The Choice

My day is filled with choices; so is yours. Should I have cereal for breakfast today or cook an egg? I consult my mood and my stomach. I decide on the cereal. That was easy. Should I go out shopping this evening or stay at home? I consult with my wife. She’s tired tonight, and we’ve already spent a bit too much this month. We’ll stay at home. Good choice.

Other choices are harder. Go on a trip next month or keep working? Check our family schedules. Finding the right dates turns out to be a challenge. Should we drive the old car another year or is it time to buy a replacement? We’ll need to think more about it.

How about a really big choice? Do I love this girl enough to ask her to marry me? Now there’s a choice that can change everything! I really did love the girl. She said, “Yes!” Every year I realize more what a great choice that was.

We try to make good choices, and often we are successful. However, our choices don’t always go well. Sometimes we choose too quickly or we don’t think it through all the way. Life surprises us in ways we couldn’t predict. Later we may think, “I really shouldn’t have done that.”

And then there is life’s biggest choice of all. Joshua calls upon his people to this choice. Will they serve the “gods beyond the river” or the Sovereign Lord of heaven and earth? No room for in between with this one. No half choices will do. It’s a “forever” kind of choice.

There are always “gods beyond the river” competing for my loyalty. There are different rivers and different gods, but I know the ones that call most loudly, most temptingly to me. You know the ones that call to you. “Serve me,” they say, “I can make you happy, fulfilled, complete.” They never give up. They never stop calling.

They’re all different, but they have one thing in common. They’re all false, all dead, and all deadly. This is life’s most consequential decision. So Joshua says, “Choose this day.” It’s a decision that can be anchored by one decisive choice, but it must be affirmed and lived out each day.

My day is filled with choices; so is yours. Today, yes, this day, I choose to serve the Lord. And you?

Some days it is so easy to serve you, Lord. I see things clearly, and it’s so plain to me that I want to serve you. But some other days, I can be forgetful, confused, tempted. I don’t always see the long-term consequences. In all the choices I make this day, be my guide. I want to serve only you.