The choice is ours...

The Choice is Ours--Deuteronomy 30:15-16

"See I have set before you today life and prosperity, and death and adversity; in that I command you today to love the Lord your God, to walk in His ways and keep His commandments..."--Deuteronomy 30:15-16.  As we approach the close of the book of Deuteronomy Moses continues to drill the point about the importance of obeying God's commands.  Here two choices are put before the people, obedience to God's commands means life and prosperity.  Disobedience means death and adversity.  And just like the people had a choice, the choice is also ours.

The choice is ours.  Due to the nature of the issue, this morning's blog is going to be a little bit more somber as it quite literally deals with life or death.  With that being said, consider the following scenario.  It pains me when I hear of families that are faced with one of the hardest decisions a person ever has to make and that is to take a dying loved one off a system of life support.  Sadly, my family was faced with a very similar decision in the days prior to my dad's passing.  It was a difficult choice for our family to make but nonetheless the choice was still ours.

The choice is ours.  Take the above mentioned scenario and consider how we might apply it to our walk with God.  Fact is God is our system of life support. We know from Genesis 2:7 that God is the one that breathed life into Adam's nostrils.  How awesome it is to realize that every individual breath we take comes directly from God.  God is our life support system.  But He does not only support our life physically, much more importantly He is also our spiritual life support system.  Continuing in Genesis we know that in Genesis 3:1-24, Adam and Eve were confronted with the same choice that faced the Israelites in Deuteronomy 30:15-16 and they were faced with the choice that faces us today.  It is no secret that they chose wrong.  Adam and Eve chose to "pull the plug" on their spiritual life support system and in turn their physical life support system.  They were separated from God and no longer had access to the tree that gave them eternal life.  Adam and Eve had a choice and today that same choice is ours.

The choice is ours.  The choice we must make is whether or not to obey God.  To obey means life and prosperity.  Does this mean we won't physically die?  Of course not.  Does this mean we will always be prosperous and that life is always going to be easy? Of course not.  However, what obedience does mean is that eternal life is guaranteed and that God will be with us wherever we go through the good times and the bad.  So what about option 2, disobedience?  Deuteronomy 30:15-16 shows us that option 2 means death and adversity.  We know disobedience ultimately means spiritual death and eternal separation from God but how does disobedience lead to adversity?  First of all, a footnote in my Bible says this word adversity can also mean evil.  That being said, take a second to look at the world around us.  Just the other night I was talking to my girlfriend about the issues facing our nation today.  Among the issues I specifically mentioned were abortion and same sex marriages.  While I am all for voting against these issues, voting, while making a difference, does not fix the real problem. These issues are just symptoms of the real problem, a sin problem.  When we look at the world around us, we can see how disobedience to God leads to evil and adversity.  Some of the adversities I have faced have been a result of my disobedience to God.

So, the choice is still ours.  Will we obey God and thereby receive the guarantee of eternal life and ultimate prosperity or will we choose to disobey bringing spiritual death and adversity and evil into our own lives?  The choice is ours.  Ultimately, this choice hinges on one crucial decision, the decision as to whether or not we will obey the gospel.  2 Thessalonians 1:8 tells us what will happen to those who choose wrongly.  The choice is ours.  Make that choice today and believe in what God can do for you through His Son Jesus Christ, repent of any sins you might have in your life and be baptized into Christ for the remission of those sin per Acts 2:38 and Romans 6:3-4.  The choice is ours.  What will we choose?