A Prayer To Choose Life In Whatever Way The Choice Comes To Us Today

Choose life.  Seems like a good idea doesn’t it?  In our world of increasing self-centeredness and personal convenience things like abortion and medically assisted suicide become increasingly popular choices as people seek to decide when life begins and when it should end.  In between those beginning and end of life choices are many others that either honour or exploit others, the environment, money etc. for personal gain.  God sets a choice before us every day – thousands of expressions of it but at the heart is the choice for God that we are introduced to in the Bible with these words:

… 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 …  Deuteronomy 30:19-20

Even earlier in the Garden of Eden God set before Adam and Eve a choice:

… the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.”  Genesis 2:16-17

The moments of choice in stories in the Bible are too numerous to mention here.  What we can say is that when people chose to follow their own agendas, it ended in a mess that left them with suffering and sorrow.  When they chose for God’s plan – life – they may have experienced momentary hardship and discipline but the blessings that God promises were their’s and life with God forever in heaven as the ultimate expression of life.

I find it interesting in the abortion debate that the two camps are the pro-life and the pro-choice camp and I think there is a real challenge to us in that.  If we want to make our own choices according to our own desires we get to do that – but the clear warning is that there are devastating consequences to moving down that pathway.

We hear lots of noise about personal freedom and choice when it comes to social distancing and mask wearing and getting or not getting vaccinated.  They choices can only be well made when they are made within the context of the most important choice: the choice to love the Lord our God, listen to his voice, and hold fast to him, knowing that He is our life.

… 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 …  Deuteronomy 30:19-20

That’s the foundation for the greatest commandment that Jesus mentioned when asked: Which is the greatest commandment in the Law?

“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.” This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”  Matthew 22:37-40

Lord, you are a generous God and You have set before us today life and death, blessings and curses.  Help us with gratitude and humility to choose life so we can truly live.  Give us grace to love You more than our own pleasures, to listen to Your voice and follow Your ways whether it is convenient or not, and to hold fast to You when the world around us seems to be shaking and falling apart.

Your love for us is so very evident. Everywhere we look, we see tangible proof of Your great care for us. Yet, when it comes to following You, we confess that we often don’t surrender our entire selves. We hold back portions of our lives that we would rather control instead of releasing them to Your loving care. Have mercy upon us, Lord. Forgive us for frequently saying one thing and doing another. May choices, our words, and our actions line up with Your will. 

Lord, our emotions needs focus and discipline so we can love you with all our heart.  Our desires and choices need shaping so our soul is lined up with Your expressed will.  Our thoughts need changing and refining so we have the mind of Christ rather than a mind that is twisted by the many influences.  Spirit of God, work in us today.  Help us to believe the good heart and good words of God and give ourselves wholeheartedly to Him at every point today.