Wednesday, August 20, 2008
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The Daily Choice
"Now fear the LORD and serve him with all faithfulness. . . . Choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve . . . but as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD" (Joshua 24:14-15).
Serving the Lord or choosing to be a disciple of Jesus, and they are one in the same thing, is a choice. We are not forced to do it. It is an invitation that must be willingly embraced or it will not happen at all. God does not coerce any of us to be a person of faith. One day, we looked at all of the evidence, we felt the nudge of the Holy Spirit inside of us, and we said yes. That is the way that we come to faith. By making a choice. One of the most familiar verses in the Bible says, "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whosoever believes — whoever chooses to activate their faith — in him shall not perish but have eternal life" (John 3:16). It is always a choice to believe. But once we make that choice, something eternal happens. That one choice on one given day in our history makes an eternal difference. We pass from death to life. We are transferred from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light. We become part of a new family. "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).
Satan is not that way. He got the human race to embrace sin through cunning and misrepresentation. He will use any tool at his disposal to keep us there. He has an arsenal of deception and accusation and lies and every other foul thing that he will use to keep us from choosing the one with whom he has been at war since before time began. Unlike God, he is no gentleman, and has no desire to offer us a choice. He wants only to steal, kill, and destroy you (John 10:10) and he will stop at nothing to do that. Do you realize that were it not for the merciful protection of a loving God on all of humanity, Satan would have already destroyed everyone!
Since the sinful mistake of our first parents in the garden of Eden, all of us are born into a sinful world. Sin not only surrounds us but has been passed down to us by our parents and we will pass it to our children. And, as soon as we are able, we carry on the tradition of sin. "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" (Romans 3:23). That is our lot in life. Satan wants us to stay there. God offers us a new and living way. "The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans 6:23). If we remain in our sin, Satan is content. When we choose to serve the Lord, he flies into action. He cannot take us away from God (see Romans 8:35-39), but he will do everything in his power to make us weak and ineffective in our walk of faith. To keep us walking in sin is his number one strategy. For then, we are actually serving him and his purposes.
1 Peter 5:8 tells us to, "Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour." He is out to get you and me. He wants us to sin and to keep on sinning. He is prowling around looking for someone to devour, anyone, he doesn't much care who, although he seems to find Christians particularly tasty! Be self-controlled. Be alert. Pay attention! Don't fall prey to any of his traps or schemes. "Resist him," says the 1 Peter 5:9, "standing firm in the faith." Do not yield your body to sin (Romans 6:11-14). Make a choice to rise above any and all temptation. Choose the way of faith! God has said that we do not have to sin and has provided the way out (1 Corinthians 10:13). It is simply a matter of believing him and acting on it. "I can do all things through him who gives me strength" (Philippians 4:13).
You have made the choice to follow Jesus. Now, make a choice to make a daily choice to do that. At the beginning of each new day, I again affirm my choice to serve the Lord. And, if something comes up during the day that would take me away from that or take me in another direction, I make the choice again. As for me, I will serve the Lord. And, if God has put others under my responsibility, I choose to direct them in the way that they should go too. As for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.
There are many things that we have to do anew each and every day. Get up. Shower. Get dressed. Eat. Go to work. The most important thing that we have the opportunity to do each and every day is to choose to serve the Lord.
"I am yours, today, Lord. I choose to follow you and serve you. I gladly accept all that you have for me today. Fill me with your Holy Spirit and use me today. Keep me from sin. I love you!"
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