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There was something rather extraordinary about Dolly Parton. She could write a song about almost anything: work, poverty, love, heartbreak, faith, loneliness, family.

And somehow, beneath the rhinestones and the humour, there was usually something rather serious going on. She understood that life isn’t always the story we would have chosen. Sometimes you find yourself on a road you didn’t expect. Sometimes love hurts. Sometimes work is exhausting. Sometimes you have to let somebody go. And sometimes, despite everything, you wake up the next morning and carry on.

The road you’re walking

As you will have no doubt seen in the news, Dolly died this week, after a brief battle with cancer. And as we hear today’s readings, I wonder whether one of her observations might help us hear them afresh. I don’t mean the one about not knowing how long it took to do her hair because she was never in the same room when it was being done. Or the one about being a dumb blonde – that she was neither dumb nor blonde. But this one: “If you don’t like the road you’re walking, start paving another one.”

It’s a lovely line. But I think we need to handle it carefully, because not everybody gets to choose the road they are walking. Some roads are imposed upon us. There are roads of illness, grief, poverty, injustice and loss that we would never have chosen. There are things done to us that we cannot simply walk away from. Sometimes the most faithful thing we can do is simply take the next step.

But there are also times when we can begin to build another road. We can make a different choice. We can ask for help. We can leave something that is harming us. We can set a boundary. We can begin again. And part of the wisdom of faith is learning to discern the difference: which roads are ours to walk, and which roads are ours to leave?

Not pretending

Jeremiah knows something about difficult roads. He has been faithful. He has spoken God’s word. He has tried to do what God has asked. And yet his reward seems to be suffering. He cries out to God: “Why is my pain unceasing, my wound uncurable, refusing to be healed?”

It’s an extraordinarily honest prayer. Jeremiah isn’t pretending that everything is fine because he trusts God. He says, in effect: “God, this hurts. I don’t understand. I have tried to be faithful and look where it’s brought me.”

There is something really important about that honesty. We owe it to people not just to look at the nice bits of Scripture since it can imply that it has nothing to say to them when they’re struggling.

Christian faith does not require us to pretend that difficult things aren’t difficult. Sometimes faith sounds less like certainty and more like: “God, where are you?” Jeremiah gives us permission to pray like that.

Take up your cross

And then Jesus says something equally difficult. He tells his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem. He will suffer. He will be rejected. He will be killed. But Peter can’t bear to hear it. He takes Jesus aside and says: “God forbid it, Lord! This must never happen to you.”

Peter wants another road. A safer road. An easier road. A road without suffering. But Jesus says: “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.”

That can be a hard passage to hear, and we need to be cautious with it. Jesus is not saying that suffering is good. He is not telling someone who is being abused to remain in an abusive situation. He is not telling someone who is exploited to put up with it. He is not saying that every painful thing that happens to us must somehow be God’s will.

Love sometimes has a cost

The cross is not a command to seek suffering. But it is a recognition that love sometimes has a cost. Sometimes choosing what is right means refusing the easier road. Sometimes faithfulness means continuing on a road we would never have chosen.

But Dolly’s words give us the other side of the picture. “If you don’t like the road you’re walking, start paving another one.”

Perhaps Jeremiah could have heard something in that too. Not a glib promise that he could simply change his circumstances, but a reminder that the future is not necessarily a repetition of the past. There may be things that Jeremiah cannot change – but there may also be new things that God is still asking him to build.

A particular kind of person

And that’s where Paul’s words become so important: “Let love be genuine. Hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good. Love one another with mutual affection. Rejoice in hope, be patient in suffering, persevere in prayer.”

Paul gives us a picture of what it means to walk the Christian road. It isn’t simply about believing the right things. It is about becoming a particular kind of person: someone who loves genuinely, perseveres, resists evil, welcomes others, and continues to hope.

And then comes that remarkable phrase: “Do not be overcome by evil but overcome evil with good.”

Notice what Paul doesn’t say. He doesn’t say evil isn’t real. He doesn’t say everything will work out immediately. He doesn’t say: “Just forgive and forget.” He says: “Don’t let evil have the final word about who you become.”

That is much harder.

Because suffering can change us. It can make us bitter. It can make us cynical. It can make us withdraw. Sometimes it has to make us cautious. Sometimes we need boundaries. Sometimes we need to walk away.

But Paul asks whether we can refuse to let what has happened determine everything about what we will become. Can we continue to love? Can we continue to hope? Can we continue to do good?

Something beautiful from scraps

One of Dolly’s most beautiful songs is “Coat of Many Colors.” She tells the story of being a poor child whose mother makes her a coat from scraps of material. Other children laugh at her because it isn’t expensive or fashionable. But Dolly understands something they don’t. The coat isn’t really about material. It’s about love. Her mother has taken what looked like scraps and made something beautiful.

