Choose Life

Have you heard this saying?

“You don’t get what you want, you get what you fight for.”

Are you like water flowing down a mountain? Do you take the path of least resistance? Water always flows down, goes around high places and around trees and boulders: it always flows downhill. There are so many hard choices in life that it certainly would be easier to be like water and go with the flow.

Everyone lies, why not me? Everyone is sarcastic. Why should I be different? I stand out if I don’t do what everyone else does…the flow.

But will you get what you want if you don’t fight?

Wise people walk the road that leads upward to life, not the road that leads downward to death. Proverbs 15:24

God’s people are wise. They climb mountains. They accept the challenges that God calls them to face. And the biggest challenge they face is to choose life, to choose faith and obedience to God.

There is a story in the Bible of a woman who suffered from severe bleeding. This handicap made her unclean in her culture. Kind of like how people who didn’t wear masks were treated during the scare-demic. And how people of color were treated in the South before the Civil Rights Act in 1964.  Treated like poison. But, this woman determined to get to Jesus. She believed that if she could only touch the hem of His clothes, she would be well.

She decided to choose life.

Jesus felt power leave him when she touched Him. Jesus acknowledged her openly. She was healed physically and emotionally because she was willing to climb up the mountain. See Mark 5:25-34.

Moses spoke to the people who came out of slavery in Egypt. Sternly he warned them that they had a choice. They could go after other gods and follow the ways of the people who lived in the land they were about to occupy. They could go with the flow. Or, they could be different. They could choose the God who powerfully released them from slavery. They were called, challenged to choose life and love their God, obey him and be faithful to him. See Deuteronomy 30:15-20. Choosing God is choosing life.

You may fall sometimes, but get up. Fight for what is right and good.

No matter how often honest people fall, they always get up again, but disaster destroys the wicked. Proverbs 24:16

The path of least resistance is the road to death. Fighting for what you want is accomplished in your heart first. God adds the power as you fight. Fight for righteousness. Choose life.

You must remember who you are, stand in your identity in Christ.

But you are the chosen race, the King’s priests, the holy nation. God’s own people, chosen to proclaim the wonderful acts of God, who called you out of darkness into his own marvelous light. At one time you were not God’s people, but now you are his people; at one time you did not know God’s mercy, but now you have received his mercy. I appeal to you, my friends, as strangers and refugees in this world! Do not give in to bodily passions, which are always at war against the soul. 1Peter 2:9-11

There are people in authority trying to control you, attempting to take away your power to think for yourself, to make choices for life, for God. They are using outright lies to turn you away from God and steal your freedom. Fight. Pray. Ask for power from Holy Spirit to push against the darkness. Climb that mountain.

In the book of Ezekiel in the Old Testament, evil prophets were using witchcraft to control and manipulate people. They were making wristbands and scarves to control life and death over people for their own benefit. God hated this. See Ezekiel 13:17-23.

God hasn’t changed, but neither have evil people.

Abortion is one example of people controlling life and death. Evil people lie to convince women to kill their babies while still in their womb. Evil people discourage people who are trying to obey God, and they prevent people who are doing evil from choosing life to save their lives. But, just as in the days of Ezekiel, God promised to rescue his people. He is coming to bring us out of darkness and into the light. He will show that He is LORD. Wait for it.

Hold on. Fight the lies. Choose life. Choose God. Climb that mountain.

Scripture quotations are taken from the GOOD NEWS TRANSLATION, SECOND EDITION, Copyright©1992 by American Bible Society. Used by permission. All rights reserved.