“I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live: That thou mayest love the LORD thy God, and that thou mayest obey his voice, and that thou mayest cleave unto him: for he is thy life, and the length of thy days: that thou mayest dwell in the land which the LORD sware unto thy fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them.” Deuteronomy 30:19-20
“I’m going to go do such and such,” I thought.
“What did I tell you to do?” the Holy Spirit immediately spoke to me.
“You told me not to do it,” I responded.
“Will you do it, or will you obey me?” the Holy Spirit essentially said.
Ouch. The Spirit of God had spoken. I was caught in the act. Of thinking of doing something I knew He didn’t want me to do. I knew the choice I faced. To go ahead and do what I wanted – or to obey the Lord. I am a Christ follower, but I struggle daily, sometimes moment by moment, with my flesh wanting to run in the opposite direction of God and His will for me. So I can do my own thing. And satisfy my flesh.
How often do we convince ourselves what we’re doing, or planning to do, is okay, when we know it’s not okay in God’s eyes? Or so want to do what we want to do we don’t seek the Lord and His Word and godly counsel if needed to see if it’s okay with God? If it’s His will for us?
Truly loving the Lord Jesus Christ, not just professing to believe in Him and love Him, being genuinely committed to Him with genuine love for Him, manifests in obedience to God. It means we choose to love Him instead of choosing to love our selfish selves, to follow Him instead of to follow the world and its ways, to seek Him and His will for us instead of chasing after our own will for us, to say yes to Christ and no to our self-centered ways and desires. We choose to sacrifice our self-centeredness and choose to be Lord-centered instead. We choose to live by God’s Word instead of by the world. We choose to seek the Lord, listen to the Lord, and obey the Lord. We choose. We choose. We choose. We choose Christ!
Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden knew God’s will and went against Him and then hid from Him. They lost a forever life in paradise, but most importantly they lost everlasting intimate fellowship with God. For those who desire forever fellowship with Christ, we need to choose Christ, to choose God and His will, to choose to follow Him step by step through our lives. Our human flesh hates to be denied the satisfaction of what we lust after to please ourselves, but oh the unfathomable amazingness of being intimately in Christ’s fellowship under His glorious lordship forever – nothing can compare! So we choose. We choose life. We choose Christ!