someone who really was very good – I learned a lot from her and her team.

However, they took a new direction and were encouraging me to join their new efforts of buying products and then selling them on another platform. They talked about how I could earn a lot of money doing this.

But you know what? I want to live my life on purpose.

That is not my purpose. My purpose is not to make a lot of money.

My purpose is to help people take their next step in their faith, in their health, and in earning more resources – not in spending my time shopping to resell again and make money!

No, that is not what I am about.

Follow God’s plans for you.

I was sincerely following the wrong truck who would have led me to a destination that I did not want to go to!

Have you ever discovered you were following the wrong leader? Share below in the comments.

Be careful who you are following!