THE OLD PATH IS NOT OF THE LAW OR LETTER BUT OF THE SPIRIT

 THE OLD PATH IS NOT OF THE LAW OR LETTER BUT OF THE SPIRIT

Jeremiah 6:16 Misinterpretted

By Jonas T.  Suizo

Thus saith the LORD, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls. But they said, We will not walk therein.

The old path is one of the most misunderstood ideas in Scripture. People love to quote it like it’s some cozy, vintage religious aesthetic, but the real meaning is far from cute. Jesus Himself already warned that many “err, not knowing the Scriptures nor the power of God,” and that’s exactly what happens when this verse gets treated like a slogan instead of a call to surrender. The old path isn’t old because it’s nostalgic — it’s old because it’s rooted in God’s eternal way, the one that existed long before human preferences, traditions, or church styles ever entered the picture. And every time God describes this path, He makes one thing painfully obvious: it’s never convenient to the flesh, never predictable, and never controlled by human expectations.

When Jesus told Peter, “When thou wast young… thou walkedst whither thou wouldest, but when thou art old… another shall carry thee whither thou wouldest not” (John 21:18), He exposed the real nature of God’s way. The old path is a road where your will gets crossed, your desires get denied, and your flesh gets dragged somewhere it wouldn’t take itself. If the journey you’re on always matches your comfort zone, then let’s be honest — that’s probably your own path, not God’s. The way of God has always demanded surrender, not preference.

And to make things even more humbling, the old path is not a route you can predict, chart, or control. Jesus compared life in the Spirit to the wind: it moves where it wants, you hear it, but you don’t get to know where it came from or where it’s going (John 3:8). That’s the uncomfortable truth of the old path — you walk it without a map. You follow God without knowing the itinerary. But even if the route is unclear, the destination is absolutely certain. Jesus promised, “Peace I leave with you… not as the world giveth” (John 14:27). And God assures His people that His thoughts are “thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end” (Jeremiah 29:11). In other words, you don’t get to see the twists, but you can trust the ending.

Scripture pushes this idea even further by showing that God’s path is literally invisible to human wisdom. Job said, “There is a path which no fowl knoweth, and which the vulture’s eye hath not seen” (Job 28:7). Even the sharpest, highest creatures can’t spot it — meaning, this isn’t a path humans can discover on their own. It’s only known if God reveals it. And when He leads, He leads through places that don’t even have paths, just so it’s clear He’s the one doing it. God says, “I will make a way in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert” (Isaiah 43:19). He even guides the blind “by a way that they knew not” (Isaiah 42:16), proving that what you need is not sight — it’s trust.

So the old path isn’t about going back to some “better era” or recreating what older generations did. It’s not nostalgia. It’s not tradition for tradition’s sake. It’s about returning to the original route God designed, the one no human invented and no human can improve. It’s ancient because God authored it, and it’s new because the Spirit reveals it in every generation. It denies the flesh, humbles human wisdom, removes predictability, and yet guarantees peace at the end.

The old path is not the one you choose. It’s the one God chooses. It’s not the path that makes sense — it’s the path that saves. It caught Job unaware.  And honestly, it’s the only path that doesn’t leave you walking in circles because it has no certain patterns only the WILL and PLEASURE of GOD.