Sunday Morning in Charleston, SC: A few weeks before my father died in 1982, I was visiting him in his hospital room. Standing by his bed, I noticed his medical chart had the initials “DNR” written in large letters. Having worked in a hospital admissions office, I knew the letters meant “Do Not Resuscitate”. Becoming upset, I asked him why DNR was written on his chart. He calmly replied, “Do you expect me to live always?” “Would you want me to live in misery and pain?” Even though my heart was broken, I knew that he was right. My father had made a decision on how he wanted his life to end. He had made the decision on how much effort should be made to help him recover if his heart stopped beating... I know now that it was not an easy decision. He would have rather made that decision than to leave what to do for him to his family. Even after his funeral, I would ask myself “did we allow my father to do the right thing?” “Was there more that could have been done for him?” My father made the right decision even though it was a heart wrenching decision. At some point in your life or if you have not already done so, you are going to have to make some difficult decisions. You might be in the middle of a big decision right now. So what do you do when you are facing a big decision? In reading Luke 6:12-17, we get a glimpse of how Jesus handled what would have been a tough decision for me. In this passage of Scripture, Jesus was faced with a decision that would shape the rest of history. Out of the hundreds that were loyal and followed him, he had to choose 12 men who would be trained to continue his ministry. But what if he had made the wrong decision? Jesus did something here that everyone should do before making an important decision. He prayed. In fact, he was so serious about wanting to make the right choice that he prayed all night! And in the morning, he was ready to make his decision. If he had selected the wrong men, everything that he accomplished while he was here on earth could have just fizzled. Where would Christianity be today if the apostles had failed - just given it all up as a failed experiment and gone back to their old professions of fishing and tax collecting? We definitely wouldn’t have the Scriptures as they are today. We probably wouldn’t even know much about Jesus Christ at all. There would have been no Christian churches. God’s plan for salvation would have been lost to all generations. James 5:16 says that ’the prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective." This was a big decision Jesus had to make and to make it worse; He was under immense pressure in other areas of his life. His enemies were breathing down his neck and plotting against Him. Do you ever feel the weight of decisions on you? Do you ever feel that the well being of your family or maybe your whole future rests on this one decision? I think that Jesus felt that pressure ... So what did He do? We read in verse 12 that “Jesus went out into the hills to pray and spent the night praying to God”. The Scripture says it so plain and simple. He Prayed. I want to ask you this morning, how often do you pray about the decisions in your Life? No matter how busy you get and how many other pressures are on you - if you don’t stop to pray, you won’t have the guts or the common sense to make any good decisions. You won’t be prepared to choose well when the decisions are needed. You need to keep your wisdom SHARP and you do that by praying. “How often do you pray about the decisions in life?” If you want to make good decisions, you need to pray. How long do you spend praying about the decisions of life? The second thing we see about Jesus’ method of decision making is that his prayer was not just a “Please help me Lord” prayer, thrown up to God on the run . He was serious about praying and waiting for God for the answer - for wisdom to make the decision. He spent all NIGHT praying. How long do you spend praying about the decisions of your life? This is a challenge for me as much as it is probably to you. Have you ever stayed up all night praying about something? I will admit, I have not. But this is the example Jesus sets for us. A third thing we need to do is to ask for advice. Proverbs 19:20 says "Listen to advice and accept instruction, and in the end you will be wise." I don’t ask for advice because I don’t have the ability to make my own decisions, I ask for advice because I’m humble enough to know that I’m not an expert on everything. If I have car problems, I’m not dumb enough to go out in my driveway and try to fix it myself. Instead, I take it to people who know what they’re doing, even if it costs two arms and a leg. I discovered years ago that because your best friend work on cars does not mean that he’s an expert with your car. The same thing is true of my life. Before I make any earth shattering decisions, I want to hear from people who know me. People who are wise. People who are able to provide godly advice. We all need people like that in our lives. "Who’s that person in your life? Who are the people you can look to and lean on for wisdom? And support? And insight? Proverbs 15:22 says that "Plans fail for lack of counsel. But with many advisers, they succeed." After you have prayed for guidance, gathered all the facts, and asked for advice. The next thing you need to do is to make your decision and stick with it. Proverbs 16:3 says "Commit to the Lord whatever you do, and your plans will succeed." There’s comes a time where you reach that point of no return. And you just have to trust God and go for it. I want you to remember this: Nothing we do for Jesus Christ is a waste of time. Whether it’s being a garbage man. Or working a factory job. Or sitting behind a desk. If the decisions you make in life are consistent with the values of scripture and bring honor to God, then your decisions are good. One of the things the devil likes to do is to get people to spend the rest of their lives second-guessing themselves. "Did I make the right decision? Was it wrong for me to do what I did? Am I a bad person?" It’s time for us to stop agonizing over choices that were made in the past. Trust God to make good come out of those choices. And move on with our lives. Life is too short to sit around and mope over what might have been. Isaiah 43:18 says ““Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland. One of the stories in the Bible that’s really speaks to me about making decisions is in 2 Samuel 7. King David has just moved into the royal palace. And he says, "Why is it that I get to live in this awesome palace? And the ark of God gets to stay in a tent? What’s wrong with this picture? Who’s supposed to be more important here - me or God?" And the prophet Nathan says to him, "Whatever you have in mind, do it, for God is with you”. That’s the kind of relationship I want to have with God. I want to be so close to God that I have the freedom in Christ to do any kind of Christian service I want. And you know what? I can, you can. If you love God and your heart is in the right place, you can step out in faith and do great things for Him. I am led to ask what our lives might be like if we pray before making decisions in the way in which Jesus prayed before making decisions. I don’t remember praying and asking God’s guidance before picking my closest friends as Jesus did. I have to wonder, what will my life be like if I do so in the future - and not only praying before picking my friends, but what will life be like asking for God’s guidance before all such decisions in life? And let me say that I have made a number of gratifying decisions in my life. But the best decision I ever made was when I really accepted Jesus as my Lord and Savior. My life has never been the same. I am not perfect, but I am a different person. I don’t always appear as I should. Some of the things that I used to do are no longer pleasurable. My language is a lot cleaner. I’m a little more loving and considerate of others. (Well actually, I’m still growing in that area!!!) And my life has a purpose and a focus that I never had before. It feels great to know that I have been forgiven. To be an ambassador of almighty God. A child of the King of kings and the Lord of lords. I invite you to Jesus Christ. Allow the Son of the Living God bring out the best in you. You’ll be glad you did.
Posted on: Sun, 15 Sep 2013 11:18:35 +0000
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