Today’s Bible Verse
Today, I want the sky and the earth to hear my words. I am shouting them aloud. For I have offered you, life or death, good things or bad things. Choose life! If you do that, you and your children will live.
Deuteronomy 30:19
We Have a Choice to Make
How often do you think about your choices? According to statistics, we make about 35,000 decisions per day. We have the choice to get out of bed. We have the choice to pray, do our devotions, and read the Bible.
The choices we make will determine our life’s success, and those choices are made in secret because they happen on the inside first. That secret place is in our hearts, and everyone will see the results of those choices. It can be good or bad choices, and as Pastor Art shared, all choices come with consequences.
Those consequences can have a short or long-term effect on our lives, and ultimately it will make a difference between success and failure. So, those secret choices that we make in our hearts are very critical to our walk in Christ.
Psalms 51:10 shares, “God, please make my heart new and clean. Make my spirit strong and true, deep inside me.”
God wants our hearts new and clean so that we can make good choices and not bad choices. It is our responsibility once we make that choice. It is also our responsibility to be quick to repent and ask God for forgiveness if we make a wrong choice. Don’t blame others for our bad decisions. The Holy Spirit and my wife remind me to accept responsibility and admit if I made the wrong choice. If we can’t take responsibility, then there is pride in our hearts. Proverbs 16:18 Shares, “Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall.” Pride will always hinder us from receiving our full potential blessing from God.
In Matthew, chapter 4, the devil challenges Jesus to make choices. Jesus had an opportunity to choose to give in to the devil’s challenge to prove Himself and make stones into bread, come under the devil’s taunting, and establish that the angels would catch Him if He threw Himself down from the top of the temple. The devil even challenged Jesus to bow down and worship him. In the end, Jesus made the right choice and said, “Away from Me, Satan! For it is written: ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve Him only.’”
Jesus is an excellent example for us to continue to make the right choices in our lives. (Pastor Stan Abihai, Word of Life Kahului)
Change My Story
As a husband, dad, leader, boss, and pastor, three things help me to make the right choices:
1. Having a new and clean heart
2. Swallowing my pride
3. Asking God for forgiveness
These three choices can help all of us to be successful in our lives. Let’s keep dreaming and believing in ourselves. With the help of the Holy Spirit, we can change and make good choices.
Today’s Declaration
Today, Lord, I choose to have a new and clean heart. I choose to swallow my pride. I choose to ask for forgiveness. I choose to speak life and not death. I choose to win souls and make disciples. In Jesus’ Name, Amen!
Today’s Bible Reading
- Old Testament: 1 Samuel 29-31; Psalms 106:24-48
- New Testament: Mark 13:14-31; 2 Corinthians 11:16-33
