Monday Morning Devotion-March 16, 2020
Everyday Decisions
The one who sows to please his sinful nature will reap destruction; the one who sows to please the Spirit from the Spirit will reap eternal life. Galatians 6:8
"Every day you have choices to make. These decisions are seeds that are planted in your life. And with each one you are either nurturing your relationship with Jesus or undermining it." ("Jesus Our Perfect Hope"-Charles Stanley)
Keep that in mind while I repeat some information that I dug up while researching a talk I gave back in 2014.
"Each day the average person will make 70 conscious decisions. That means we will make 25,550 decisions a year. And over the course of 70 years that adds up to 1,755,500 decisions." That's a lot of thinking. Gives me a headache just contemplating it.
"In making that many decisions it would seem that there is a fairly large margin of error built in. If you are making as many as 70 decisions in a 24-hour period of time, there is no doubt that you'll make some good ones as well as some bad ones. I mean nobody makes good decisions all the time. We are all prone to making bad decisions. Most of them won't have major consequences attached to them. Some, you can make instantly and often these don't hurt us, but sometimes they do.
Often it is just a case of being rational in your decision-making. Problem is that for most folks there is no such thing as a purely-rational self. Why is that? It's because emotions get in the way. Often those can lead to bad decision-making."
It's the bad ones we make that seem to stick with us and sometimes haunt us until we can let go. (See "Eliminating the Negative" last week's devotion) As Solomon said in Proverbs 19:3 "People ruin their lives by their own foolishness." Bad decisions can have mega-bad results if we let them hang on.
Sometimes those bad decisions are made on the spur of the moment. You don't really have time to think it through and you may act or react badly. That is not always the case. You may make an instantly good one. It may even be a great decision. If you do that is very gratifying. It shows that your, uh°as the old saying goes°" heart is in the right place." Not that it isn't if you make an instantly regrettable decision. It's just that the bad won out over good in that circumstance. Not that the good can't or won't recover.
Let me share this story again that I told in that long ago talk given six years ago, seems like a long time now. Anyway, I want to re-share this story because I love it and I'm sure that even if you have heard it before you will enjoy hearing it once again. Here goes just like it was back then:
At the Florida Conference we were privileged to hear from Dr. Bob Tuttle, on a couple of occasions. Cool guy. Professor at Asbury Theological Seminary. In fact, our Pastor at Good Samaritan, Betsy Zierden was in his class at Asbury.
Professor Tuttle told us a story about an event at the Special Olympics that was held for those with intellectual disabilities. They started a race and about half-way down the track a girl who was running in the event, stumbled fell, and just laid on the track crying.
Another runner noticed what had happened and came back to help her. Then another runner stopped racing and came back. Then another and another. Pretty soon none of the runners were running the race. They were all helping the girl up, brushing her off and trying to make her feel better.
Then one of the runners grabbed her hand on one-side and another runner took the other hand and soon everybody was holding hands as they started walking down the track. The race continued, but they didn't stop holding hands. So, everybody crossed the finish line at the same time. They all won. It was a tie. (OK have you stopped tearing up, now? Grab a tissue and let's proceed on.)
That was a spontaneous decision made by one runner and everybody else responded and decided to help with good results.
Sometimes there is risk involved in making the right decision. We are afraid to take the risk. Maybe we think our situation is the best it can be, and we don't want to risk messing that up. We might even be stubborn and refuse to listen to what other options there are. The risk is clouding our decision-making. Take a look at this story. I think you will see what I mean:
Donald Miller, in his book "Blue Like Jazz" describes such a situation. He said a friend who is a Navy SEAL was involved in a covert operation in which they were assigned the task of "freeing hostages from a building in some dark part of the world. The friend's team flew in by helicopter, made their way to the compound and stormed into the room where the hostages had been imprisoned for months. The room was filthy and dark. The hostages were curled up in a corner, terrified.
When the SEALs entered the room, they heard the gasps of the hostages. They stood at the door and called to the prisoners, telling them they were Americans. The SEALS asked the hostages to follow them, but they wouldn't. They sat there on the floor and hid their eyes in fear. They were not of healthy mind and didn't believe their rescuers were really Americans.
The SEALS stood there, not knowing what to do. They couldn't possibly carry everybody out. One of the SEALS got an idea. He made a decision. He put down his weapon, took off his helmet, and curled up tightly next to the other hostages, getting so close his body was touching some of theirs. He softened the look on his face and put his arms around them. He was trying to show them that he was one of them. None of the prison guards would have done this.
He stayed there for a little while until some of the hostages started to look at him, finally meeting his eyes. The Navy SEAL whispered that they were Americans and were there to rescue them.
Will you follow us? He asked. Then this hero stood to his feet and one of the hostages did the same, then another, until all of them were willing to go. The story ends with all the hostages safe on an American aircraft carrier."
Beautiful story of one wise, caring man making a good decision. Humbling himself. Touching others so they would trust and follow him and his companions.
The hostages were afraid to take a risk. When they did a good life awaited them.
That's what Jesus has in store for us°a good life. As Stanley points out: "The more decisions you make that honor the Lord the more He reveals Himself to you and allows His life to flow through you."
Prayer: Lord Jesus, lead us through each decision that we make so that it will honor you and enable you lead us in the best way. Amen!