Perhaps that is one of the things Christian faith asks us to believe. Not that everything that happens to us is good, but that God can still make something beautiful out of what looks like scraps: our failures, our grief, our disappointments, our mistakes, the things we wish had happened differently – none of them need have the final word.

But again, that doesn’t mean we simply carry on regardless.

Be patient

Dolly also wrote “9 to 5”, a song about the weariness and frustration of ordinary working life. It was funny and infectious, but underneath it was something very real: sometimes life is exhausting. Sometimes we work hard and don’t seem to get anywhere. Sometimes we give everything we have and wonder whether anyone notices.

And there is something very Christian about being able to say that. Jeremiah says it. Jesus says it. Paul doesn’t pretend otherwise. “Be patient in suffering.” Not: “pretend you’re not suffering.” Not: “convince yourself everything is fine.” But: “Be patient… Persevere… Keep praying.”

There is a difference.

Letting go

And that brings us to another of Dolly’s most famous songs, “I Will Always Love You,” the one that was made even more famous by Whitney Houston. It’s a song about parting, and it carries an important truth: sometimes love means letting go.

Christian love is not possession. It isn’t control. It isn’t insisting that somebody remain where they are simply because we want them there. Sometimes the loving thing is to release. Sometimes faithfulness means allowing another person to go.

Peter wants to stop Jesus going to Jerusalem. But Jesus knows that love cannot always take the safest road. And sometimes, just as importantly, love cannot demand that someone else remain on a road simply to make us comfortable.

Keep going

Perhaps this is where our readings and Dolly’s songs meet. They don’t tell us that life is easy. They don’t promise that faith will protect us from suffering. They don’t tell us that if we work hard enough everything will turn out exactly as we planned.

Instead, they offer something quieter: keep going.

Not because everything is fine, but because God is still there. Not because suffering is good, but because suffering doesn’t get to define the whole story. Not because the road is easy, but because we don’t walk it alone.

Choose what’s precious

There is a beautiful phrase in Jeremiah where God speaks of what is precious rather than what is worthless. Perhaps that is what Paul is asking of us too: to keep choosing what is precious, to hold fast to what is good, to let love be genuine, and to refuse to be overcome by evil.

And perhaps we can hear Dolly’s words again: “If you don’t like the road you’re walking, start paving another one.”

Sometimes we are on roads we didn’t choose. Sometimes the road is hard and we simply need the grace to keep walking it. But sometimes God gives us the courage to begin building something different. Sometimes the Christian community needs to help us build it. Sometimes the new road begins with something as simple as saying: “this is not right,” or “I need help,” or “I cannot continue like this.”

That, too, can be an act of faith.

Coming through darkness

There is one more Dolly song I would bring into this morning and that is: “Light of a Clear Blue Morning.” It’s less well known than the others, but it is a song about coming through darkness and discovering that morning is still possible.

That seems to me a profoundly Christian hope. Not: “there will never be another dark night.” But: “darkness is not all there is.” There will be morning.

There may be a road ahead that we cannot yet see. There may be things we cannot repair. There may be prayers that have not been answered in the way we wanted. But God’s faithfulness is not exhausted.

Peter wanted Jesus to take another road. In his place, we might also want the road without Jerusalem, the love without the cost, the resurrection without the cross, the morning without the night.

But Jesus doesn’t promise that. What he offers is something deeper: “Follow me.”

And Paul tells us what that following looks like: love genuinely, hold fast to what is good, be patient in suffering, persevere in prayer, welcome others, do good, refuse to be overcome by evil, and keep hope alive.

Hope

Perhaps Dolly Parton’s great gift was that she understood something of this. She could take poverty and turn it into a story, heartbreak into a song, hard work into laughter, loss into tenderness, and darkness into the possibility of morning. Not by pretending that the difficult things weren’t difficult, but by refusing to let them have the final word.

And perhaps that is what Christian hope looks like too.

We don’t have to pretend that the road is easy. We don’t have to pretend that the cross isn’t heavy. We don’t have to pretend that we understand everything God is doing.

But we can keep walking. We can keep loving. We can keep praying. We can keep doing good. And sometimes, with God’s help, we can begin paving another road.

Hold fast

So perhaps, this week, when the road feels difficult, we might remember Jeremiah’s honesty, Jesus’ courage, Paul’s perseverance, and Dolly’s stubborn hope. As she once said: “The way I see it, if you want the rainbow, you gotta put up with the rain.”

In their different ways, they are all saying: don’t give up; don’t let bitterness have the last word; hold fast to what is good.

And whether the road before us is one we must faithfully walk, or one we need courage to leave behind, may we trust that we never walk it alone. Because somewhere beyond the road we can currently see, God is still leading us towards life. Amen.

‘The Road we Walk’ was delivered by Ian Banks at Dearnley Methodist on Sunday 30th August 2026. It was based on Jeremiah 15:15–21; Romans 12:9–21 and Matthew 16:21–28