Make Good Choices

“Make good choices.”

            My children have heard this from their mother for years. Every time that they are getting ready to leave the house, Heather will say to them, “I love you. Make good choices.”

            I hope that they realize how important that is. I hope that we all realize how important that is.

            We have a choice to make “good choices”, to me, implies that we also have the choice to make “bad” choices. But not all the choices and decisions that we make seem either really good or really bad at the time. They are just little, seemingly inconsequential choices. But they’re not.

I think we have more little choices every day to make than we have big choices every day to make, but the little choices lead us in the direction and put us in the position to make the big ones.

I heard a pastor once call these pivotal choices. He was talking about basketball, and that in life the big choice is like making a shot. That’s where we see the fruits of our labor, that’s where the payoff is for the hard work, and that most often in life we want to see where God is leading us to shoot. But before we can take a shot, our position is important, and most of the time you can’t just take a shot because there is something that is trying to block your shot. Then you have to pivot. The pivot allows a better perspective on your problem so that you can have a better view of the goal, so that your eyes can be on the prize.

So, it’s the little pivotal choices that really matter most.

The Lord gives us little choices to make every day.

The devil gives us little choices to make every day.

Make good choices. But then you’re looking at something online that you know you shouldn’t look at it. But it’s just a little choice. It’s just a little porn.

It’s a choice.

It’s just a little vaping. It’s just one drag.

It’s a choice.

It’s just one pill.

It’s just one drink.

It’s a choice, and all our little choices pivot the direction of our lives, and lead to habits.

It’s not just sex and drugs. Some people gossip and do more damage with their mouths than any alcoholic would do with a bottle.

Sometimes the anger is the habit, or the bitterness or the stress or the worry or the complaining. You didn’t wake up one day wanting to have these attitudes, but the little choices you made every day have led to the place where you are today.

I want to remind you today that regardless of choices you have made, it’s never too late to start making good choices, it’s never too late to make the best choice.

If it looked like it was too late for anyone, it would be at the end of your life. But it’s never too late, as long as there in breath (life) in you.

            Luke 23:39-42 tells the story of Jesus’ crucifixion. And there were two other men that day hanging on crosses beside Jesus. One of them, with his very last breath, continued in the path of choices that he had made by hurling insults at Jesus and those standing below him. The other man, however, changed. He was at the end of his rope, the end of his life, literally. He couldn’t make restoration to the people he had wronged. He couldn’t turn over a new leaf. All he could offer was himself. A broken and hurting and dying individual who had likely made a lifetime of bad choices. And so he said, “Jesus, remember me” (Luke 23:42).

            And that was enough. That was one good choice, that was the one BEST choice, and in that moment a lifetime of bad choices was forgiven. That’s grace.

            Regardless of where you find yourself today, as long as there is breath (life) in you, it’s never too late to make good choices.

And it’s never too late to make the best choice of all (Romans 10:9-10).