The choice we have to make....

Deuteronomy 15-20

"See, I have set before you today lfie and prosperity, death and destruction. For I command you today to love the Lord your God, to walk in his ways, and to keep his commands, decrees and laws; then you will live and increase, and the lord your God will bless you in the land you are entering to posess.

But if your heart turns away and you are not obedient, and if you are drawn away to bow down to other gods and worship them, I declare to you this day that you will certainly be destroyed. You will not live long in the land you are crossing the Jordan to enter and posess.

This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the Lord your God, listen to his voice, and hold fast to him. For the Lord is your life, and he will give you many years in the land he swore to give to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob."

I know its a long verse this time but bear with me! I was reading through Deuteronomy this morning, and this passage really spoke to me. When something is important to us, we say its a matter of "life and death", but rarely the matter is as serious as all that. But when it comes to matters of the soul, there is nothing so absolutely imperative! We have been given a most amazing choice.....life or death. Not death as in physically, but death spiritually. When Adam and Eve were in the garden they couldnt distinguish between physical and spiritual death and Satan used that to fool them. Eve disobeyed God, and they both experienced spiritual death which I bet was far more painful than any physical death could be. They were separated from God forever, and banished from the garden. Fallen from grace, there was no going back, no pardon. It was over, and the paradise they knew became a memory.

But, the most amazing thing of it all is that human kind has been given another chance...another choice. We can choose to stay in our death, and wallow in the desert or we can take up God's offer to waltz back into paradise with him. It's easy sometimes to see God as a big ol meanie, but in his vast mercy He doesnt WANT us to choose death so that he can punish us but rather He PLEADS with us to choose life! And not just because it is what God wants us to do, or because its "the right thing" but because it is what is best for us. People seem to think that God doesn't always know best.....that sometimes sin can be good. There's this blurring of lines these days that would lead us to believe that sometimes us humans know better than God does. But the truth is, God knows what is best for us at ALL times, and He has written down what is best for us in His word. if we follow that, we choose life, and in doing so we choose life for our children, for our friends, and for our family because what we choose will ultimately influence them!

Our choices are so much bigger than us......and only God knows the full extent of the consequences of our choices. So when God puts the choice before you, CHOOSE LIFE!