CHOICES
1. Introduction: There seems to be a principle or law at the very heart of this universe – God has created man with the freedom to choose – quite a scary thought when you consider we have the freedom to choose:
· Life or death,
· Right or wrong,
· Heaven or Hell.
But this freedom to choose seems so important to God. Otherwise He could have “conditioned” us like robots, programmed only to do the right thing.
2. Blessings or Curses ~ the choice is yours! The heart of God longs and yearns for people to make the right choice. He helps us to make the right choices. Deuteronomy Chapter 28 lays out the choice facing Israel:
· Verses 1 & 2 “If you fully obey the Lord your God and carefully follow all his commands that I give you today, …… All these blessings will come upon you “
· Verse 15: “However, if you do not obey the Lord your God and do not carefully follow all his commands and decrees I am giving you today, all these curses will come upon you and overtake you”
There was a choice, notice the little word “IF”! - If they chose to obey God – big blessings, if they chose to go their own way – curses would be the result of ignoring God’s guidelines for success.
3. Freedom to make your own choice ~ good or bad! Jesus similarly gave people the freedom to make their own choice to follow Him.
· If we look at Mark 10:17 – 23 we learn that the rich young ruler was given the space and choice to make his own decision to follow Jesus for himself.
· How many of us would have ran after him, trying to persuade him, for his own good (In love, of course!) to do the right thing? But no, Jesus let him go, He gave him the choice – and “looked at him and loved him”.
· Maybe we need to let people go (a son, or daughter perhaps), to let them make the right choice themselves, even if painfully, they make the wrong choice.
4. It’s the freedom to choose that I believe God wants
· You know using force, demands or even manipulation does not work – its usually temporary at best, and people are quick to return to their own way when the pressure is off.
· God wants people to choose Him for themselves prompted by love, responding with grateful hearts. When people choose for themselves it’s a heart change not a forced change. God does not want to force anyone to love Him. We shouldn’t try to make them either.
“Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom” (2 Cor 3:17)
5. Look at Jesus words, so often its that little word again: “IF”!
“If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me”. Mark 8:34
“If you love me, you will obey what I command.” John 14:15
“If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching.” John 14: 23
“If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you will, and it will be given to you”. . John 14:7
· You see, our often “you must” does not give the response God wants. What husband/wife or parent wants to force their partner/child to love them? Neither does Christ. Its “IF – CHOICE – then because you love someone you choose to obey out of gratitude and love. Can I point out that this obedience results in blessings for ourselves and others? It makes sense!
6. Helping to make right decisions. So is it hands off, no interest or participation whatsoever in helping people to make the right choices. Not at all. We can and should help people in whatever way we can to make wise decisions:
Sometimes, God will give extra special help to assist people in making the right choices! Lets remind ourselves of the “help” God gave Jonah to make the right choice! Stay in a whale’s belly or go and preach to Nineveh! I am not suggesting that we arrange for our dearly loved ones to spend a week in similar conditions to come to their senses. But here are some practical things worth considering:
· Lets choose to make the right choices ourselves, living the right life style before we start to help others (think of getting the plank out of your own eye first before helping to get that speck out of your brother’s!). For it was for “freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.” Gal 5:1
· We need to pray, often in secret without saying a word to the person we are praying for in our prayer closet.
· Setting the right example to make sure we are not a stumbling block to anyone, so that they can be helped and not hindered in making the choice to follow Jesus. When Billy Graham’s wife Ruth, was desperately praying for one of her sons who was a prodigal at that time she felt led to make a list of things she needed to pay attention to and get right herself. We only so often see the faults of the person we are praying for – God often begins to show us ours!
7. Some choices are not ours to make:
· They are already in place before we begin our journey in this world, our parents, nationality, environment and so on.
· Our “ministry” – Luke 8:38 shows the man delivered of demons begged to go with Jesus – but Jesus wanted him to go back and tell everyone what had been done for him. Maybe we need to realign our choices in line with God’s for the sake of the gospel and others we know and love.
· Sometimes when you seem to have no choice, choose to trust and follow Him whatever. Proverbs 3:5~6 says, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight.”
8. Just make sure you are making the right choices where you have a choice
Choose the best: Mary made the right choice – she chose to sit at Jesus feet listening to what He said, and was commended; “Mary has chosen what is better and it will not be taken away from her” Luke 10:42. We too need to adopt a similar lifestyle sitting and listening at our Lord’s feet, especially in our busy lives.
Choose who you will serve: Daniel’s friends in the face of great opposition chose to serve God – so must we even when things seem impossible. “If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to save us from it, and He will rescue us from your hand, O king. But even if He does not, we want you to know, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up”. Daniel 3: 17- 18
Choosing to go … even when we say we won’t! In the parable of the “Two Sons – (Matt 21.28 –32) it says the son who originally refused to go to work in the vineyard at the request of his father, “changed his mind and went”. A good choice, especially when contrasted with the son who said he would and didn’t! Maybe we have to change our minds about something God wants us to do and make the right choice.
9. The most important choice you will ever make ----- “The Gospel
Because Jesus made the ultimate choice, of laying His life down for us on the Cross for each one of us, we now have the choice to receive Him and accept all the good things God has planned for us: “Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in His name, he gave the right to become children of God” John 1:12. In the words of a song I once heard “How can you say no to this Man? Yet even here God gives us the ultimate freedom to choose, although I believe He longs and yearns for you to come to Him.
Finally, in the words of Joshua, (24:12) “ Choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve” Lets pray to the Lord and ask Him to help us to make the right choices for Him, for ourselves and for others.
